T440s Owner´s Thread

Hi I am thinking about purchasing this laptop but I am concerned about the screen issues. I don't really want to gamble with the non-touch FHD option and upgrading to the FHD touch screen would make it out of my price range. Is the HD+ (1600 x 900) screen option plagued by similar issues as well? I understand that the HD+ display is not an IPS display but I would be fine with choosing a lower res and knowing that I will not have any of the light bleeding or spotlight issues that comes with the LG non-touch FHD. I would wait until the next iteration of the laptop came out but I need a laptop by the end of the summer. (school)

Thanks.

 

The HD+ display is far worse than either FHD option (LG or AUO), so I wouldn't suggest going for it to avoid the screen lottery. If you're truly concerned about the LG v. AUO lottery, I would closely monitor Lenovo's prices and buy when the touch option falls within your budget (you can also check out the Lenovo Barnes and Noble Gold site).

 

I was working on my wife's T440s yesterday. Moving music around in MediaMonkey. I was having issues with WiFi (Intel 7260AC) about 10 feet direct line of sight from the access point (Asus RT-AC66U with new FW installed yesterday, 3.0.0.4.374_5517). WiFi would drop randomly. She has the same driver version that I have (17.0.2.5, I also have the T440s with the Intel 7260AC) and I don't have these issues. I moved her to the wired ethernet. I let the laptop sit and left the room. I came back, and the laptop was in standby. I had power plugged in, ethernet plugged in and the mouse. I think the laptop over heated. I boot it up, and MediaMonkey continues it's move. I lift the laptop up to feel if the fan is moving, and it's not. As I move the laptop, the ethernet drops out. Great.

Today, I'm doing more work with her laptop, and the fan still isn't running. Has anyone else experienced this? Is there an app I can install that will tell me the correct fan speed? I know that Lenovo has a Power Management application you can install, however, it will not install on Windows 8.1 x64 Pro. We have a 3 year onsite warranty. I'm hoping I don't have to call it in. If I do, I wonder if they'd let me pay the upgrade to the i7-4600U from the i5-4300U. I can see the speed difference between our machines.

 

Was the machine hot to the touch when you came back and found it in standby? My T440s' fan is off at idle/low loads. Thinkpad Fan Control is usually a good tool to use to check fan speeds.

 

Same here. CPU temps are right around 50 for general web use, and peaked at 63C when I had lots of things open simultaneously, torturing it (including a VM that was updating itself). Outside feels warm at most. Seems like it sometimes takes a fair bit of load to trigger the fan - I can do a fair bit of web browsing with temps remaining 50 or so and the fan staying off.

 

The bottom was quite warm. There's no other reason for the machine to have gone into standby.

 

Does anyone know how long it takes for the Parts Lookup database to updated once the machine has shipped and I was sent the serial number? Currently, I get the "Error : Could not retrieve parts information for 20AQ xxxx". Looks like machine left China on Saturday morning.

 

Anyone know how to improve the battery life on Windows on the T440s? I get around 2 hours less on Windows than I do on Ubuntu 14.04. I need to dual boot Windows for certain applications but I only get 5-5.5 hours of battery life in Windows when I get 7+ in Ubuntu doing the same tasks.

Any tips for increasing battery life on Windows?

 

I'm cloning my original drive (500gb + 16 gb cache) to a 500gb SSD. Do i need to turn off a setting to make sure caching doesn't work with the new SSD? I wanted to wipe the 16gb and use it for storage.
thanks

 

I have about the same battery life in Win.
How did you setup your dual boot? Got a single ssd or are you using the extra m2?
Mine didn't come with any m2 slot, I was thinking of splitting my ssd.

 

I have a single SSD

 

Sometimes my thinkpad will not charge. When I plug in the power the power button indicator just blinks 3 times and then a long one. Doesn't matter if I switch outlets or anything. It knows its being plugged in but it wont charge. I have to restart the computer to get it to begin charging properly.

Not a huge deal except one time I let the computer completely drain of battery. It wouldnt turn back on for over 24 hours. This persists even if I remove the external battery and then plug it back in.

Edit//

This has only happened twice. Once when it wouldn't turn back on and then last friday it wouldn't charge. It had 85% charge and was dropping. I can't remember which battery it was though. One was charged and the other was single digit %.

 

I'm getting around 10 hours in Windows on a 6-cell, so proportionate to your ~5 hours on a 3-cell.

I didn't see any BIOS settings for disabling cache, though there is a tool you install on Windows for it. I suppose you just need to uninstall that tool then. Personally, I put in an SSD, did a clean Windows install (without the cache program), and formatted the M2 drive.

 

yes i did almost the same, cloned the stock drive to the new main SSD, and just left the cache SSD in there.. looks like it runs fine.
Now i will format the cache SSD.

 

I get 5-6 hours in Windows and in Ubuntu (with TLP installed). What did you do to get 7+ hours in Ubuntu?

 

I forgot to mention, I'm talking 10 hours on a 6-cell and Windows 7 WITH a touchscreen. What about you guys? I tried turning off the touchscreen in Device Manager, and will see what battery life results I get out of that. Note: seems like it can be disabled in Windows by going into device manager, HID, and disabling the sole USB input device that appears (assuming you don't have any external mice or keyboards connected to further populate that list). At least, that's what I see. Not sure if it's actually cutting power to the touchscreen, though it does stop it from working.

 

I had about 20% battery left when I turned it off yesterday and now I have 5%? Doesn't make sense...

 

Does anybody else find their T440s to be really laggy?

I got a Lenovo T440s a few weeks ago (i5-4200U, 4gb ram, built-in intel gfx, 220gb ssd, win8.1). It often feels like it's running very low on RAM or something, even though the task manager shows the usage to be <50%. At times just switching between browser tabs or opening new windows can take several seconds. If I have a twitch stream going, it'll take 4-5 seconds to maximize, and then it may or may not run choppily as well. Things running in the background can make things slow down as well.

I barely have anything installed, and I got rid of some of the fluff that came pre-installed. Is this just how the laptop is?

 

No, mine isn't like that. What's your RAM use like? My t440s with a 4300U (marginally faster), 12GB RAM, intel gfx, a 500GB SSD, and clean win7 install isn't slow at all. I've fired up multiple VMs, opened several browser tabs at once, etc without issue. 4GB ought to be OK without VMs - bloated OS install perhaps? Anything about SATA controller issues in Event Viewer?

 

I haven't encountered any lag at all on my T440s, really. Even when I was running just 4GB of RAM while my defective 8GB stick was RMAed, I had no issues.

Run a CrystalDiskMark on your SSD to make sure all the parameters are comparable to what they should be. When you encountered the lag, have you tried restarting the system? Would it resolve the lag temporarily?

 

Can someone please test this for me? I'm trying to determine if this is a bug or if its just isolated to my machine.

Recreation:
Plug computer into AC power
Put computer to sleep
unplug power
Wake computer from sleep
after waking, plug in AC power and see if computer starts charging OR if it doesnt charge and the LED blinks 4 times repeating.

 

After plugging in the AC power it blinked 4 times and started charging.

 

dang. Mine never continues to charge. I have to put it back to sleep, plug the power back in, and then wake it up. Even a restart wont fix it (but a shutdown will).

 

Mine seems to charge fine as well. Do you have the latest BIOS version?

 

Hmm CrystalDiskMark numbers seem comparable to what I see in reviews, except fore the 4K QD32 numbers (157.7 read, 122.2 write), which seem to be about 40% of what they should be. Is this fixable?

 

I have a question about the Fn keys. At the moment, the special functions on the Fn keys take precedence. So to mute, I hit F1, and to get F1 I hit Fn+F1.
I know I can reverse this behaviour by turning on Fn Lock, but I find the Fn Lock indicator light irritating.

Is it possible to reverse the Fn key behaviour without using Fn Lock?

 

I'm planning on buying the T440s with FHD but my concern is that it'll come with the inferior LG panel that a lot of people are complaining about. What I noticed is that the FRU list of the T440s, in terms of FHD, doesn't have the LG panel (04X0626) anymore, and all I could see is just the AUO panel (04X0436).

With all that in mind, does that mean Lenovo has stopped using the LG panels anymore for the T440s? Anyone who bought a T440s with FHD recently please let me know, thanks for your help!

Link to T440s FRU list

 

I’ve bought mine recently and got it with a mediocre LG display. At the time I bought it (via Lenovo.com) the FRU list only listed the AUO FHD display. I frankly find it unashamedly dishonest from Lenovo to deliver a significantly lower quality than announced.

 

Notebookcheck (German) just tested the T440s with nVidia GPU and LG IPS display: Test-Update Lenovo ThinkPad T440s 20AQ006BGE Ultrabook - Notebookcheck.com Tests

 

I just bought one with FHD touch, and it came with the nice AUO display. (Has anyone with touch gotten an LG display?)

 

My T440s is not going to sleep when I close the lid.
In Windows power options I do have it set to sleep when I close the lid.

Has anyone else had this issue? How did you resolve it?

 

All right, so my month-old T440s is giving me a lot of problems. It bogs down really badly when I open just a few browser tabs, or any flash video. Also the wireless keeps losing packets and freezing for 20-40 seconds at a time. I did a clean factory format/re-install, and it's still like this. Does anybody have experience with Lenovo returns? Is the process a big pain or fairly straightforward?

 

Hey guys, this is a great forum, and looking forward to being part of it. Just ordered my T440s in Canada with the following specs:

Processor - 4th Gen Intel Core i5-4300U Processor (3MB Cache, up to 2.90GHz)
Display - 14.0" FHD IPS With WWAN
Graphics - Intel HD Graphics 4400 with docking connector
Memory - 8G 4G Base + 4G (1 SoDIMM)
Hard drive - 256GB Solid State Drive Serial ATA3
Front Battery - ThinkPad Battery 3 cell Li-Polymer (23.2Whr) Front
Rear Battery - ThinkPad Battery 3 cell Li-Polymer (23.2Whr) Rear
Wireless - Intel Dual Band Wireless 7260AC with Bluetooth 4.0

Looking forward to it, coming from a Dell XPS M1530, and no Thinkpad experience. Hopefully the trackpad/pointer issues wont affect me since I have no frame of reference! A couple of questions

1. Have they fixed the issues with the LG screens? Anyone got this in Canada in the last month or so and can comment?
2. How do I even tell who the screen manufacturer is, is it in the general System information or is some other way required
3. I bought the 3 year depot warranty. Anyone from Vancouver have any experience with return/repairs around here? How much of a pain is it?

 

To answer questions 1 and 2, I'm from Canada and I received my T440s 2 weeks ago. It came with the LG screen. I used HWiNFO to find the screen manufacturer.

 

I had only had mine for a little bit so I dont know if the experience will be different, but, they sent me a laptop and a box with a label to ship mine back. I waited until I was satisfied with the new one first.

 

Or ask them to email you the shipping label when setting up the return. You could use the box that came with it if you still have it.

 

I can test some games if anyone is interested in how Nvidia 730m performs in t440s. Also, maybe sb could link the color profile for AUO screen? I remember it was around here somewhere but cant find it. Colours are really yellowish. Thanks.

 

Here you go: http://www.notebookcheck.com/uploads/tx_nbc2/B140HAN01_2.icm

 

Can you test cs go on low settings 1080 p, and league on max settings but shadows, v sync, and anti aliasing off 1080p?

 

I will try lol, but I don't have CSGO account. Maybe there is some kind of trial or invitation?

By the way, how much battery does sleep use for you all? Mine is probably 10-15% overnight which is too much I think.

 

Summoner's rift:
1080p on highest
No shadows: 65 - 75
With shadows highest, no aa: around 50
With shadows highest and aa 38-45

 

It is better to put it into hibernate but that affects your SSD.

 

Wow thats pre good. Where did you buy the t440s with the 730m?

 

kuzniewski.pl - notebooki, laptopy, ultrabooki
Guys don't speak english on the phone so had some troubles arranging everything via mail and had to wait long. Foreign shipping is also quite expensive but the prices are low. Also got the AUO screen.

 

It seems not everybody is complaining about the AC wireless card. Is it possible that some ac cards are working well, even in windows 8.1? Has anyone an AC card working well in 8.1?

 

Windows 8.1 Pro, Intel AC 7260 no problems so far.

 

Hey, I bought a t440s with a geforce 730m and have a question.

The fan makes a high frequency whine, the whine goes away when the fan turns off. I have searched online and have found mentions of the cpu making a noise but I don't think that's it, since it goes away with the fan.

I am trying to decide if it's something to return it over, or if all t440s' sound like this. The whine isn't very loud but it is an annoying frequency.

Has anyone noticed anything similar on their t440s? Thanks.

 

My 7260AC card is working very well with no problems with speed or connectivity, running Windows 8.1

The fan on my T440s is silent, only barely louder than the whisper-quiet one on my T500. There's no whine at all that I can hear.

 

Try taking the fan out and spraying a little wd-40 in the grooves and let it seep in. I did that for a graphic card and it worked well.

 

Have had no issues with my AC card in Win 8 pro or Win 8.1 pro