T440s up on Lenovo website (IPS Screen, 1080p)

I would love to see more answers to this question. I've been following this thread for the past few months and I'm currently going back and forth between the yet-to-be-announced retina Macbook Pro with Haswell and the T440s.

When I started my search, I was hoping to see a refresh of the Samsung Series 9 15" but it doesn't look like it's coming.


I would love some advice on swapping in a SSD to the T440s. I'm a relative newbie to computer hardware so I'm not totally sure what the process would be. 256GB just isn't enough space (Apple is likely to offer 1TB on the new rMBP, why is Lenovo offering 256GB as the max for SSD?). I'd like to buy a 512GB SSD and replace whatever I decide to purchase for the T440s. What's the best way to do that? I know I need to clone the drive, etc. and I'm sure I can follow instructions, but it would be awesome if someone laid out the steps and which base T440s model I should buy if I'm planning on replacing the hard drive anyway.

Thanks in advance for any advice--I've enjoyed the endless speculation.

 

I'd recommend a Samsung 840 Pro SSD, or perhaps one of the new Samsung EVO drives in 512GB or 1TB. Retail versions of the Samsung drives come with cloning software and a USB interface so you can just plug the new drive into your notebook via the USB interface, clone, then swap the drives. Easy and fast.

 

Thanks! And I need the 2.5" form factor for the T440s? Sorry I'm sure this is obvious, just never really opened up my laptop before.

 

I'm looking forward to the T440s.

Like Nicolaim, I'd be interested in the HP ZBook 14.

Before it was release, I really thought the Clevo W740SU was going to be the perfect workstation.

Spoiler

• 
  Review: Review Schenker S413 (Clevo W740SU) Notebook - NotebookCheck.net Reviews
• Intel Core i7-4750HQ
• HDD+mSata
• 2x DDR3-1600 Slots
• Intel Iris Pro Graphics 5200
• 3 USB 3.0, 1 HDMI, 1 DisplayPort, 1 Audio In, 1 Audio Out, SD Card Reader
• 1.9 kg
• ~6 hour battery life (53 Wh)

Sadly, other than the guts, the build quality is terrible.
The case is cheap, the screen flimsy and the keyboard has the tactical feedback of a wet napkin. As person who swears by his Cherry Browns, I need a good keyboard.


I've also been looking at the Gigabyte P34G

Spoiler

• i7-4700HQ
• HDD+mSata
• 2x DDR3-1600 Slots
• GTX 760M 2GB
• 2 USB 3.0, 2 USB 2.0, 1 HDMI, 1 VGA, Audio in/out, SD Card Reader, Audio In/Out Combo
• 1.7Kg
• Battery Life ??? (47.73 Wh)

The P34G is unreleased, so it's kind of up in the air as to how well it'll handle a 760M in such a thin form factor or what battery life will be like. (My guess is 2 to 4 hours.. Seriously) I also worry about the keyboard's quality, which I can't imagine being great.


Those are my two T440s replacements. Neither are Workstations or ULV Processors, but its slim picking seeing as manufacturers are still refreshing their lines.

 

Yea, to me, building a laptop is harder than just putting all the specs together like on a desktop. Maybe check out the HP and Dell business laptops?

 

What's the release date for new machines preloaded? Is it the same as the OS itself?

S

 

This is my current list:

Acer Aspire V7-482PG-6662
Lenovo T440s
Lenovo u430
Dell Latitude 14 7000 (E7440)
HP ZBook 14

If the u430 comes out and actually matches its datasheet it'll be the perfect laptop for me. But I'm not getting my hopes up. I'm worried that the Dell and the HP are going to be badly overpriced. The Acer's kind of a last resort. I do like it, but with just an i7-4500U I feel like $1300 is too much, and I'd like a little more speed than that.

 

Anyone heard about this?

ThinkPad 9 Slim, 990 grams, 3200 x 1800 resolution, 10mm thick.

The Verge

 

I think so. October 17...

 

There's a thread about it on the first page.

 

If you wait a bit you'll have another option: a 42mm M.2 (aka NGFF) SSD + 2.5" HD (up to 1 TB.) Problem is those SSDs aren't available yet, it's not clear when drives larger than 64 GB will be out, and it's unknown whether double-sided drives will fit. There's a rumour Lenovo will offer a 128 GB SSD for that slot.
In my opinion this combination is the best because you get a fast OS drive and plenty of cheap storage.

 

Great - thanks.

S

 

I bought a rMBP around this time last year, then installed BootCamp and Win8. It ran just fine, but I sold it two months ago.

The reason was it's weight and heat. I often use the laptop with it sitting on my lap: simply browsing the web for an hour on an MBP will cause you to sweat, and I'm saying that from experience. [And being used to British keyboards, and being a Windows user, the Mac keyboard was driving me mad.]

If you really do need that much power in a laptop then it's a well-built machine (still over-priced, I reckon) but I sold mine with the deliberate intention of buying something lighter and, yes, less powerful. I realised that I just don't need the industrial-strength grunting power that comes with an MBP or rMBP, which is why I've been keenly following this thread.

My point is this: the T440s and a rMBP are two very different laptops.

 

Hopefully receiving my P34G from Xotic a week from today. Preliminary reviews say the keyboard has some flex on the "G" and "H" keys, but other than that fine; substantially better than the Clevo W740SU. Will check back in here when I have it in hand and will let you know.

 

I wish Lenovo would offer a bigger M.2 slot on the T440p. Options for the 42mm are probably always gonna be limited by the laws of physics and any official Lenovo M.2 SSD option will be the usual rip off.

Does anyone know if a T440s bought without the M.2 cache drive option still has the M.2 slot available on the MoBo? After reading tales of the slot missing from Y-series machines that were not optioned with the cache drive I'm a little worried this is Lenovo's way of making us pay its inflated prices.

 

Excellent and very important question!

ibmthink, are you willing to open yours up again to look for the M.2 slot under the black plastic stuff?

Since it's the WWAN slot, I think it will be there, BUT that leads to another potential problem: The BIOS may have a drive whitelist, preventing after-market drives from working...

 

It is not plastic, the backcover is made out of Magnesium.

Yes. My model is WWAN ready (as most of the models) and because of that, it has the second M.2 slot.

There is no whitelist in BIOS for any HDD or SSD. Only for WLAN and WWAN cards.

 

Very much so, around this time last year I spent a couple months trying to find a nice laptop for myself, but gave up and built a Desktop, deciding I'd wait till Haswell and get a new laptop then.
Laptops are a bit of a nightmare when it comes to getting the perfect fit. There's always something wrong, or the price is astronomical.

I'm about one step away from giving up on a workstation and just going with an Ultraportable with a iGPU. I've been interested in the Yoga 2 Pro for awhile now, but chances are its HD 4400 is hindered by the MoBo having a single SO-DIMM slot.
An early 3DMark 11 score for the Yoga 2 Pro came back with 689, or the about same as a HD 4000. - I've also considered the ThinkPad Yoga, but it'll probably have the same RAM problem and has less battery life and is a bit heavier. (Digitizer pen is nice though)

Nevermore0 mentioned the Lenovo IdeaPad u430, which is pretty interesting. Looks like a non-business oriented T440s. Same internals, but less ports. The weight is a bit heavier, but it does come with a touchscreen, so it's about right.
And as a one person small business, the u430 may be a little more in my budget.

I've checked out the Latitude 7000 series, but haven't seen the 1920x1080 version listed yet.
The HP ZBook 14 I'd like to see more details on.

Wow, the Lenovo u430 looks like a pretty decent buy.
And I've heard some mixed reviews concerning the Aspire V7 line. I was reading the Samsung ATIV Book 9 Plus thread trying to get an idea of what a QHD+ screen was like with Windows 8.1 and some of the people over there were Aspire V7 converts.

Nice!
I just found Clintre's post where he talks bout the keyboard. The only concern I have is battery life, his post says about ~3hours or about 4h 40m under volted. Which makes sense because it's a i7-HQ processor, which when under volted is about the same as the Clevo.

I'll be watching P34G thread, I hope it's everything you want it to be!

 

The U430's spec sheet looks very different than the T440s:
http://shop.lenovo.com/ae/en/common/pdf/U430 Touch Data Sheet.pdf

Much faster processor options, and a GT 730M which is said to not be available on the T440s in the US. Less max RAM, and fewer ports like you said. Plus I don't think they use the same keyboard. Supposedly they're actually going to have this on Lenovo.com at some point, and not just the Best Buy version.

 

Well, the T440s will be available with the Core i7-4600U, which will be much more powerful than the non-VPro Core i7-4500U used in the U430.

 

Thanks for the reply, even if it is a bit rude and inaccurate. The USB 3.0 dock has two DVI ports. Is there a normal dock option for the T430s? I thought the USB 3.0 dock was the only option. How else could one run two monitors off the T430s if not via that USB 3.0 dock?

 

You would use the series 3 dock which is not a USB 3.0 dock. The USB 3.0 dock may have two DVI port but it is horrible and leggy. It is hard to use it with one monitor. You can find the series 3 dock on Lenovo website. The one you are looking for cost $269.99.

 

Lenovo's US site now has a "notify me" button to sign up to be notified when it's selling:

ThinkPad T440s Ultrabook Laptop | Lenovo | Lenovo (US)

 

This brought a smile to my face. But I figured someone on the forum will tell me before Lenovo lol.

Has anyone ever done this/has this ever been an option for other models?

I am already signed up with B&N so I get emails regularly but those emails go to accounts I have to manually sign into and not the ones on my phone. I would love to wake up and get this in my main Inbox but then I would probably
miss class ordering it. lol

Also, when I went to the Lenovo site on my own, the T440s was not up? How did you get that link?

 

It all worked to plan... I asked for alternatives... so the Lenovo double agents who lurk this thread could take the news of unrest back to their HQ. They saw the HP Z Book gaining traction... along with mention of a Acer Aspire V7-482PG-6662, and a Latitude 14 7000 (E7440) and decided action was needed... immediately to placate the masses, and dampen the competition.

J/K but... it'd be nice to think so.


Sent from my SCH-I605 using Tapatalk 2

 

The T440s is obviously not officially listed yet, but the preview link has been up for a while. I think I signed up for the "notify me" thing about a week ago. It's really quite pointless, since it'll be announced here very quickly.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHrqAcouXMc

Hey at the 21-23 second marks of this video (just a T440s picture video) it says in Hong Kong, the T440s comes with 500Gb hard drive AND a 24 GB mSata drive.
What would one do with two drives? 24Gb is too small for an OS right? So what is the combo? And does that mean I can use an msata Drive in the laptop? Not too familiar with mSata drives of this size? Also, none of these questions matter if that combo is not offered on the U.S version.

 

The 24GB SSD is a cache drive. OS is loaded on the HDD.

 

Can the msata be upgraded to be a boot drive?

 

I *presume* that the answer to this question is "yes", but I have zero personal experience with these machines so take this post with a grain of salt.

 

Thank you.

 

Is there really no 730m option in the US?

 

Most likely yes, but no drives are available for purchase yet. Since they're the smallest size (42mm) of the M.2 standard they will always be more limited in capacity and performance compared to larger drives.

I think Lenovo missed the boat by not marketing the T440s as a dual-drive system (and not making space for a 60 or 80mm drive...)

 

All the T-series machines (including the new T440s) have multiple dock options (at least three), most of which use the dock connector on the bottom of the machine. I believe the T430s has four options -- the USB dock plus three mechanical docks (port replicator, mini dock and mini dock plus) all of which offer USB3.0. The T430s can also use the previous generation docks, but those only offer USB2.0 speeds.

 

My T430 dock has a USB 3.0 port

 

So I bought a new battery for my Edge 14" off Amazon two weeks ago to hold me over in class until the T440s comes out. But now my "K" button decides to get faulty and requires a hard press each time. So random. Perfect timing as essays become due. I can't win. lol. And I have to wait at least a month for ordering.

 

Um, intuiting it from other T series links? Not that hard, actually.

 

ugh, I found it by searching on the website. What did you mean by intuiting?

 

Is the "new style" keyboard on the T440s the same as on the edge E530 or X230? My housemates have those laptops and the keyboards are frankly amazing compared to my laptop (which I also feel is better than just about any non Thinkpad laptop that I've tried). If so I really can't wait to get my T440s, that keyboard is just too good. I'm guessing it'll have a little less travel due to the thinner chassis which I think is fine.

 

Yes. and it's even better (from my perspective).
The dedicated volume buttons are integreated into the Fn-keys
The Fn keys are now grouped in 4s
The Fn keys have the multimedia fuctions primary (like the E530), this can be changed if you want
There are now LED lights for Fn-lock, Mute, and Mic-on/off
The red (on the E530) and blue (on the X230) colours are now gray... (I'm actually a little disappointed, red looked awesome)
Finally, that ugly green LED at the power button is gone.

 

Maybe I have found a fitting 42mm M.2 SSD: Intel® SSD Pro 1500 Series The Intel Series 1500 SSD will be available with 120 GB in the 42mm form-factor. However, it is double-sided, so somebody would have to check if the T440s accepts double-sided M.2 SSDs.

It is not on the market yet, so no price at this point.

 

Replace the keyboard?

 

That's costs about $60-$70 the "K" key issue is not a big deal. As long as I don't type in front of my classmates. And I don't think my laptop can handle any unscrewing to put it in a new laptop. Bought a new keyboard (after a spill) last year and it took some work. And some screws are missing. The left side is elevated. My computer looks rough. The battery was the biggest issue. Buying a new battery is an investment. Keyboard is more of convenience. Let's pray that nothing drastic suddenly occurs for the next 4-6 (or 7?) weeks until the T440s hopefully arrives at my door step. I literally have no backup laptop in case my Edge does not last me until November.

 

IIRC it does not accept double-sided SSDs. However, there supposedly will be a 128gb M.2 option, although I'm skeptical of whether it's for the M.2 or simply a replacement for the HDD.

 

You could remap another key to K, which would be confusing for a while, but will work. I recommended the keyboard because it'll help the resale value, but it sounds like the computer is looking quite sad...

 

I have searched a bit and found out that the T431s does accept double-sided M.2 SSDs, so I assume the T440s has the same ability.

 

Thanks for the advice. The key still works it justs needs hard pressing. Considering this did not occur because of any physical damage to they keyboard I figure it will correct itself (and at the time of this message it may already have). I could have sworn that happened with another key last year.

Resale value? That's a joke. This is my second laptop. I would never resell my laptops (still don't know what to do with my old T43 ), and it would be unethical to sell this Thinkpad Edge. I had a juice spill last year which forced me to get a new keyboard ($73). Also as a result of that spill the right clicks don't work on both trackpoint and trackpad so one needs a mouse to be efficient. Also I bought the laptop refurbished, and it has served me well for my needs at the time. It will also be my backup here at school, if anything were to need fixing on the T440s. So... I will survive.

 

Do a SATA-mod on it, throw in a SSD and watch the oldie fly.

 

Being new to ultrabooks, I'm puzzled by the lack of concern about the soldered DIMMs in the T440s and many of the other new products out there. Are memory failures too rare for this to be a worry for most people?

 

No, first my T43 does not start and the screen hinge is broken. It could stay open, just could not move it. I mean I have yet to delete/recycle the hrd drive, and other parts. I would have bought and SSD for my Edge if it had the ability to to be used without a mouse and no juice spill.