T61: Some Questions

I'm considering purchasing a T61 in the near future using through a friend's EPP but I have a few questions first:

1) I live in Canada and I'm wondering if there is any other place that might offer a deal cheaper than the EPP?
2) Is Lenovo customer service and support good? Also, people are saying that since Lenovo began producing Thinkpads, the build quality has gone down. It is still very good though right?
3) I'm planning on putting Ubuntu on it. I've heard installing Linux voids the warranty of some notebooks. Is this true for the T61? Should most features work out of the box?
4) How is battery life on the T61? Would it last for 3 hours of normal use (word processing, surfing etc)?

Thanks in advance for your answers! I really like to be sure on my purchases lol

 

I will answer the questions that I can.
2.) I have only had to call Lenovo a couple of times since owning my T60 (I've had it for a little more than a year), but I have always had a great experience. I did not wait on hold very long, the phone was answered by a professional technician based in the USA. English was his first language.
3.) Linux will not void the warranty on your notebook. Almost all of the features work out of the box on my T60.
4.) What size screen and what size battery?

 

Thanks for the reply. The model I was looking at had a 14.1" screen and a 6 cell battery. It had the nVIDIA Quadro NVS 140M 128MB graphics card. Would I get considerably battery life if I went with the X3100 instead?

 

yes, also less heat.. but it depends on your needs.. may be you need a discrete v card.. in this case you should consider a battery with higher capacity.

 

Is the 140M able to play games. Not recent ones or anything but ones maybe a few years old?

 

so far i play need for speed carbon with quite good detail for the graphics.

 

may be this will help
http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVidia-Quadro-NVS-140M.4216.0.html

 

Thanks guys! It should be powerful enough for the games I play. Are there any other opinions on Lenovo's customer service and support? And how much battery life am I going to be looking at with either a 6 cell or 9 cell battery with a 14.1" screen and the Quadro 140M graphics?

 

well since you bring up the point of a 9 cell, that means you have the same model as me, (4:3 14.1) model. I have the 9 and I get around 4 hours and twenty something minutes.

 

So a 6 cell should get approximately 3 hours of battery?

 

3- 3.5 hours optimum for a 6 cell.