Thinkpad T420s Owners' Thread

To install Windows 7:

Download wireless or ethernet driver to flash drive.
Download System Update to flash drive.
Install Win7 (format drive using custom install)
Install wireless or ethernet driver from flash drive.
Install System Update from flash drive.
Run System Update from control panel and install drivers you want.

Done.

 

Is the screen bright enough to be easily usable (no eye strain) outside on a sunny day?
(in shade / in sun)

 

I finally found some time to make a guide. Have a look here

 

cool thanks. I'll look into it

 

Only getting 2-3 hours on battery 0_0! Hmm...wondering if I should trade this for my university's T420...but that only has the integrated graphics and is heavier uggh.

 

What are you doing to conserve power?

 

No, sorry I don't have this yet (3 days!) I just saw the post where someone said they were getting 2:37 on 83% charge. In all seriousness will the battery be enough for multiple lecture classes if I don't have an outlet?

 

I don't do much other than reducing screen brightness, turning off bluetooth, and setting HD spin-down to 3 minutes. I use the power profiles for balanced performance on battery, which allows for lower cpu, gpu, and pci-e bus power utilization, but not the most aggressive settings because that tends to give adverse performance like reduced wireless range and speed, and sluggish computer response.

Aggressive power conservation efforts will of course help, but that totally depends on what you're using the computer for as well. For my usage patterns I get 2-3 hours on battery, and more aggressive measures to save power result in usability issues for me.

I suppose as I use the computer more I'll figure out some more tricks on how to get more life out of the battery. But I haven't been using it on battery enough to get a feel for how far I can dial things back and still be happy. For example, turning off the nvidia gpu in bios instead of letting win7 and optimus drivers handle it might drop power consumption by quite a bit. But I haven't tried it yet. And T420s computers without the nvidia gpu won't even have that issue at all.

For what it's worth, the nvidia gpu isn't fast enough to justify the extra cost or power usage for anyone that isn't running an application that specifically needs an nvidia gpu. The informal benchmarks I've run myself (just running a couple of games and seeing what settings are playable) show that the on-cpu graphics are almost as fast as the nvidia gpu. So if you don't specifically need an nvidia gpu (and aren't using cuda gpu apps), save the money and skip it.

Except that the last time I checked, Lenovo was selling the i7 powered T420s only when combined with the nvidia gpu. That is yet another sales/marketing fail on Lenovo's part IMHO, but it's their company and they're free to wreck it if they like.

I am also using the intel 310 mSATA drive, which may or may not save me power depending on if the computer keeps waking up my data drive because that is where the windows page file is stored. Moving the page file back to the SSD might save power if it keeps my data drive spun down, but it could also reduce performance of the SSD or even make it die an early death. So for now I'm keeping the page file on the spinning data drive and accepting the power drain.

 

If you put in the bay-bus battery instead of the optical drive and use the power savings features, I'd bet that the T420s would be fine for multiple classes per charge. Put it to sleep or even use full hibernation between classes so you don't have to waste power booting up and shutting down.

Depending on if you care about games or not and if you really want/need the i7 cpu instead of the i5, you could save a bunch of money and get a little better battery life by going with the i5 powered version that does not have the nvidia gpu. The money saved vs. the i7 powered nvidia gpu version would be more than enough to buy one or more bay-bus batteries. If you really need an optical drive, you could use an external optical drive and unplug it when it's not in use, so you get the benefit of the second battery plus only using power on the optical drive when it's actually plugged in. But during class, you probably don't need the optical drive right?

You say it's only 3 days away, so you obviously already bought it. If you didn't get it with the extra battery, you might as well try it out and see if it is useable as-is. If all you need is an extra hour or two of battery life, then the second battery would probably work really well for you.

 

I noticed that sometimes when I use the trackpoint, it would move by itself when I take my hand off. This also happened on my x120e. Is this normal? It seems like the trackpoint is resetting itself to the middle after I use it, moving the pointer with it.

 

With bay battery is it possible to get >6hours of taking notes with wireless turned on ?

 

This is common if you have the habit of lightly resting your finger on the trackpoint even when not moving it. The trackpoint software automatically calibrates itself all the time so a constant gentle pressure will be zeroed out over time, and then when you take your finger off the trackpoint it releases that pressure and the mouse zings off on its own until it zeros out again.

So this is normal, and the cure is to remember to lift your finger off of the trackpoint when you're not actually trying to move the mouse around, so it won't zero out the light pressure you are putting on it when your finger rests on the pointer.

If trying to adjust your habits doesn't help, there may be a way to adjust the sensitivity or increase the center deadband (the amount of pressure required before it moves the mouse) but I don't know for sure.

 

I don't know for sure, sorry. I suspect that it will, but I don't know for sure because I don't have a bay battery. You will probably have to look for other online reviews to see what sort of tests the reviewers use, and take a guess on what your battery life will be like from their test results.

Your laptop specs will also make a difference. What cpu and other options did you choose? SSD or regular hard drive? Optimus graphics or just intel graphics?

Maybe someone else has more experience on getting the most out of their battery, or maybe earlier in the thread there might be someone who wrote more about battery life.

 

With the ultrabay battery, power set to power source optimized and display set to 5 I get a full workday (8 hours) from mine. That's using wireless and internet, no videos or flash.

 

Thanks for all responses, 8 hours with bay battery looks quite nice. I have one more question, during office work and light browsing is cooling system activity annoying with new BIOSes ?

 

Not sure what is the latest bios but I have not noticed any unusual fan activity during use, except when an occasional website or win7 makes the GPU work more than expected. In those situations sometimes the fan will kick up a bit, but it still isn't annoying to me.

Turning off some of the windows aero eye candy can be a good way to help out with battery life as well as reduce system temperatures, since it will keep the gpu usage down.

 

Anyone having trouble with the touchpad on the T420s? Specifically, when it comes to page scrolling. Whenever i try to use the touchpad to scroll, more than half the time it recognizes it as moving the cursor, and not scrolling the page. I have the touchpad sensitivity set on the highest but no luck. Any suggestions?

 

I'm thinking about getting a case/bag for my T420s and I was wondering which cases/sleeves/bag would fit them snugly. I would prefer a handle or a shoulder strap so I can have it separate from my backpack for school/travel.

 

BIOS 1.25 released on Lenovo website:
Lenovo Support - Download Drivers and Software (US)

[New functions or enhancements]
- Added support for the Password Beep function.
- Increased the number of configurable boot devices by BootOrder option of
Windows WMI script.

[Problem fixes]
- Fixed an issue where the BitLocker function could not be enabled on Windows
64-bit.
- Fixed an issue where PXE boot might fail.
- Fixed an issue where the fingerprint authentication associated with some
password strings might fail.
- Fixed an issue where the Intel TXT feature might not be enabled when the
Security Chip was activated and the Intel TXT feature was enabled at the same
time by ThinkPad BIOS Settings Windows program.
- Fixed an issue where the Bluetooth wireless status indicator might be changed
after running Windows WMI script.

 

An important question about the T420s battery, as I am ready to pull the trigger:

A usual scenario for me is to take a lot of 3 or 4 hour flights.

Will I be able to watch a movie in-flight, based on the battery?
I am talking about a standard 480p divx movie, not a 1080 thing (so cpu consumption should not be high on a i5)
Also, on a T420s with embedded gpu, not the extrenal one (again for lower consumption).

Will it last 2 or 3 hours while watching a movie like that?
What about if I also use a bay batter? (I probably will use one in this scenario).

If I cannot do that, I am going straight for the T420..

 

You should have no problem watching a 2-3 hour divx movie with the a T420s and an additional bay battery. I commonly watch streaming HD resolution videos on mine and get a bit over an hour on the bay battery alone (the T420s drains the bay battery before draining the main one), with wifi off you should get even better run times.

Ike

 

@Isaac-1 Thank you, just ordered it

 

hey John, did you ever figure out how to fix the random hibernations?

 

Picked up my T420s today. Will write a short review in the coming days.

 

Assuming that's me, I can't remember this happening so the problem must have gone away.

John

 

Hmm... Does your battery charge reach 100% for you guys?
I just received the laptop, put it to charge, and after enough time it just stays at 99% - it doesn't go to 100% or say 'charged' or anything.

Just '99% remaining', 'plugged in', 'not charging'.

Is this normal?

edit: never mind, I may have restarted it (win updates..) while it was above 95% so it doesn't charge now. I'll leave if unplugged to go below the limit.

edit2: And another question.. I just found out I accidentally ordered and got the 90W charger instead of the 65W i wanted. If anyone in the uk want's to trade, drop me a pm.

 

Or just buy another one. I find it is useful to have a spare - one on the desk and one in the bag.

John

 

oh is that genuine or just compatible? I'm afraid of battery wear or similar problems with a 'compatible' charger - it's a brand new laptop :>

that's interesting, i thought it would be above 50 pounds like on the lenovo site. If its 15 i'll probably buy one thanks

 

If an ebay advertiser claims "genuine" then it should be that and not the compatible PSUs (which are less than £10). However, it's even cheaper here. I can vouch for that one being genuine - I bought one (but it was only £13.99 back in May).

John

 

My T420s can be set to have a screen refresh rate at 50hz (default) or 60hz. Which setting is preffered? Does either have any impact on battery life/ graphics performance? Thanks.

 

Mine has defaulted to 50Hz which, I assume, uses slightly less power. I don't know the advantages of 60Hz: In the old days of CRT monitors then this refresh rate could give noticeable flicker. It is also possible that screen refresh can interact with lights running at mains frequency (50Hz where I am).

You can try 60Hz to see if there is any difference but somewhere in this forum there's a thread about the blank screen that occurs for about a second when the graphics switch from 60Hz on mains power to 50Hz on battery. I've just tried the 60Hz and can't see any difference.

John

 

Hi guys, for some reason the search thread options doesn't work for me.

I remember you discussing about the battery bay for the t420s, that an older and cheaper version of the battery bay fits, and there was an ebay link, can someone post it again please, how much more capacity there is in the new battery bay.

regarding the battery, I remember people talking about different brands, that some are better than others, like there is panasonic, and I received Sanyo, how is this sanyo battery battery?

I'd like to ask another thing, I need a hdd caddy also for the t420s, does anyone bought one from an ebay seller and knows it fits.

I received the bad Samsung panel, is there some calibration that can be done to make the screen show a little better?

sorry for all the questions, the search doesn't work.

 

The refresh rate issue has been fixed!

I had the same problem that many of you have described, where the refresh rate jumps from 60Hz to 50Hz after unplugging the AC.

Apparently Intel has said that they won't release an update to fix this problem so instead we will have to use the fix that Lenovo posted HERE. I can confirm that this fixes the refresh rate drop.

 

If you want to find a word, for example - "bay battery", in this thread, try to use Google with this string:
site: http://forum.notebookreview.com/lenovo-ibm/574678-thinkpad-t420s-owners-thread.html lbay battery

Ultrabay II battery. This one (UK ebay) works fine for me.

I've not noticed any difference in battery performance which can be correlated with the manufacturer.

This one works fine for me. It says SATA 150 on the label but works fine at SATA 300 (as it should, there's no electronics inside).

I spent a lot of time fiddling with the Windows 7 Calibrate tool and Cleartype tuner but they sometimes made things worse and there's no reset button. Then I went to the colour enhancement tab in the Intel graphics control panel and did a manual tweak on (i) the gamma and (ii) the blue saturation (mine's an LG panel which is a little blue).

Hope this helps,

John

 

Anyone having issues with the speakers on the T420s? The sound is great but the volume seems to be louder on the left speaker than the right. I can't find a setting to adjust the balance (is there one)? Should I get this problem repaired or is it normal? Thanks.

 

hmm, I noticed it as well. I almost came to believe that my hearing was the problem. I downloaded Conexant Audio Software SmartAudio from the lenovo website and I merely adjusted the speakers to be more in favour of the right. fixed it right up

 

Got it. The Conexant program actually came with my T420s aleady installed. It wasn't very easy to find the setting that alters balance. I wonder if the optical drive's placement influences the accoustics. Oh well, problem solved.

Thanks.

 

I didn't realize I'm having troubles with this too. It wasn't happening before, I wonder what caused this to change

I tried following the fix, but I'm having a little trouble with the first part lol. which drivers are they talking about? I downloaded and extracted the ones under Display/monitor - Monitor file for Windows 7, but can't seem to find this "kit32889.inf".

my current fix is to change the rate to 50hz. I also don't find any difference, but its nice to get this sorted out

 

They are talking about the Intel drivers. If you have Optimus you should download that. However, since the drivers for either of those are not very new I bet you have the latest version. So instead of downloading just go to "C:\DRIVERS\WIN\VIDEO\INTEL\Graphics" and look for the .inf file there. Then continue with the steps.

 

I'm guessing there's different directories for the Optimus since I couldn't find "C:\DRIVERS\WIN\VIDEO\INTEL\Graphics". Instead I went to "C:\DRIVERS\WIN\DISPLAY3\Graphics" and found/changed kit33533 instead of Kit32889. Same procedure after that. fixed the problem. thanks

 

I'm considering a T420s but would like to replace the HDD when I get it. Has anyone successfully replaced the 320GB HDD with a Crucial 256GB C300 SSD?

 

See this thread, which also applies to the T420s (ie 7mm high drives). You can almost squeeze a 9.5mm high drive into the slot if you leave off the rubber rails, but it's not something I would recommend.

John

 

I had no problems with the speakers on my T420s until yesterday. The left speaker started to make a crackling noise right before it stopped working. Sometimes it came on by itself and then stopped working again.

This is obviously a hardware issue so I called Lenovo Support right away and the repair guy came by today to replace my speakers. After they were installed properly we tried them out and sure enough both speakers worked.

However, after he had left and I started to listen to some music for a few minutes I noticied the famous L/R volume imbalance...

I can with 99% certainty say that this is due to poor manufacturing of the speakers rather than anything else because of the following.

-I was looking as the repair man switched out the speakers.
-I didn't have this issue before the speakers where replaced.
-The speakers come in one package, the cables are taped together on some places and are of different length. This means that only the left speaker only goes into the left socket and there is little to no possibility of installing the speakers wrong.
-I did not install any programs or drivers before or after the speakers where replaced and the imbalance was noticed.
-All hardware, aside from the speakers, where unchanged before/after the imbalance appeared.

My point is this:
-Don't expect an update to actually fix this!
-Also, I wouldn't send my laptop in for a one week repair! This issue seems to be pretty common and it doesn't matter how careful the assembler is with your laptop because it's not an assembly issue.
-If they don't actually test the speakers with some music in the repair-shop they won't hear the imbalance. I don't know if they do that or not, but I would think that they would just replace the speakers, notify you, and then mail it back (correct me if I'm wrong).

However, If you have on-site repair you can always test the new speakers out while the repair man is still att your home/office. I was stupid enough not to test them properly with music on full volume. Anyway, I balanced the speakers in the windows control panel and I guess they work satisfactory now.

 

I apologize if these questions have been asked before, but the search function hasn't been particularly cooperative with me recently. There are a couple of things I'd like to confirm before committing to the T420s though.

1. When on the Lenovo website, I have no issues configuring both the 3x3 wifi card and the webcam. Are there no space constraints involved with 3 antennas and the webcam like on the x220?

2. Are there any differences, even minute, in terms of physical dimensions, weight, etc. between the normal T420s and the Optimus edition?

I'm aware that the addition of a gpu might come at the cost of additional heat or reduced battery life, but that (should) be kept to a minimum with optimus, right?

I've also heard that because of requiring a better cooling mechanism, the T420s optimus could actually run cooler at light loads?

3. I am planning on putting my primary boot SSD in the ODD sata port, since the random reads wont even come close to saturating SATA 2 speeds, and I don't have to constrain myself to 7mm drives. Are there any performance penalties (besides sata 2), troubleshooting quirks, etc. that should be aware of when using the ODD bay as my primary drive? I should easily be able to set it as my primary drive?

4. I am also planning on ordering the T420s with 1 DIMM of 4 GB RAM, and purchasing another 4 gigs. The only things I need to worry about for compatibility and dual channel support would be the speed and timings, I don't need to worry about matching brands? Could someone tell me the timings of the 4GB Lenovo supplies?

I've also seen a thread on the huge graphics gains on the x220 due to an upgrade to 8GB of DDR3 1866 RAM. That's only due to the fact of the x220 utilizing integrated graphics correct? I wouldn't see such dramatic gains on the T420s Optimus?

 

Yes, it was easy. I took the plastic spacer off the C300 first. It fit inside and worked well.

 

My T420s has the Intel 6300 WiFi and a webcam.

Logically, there would be a small weight penalty with Optimus but this is not reflected in Lenovo's data. Dimensions are the same.

There is no heat / power penalty if/when running on integrated graphics but if running something which uses the Nvidia GPU when on battery will cause it to drain faster. Also, if CPU and Nvidia GPU are both under full load then the total heat output may be more than with the integrated graphics version.

The hardware maintenance manual doesn't show any specific differences between the Optimus and non-Optimus versions but it lists 4 different fan assembly parts. I don't think there would be any difference in light load cooling performance (governed by the thermal rules in the BIOS unless you run TPFanControl). My Intel graphics version struggles to dispose of the heat from full CPU load (CPU core speeds drop slightly once the CPU temperature reaches 95C) and I would doubt if the Optimus version is any better at handling the full load heat.

I don't see any problem with setting the bay as the boot drive but you will have a challenge if you ever need to boot from a DVD to repair your Windows. Many SSDs have 7mm versions (see here). What about using mSATA as the boot drive?

Don't worry about matching the timings. The BIOS will identify the fastest timings supported by both modules.

Yes, having two RAM modules makes a big difference to the Sandybridge integrated graphics performance (single vs dual channel memory bandwidth). The Nvidia GPU has 1GB dedicated RAM and does not share the system RAM.

John

 

Hey, I also want to set the refresh rate 60 hz. However, I cannot find "WIN" in "DRIVERS" folder...do you have an idea why is that? Thanks

 

So in the last two weeks, my computer has randomly shut down three times. Once while I was working (battery was at ~40%), and twice when it was asleep (ie, I'd put it to sleep, see the crescent moon icon light up, and 2-3 hours later when I bring it out of my bag, it's off. When I turn it on again, I get the "Windows did not shut down successfully screen" and I'm given the usual list of boot options (safe mode, safe mode with networking, regular, ...etc).

Has anyone else had this problem? I've looked around online, and some people seem to think that the motherboard may have a problem. Could that be the case? How would I verify that it's the motherboard's fault? (I use this computer every day and would rather not send it in for repairs if I don't have to.)

I'm running the original factory install of windows 7 professional, with an ultrabay III battery.

- will

 

It may or may not be related but a month or two back I had premature hibernation due to alleged low battery (30 - 40%). I knew the battery was nowhere near empty so I resumed the computer and carried on working. I think I had two instances of that problem but it hasn't happened recently so the bug might have been fixed in the BIOS or power management driver updates. Are your BIOS and power management software all up-to-date?

John

 

I just witnessed a T420s to reach 93C after playing WOW for 30 minutes, and this even a model with just an i5 and integrated graphics processor, not the nvidia optimus thing. This makes my X220 (running at 97C LinX) look cool.