Thinkpad Ultrabook T430u

it is a DP++ port.

 

Apparently a DP to DVI cannot be used on the T430u

The Mini-DisplayPort to DVI adapter (03X6595) is not supported on the ThinkPad T430u. The DVI support for external video is provided via the HDMI port.
Supported external display configurations - ThinkPad T430u

Instead they suggest DP to VGA converter, FRU 03X6402. I believe that this FRU # corresponds to 0A36536.
Lenovo offers mini-DisplayPort to VGA Adapter | Lenovo | (CA)

Now obviously I'm not going to buy the converter from Lenovo (Ebay or amazon is the way to go)

I was just wondering if the adapter is active or not? Any other specs I need to consider when buying the adapter?

 

I don't have a mDP-to-DVI adapter, but I do have a mDP-to-HDMI and I can confirm it doesn't work and so by extension, I'd say the mDP-to-DVI will not work either. Kind of disappointing as I just bought a whole set of cables and switches to be able to use my dual monitor setup with either my desktop or my Thinkpad.

 

Do you have an mDO to VGA? Is it active.
You can always use HDMI to DVI if your hdmi is free...

 

I want to ask T430U users here.

Does T430U use mSata SSD?
I see that Lenovo releases T430U with HDD + small ammount of SSD like 32GB. Does it make booting into Windows much faster than the one that uses only HDD?

I know that Full HD movies will be converted down to T430U's native resolution, but can I play Full HD movies smoothly considering it has only Intel HD 4000?

Are there any annoying issues regarding to this laptop? Not mentioning the low resolution screen, but issue such as excessive heat after long use.

 

Yes, the T430U use thw mSATA SSD, but just for cashing often used files, applications, but you can feel this, it is faster than normal HDD. I upgraded this mSATA SSD with a biger crucial M4 mSATA SSD for system and program files, and so is the T430u a perfect machine (just the screen is very poor).

With intel HD4000 you can play full HD movies with no problems, i watched many films on my LCD TV using HDMI port without any problems.

No heat problems, the 7200rpm HDD is louder than a cooling fan.

 

I am wondering why lots of people don't like the screen. I have a 17" laptop with Full HD resolution and a 15" laptop with 1440*900 screen resolution. I am fine with 1440*900 on my 15" laptop since the screen is smaller than the 17". Smaller screen with smaller resolution is tolerable to me. Since T430U has 14" screen with 1366*768, does it really matter?

By the way, how is the battery performance? I may use Office application + internet browsing + music at the same time. Can you estimate how long the battery will last for doing that activities?

I saw a video from youtube seems that the HDD is not mSATA, it is just a regular size HDD. Is the SSD a part of the HDD itself? I mean they both come in a single piece of harddrive. If the HDD is a regular size, then why can't I replace the HDD with regular size of SSD (not the mSATA one) ? I am getting confused with these. Please help...

 

Lenovo ThinkPad T430u in-depth review – Part 1 (Overview)

This should answer some of the questions regarding battery life and hdd.

I use my T430u with only the mSATA.

 

thanks for the review. I like your review.
Good thing that I can use most 2.5inch SSD instead of only having the expensive mSATA option. I see that the HDD connection is a flexible one, hopefully it's not a big problem.

Anyway did you still remember the booting time before you took away the HDD? The 500GB option comes with 24GB mSATA and I am curious how the cache drive affects the performance

Can anyone confirm if this model has a fingerprint reader? http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834312105
I checked lenovo website and not all models have fingerprint readers.

 

I just got my T430U this morning. I noticed that T430U has only 1 speaker located between F10-F12. Is that normal? This seems strange to me since all of my laptops have 2 speakers (left & right).

 

I think there are two small speakers under this "speaker bezel".

I ordered a T430u as well, and I am looking forward to it! The mein argument to not-wait for the T431s is that it won't come with a discrete nVidia GPU.

 

I tried to covered the left part of the speaker bezel and I can still hear my music clearly,
while when I closed the right part of the speaker bezel, my music started to become muddy.

edited:
I think it has 2 speakers I just checked the speakers using this
http://www.audiocheck.net/audiotests_stereo.php

Maybe it was my feeling to assume it has only 1 speaker.

Anyway if I buy a WWAN Card here in USA, can I use it everywhere in the world? I am afraid not all WWAN card will work everywhere in the world (different connection, etc). I am leaving for South East Asia within few days.

 

This new machine is really frustrating. Everytime I update the windows, it always fails. Error code 643, I tried to find solutions online but still can not resolve the problem. One advised to install the update excluding "net framework" and see if it is working. I am currently installing other updates rather than "net framework"

 

@ibmthink If you don't expect anything more than the specs promise I think you'll be happy. It's a budget ultrabook with good build quality.

@gallant Having no problems here with Windows 7.

 

Mine is 7 Professional, I already restored the Windows but the problem still persists.

Is it because Microsoft provides "wrong" windows updates recently (few days before I got my laptop) ? I meant if your laptop is fine, than my laptop should be fine as well. I am wondering if in the future (say next week) this problem will be gone after Microsoft give a better Windows update maybe?

 

@gallant You might try restoring windows and then doing the updates in batches by release date of the update. That way each subsequent update will be installed on a previously up-to-date windows install, which is what was intended when each update was released. At a minimum it will help you identify which update(s) are causing the error.

 

The problem is not the screen resolution, more the poor screen quality from AUO screens. My old laptop (Packard Bell is a low end manufacturer) with the same resolution on a 15,6 screen has a lot better screen quality, a lot better viewing angles (viewing angles are horrible by the T430u), and a lot better colors. The T430u has very faded colors, white is not white more grey or blue, and not enough brightness.

Its a great ultrabook, the only problem is the poor screen. I don't understand Lenovo why they ruin this great ultrabook with such a sreen.

 

New BIOS update for Win8 is out!

 

+1 Higher resolution wouldn't solve the problems with this screen. Colors would still be washed out, whites would still be blue/grey and there would still be times where there's seemingly no acceptable viewing angle. Occasionally dark photos and graphics are simply unviewable at any brightness or viewing angle.

 

I did restore Windows and yeah I installed like what you said and now I can update with no error anymore, Let say if in the future I need to restore Windows, do I need to do it like that again?

 

About the screen: My settings are "Gamma:1,1" and "Saturation:10". Thats fo the Intel Driver. For the Windows Color Managment, I would suggest using this profile: http://forum.notebookreview.com/att...9-max-native-min-native-2.4-hq-xyzlut-mtx.zip It was made for the T420, but it is working perfectly with my T430u. colors look so much better and saturated with this, I highly recommend it! :thumbsup:

 

I used that profile as the default but does not see any difference. How did you adjust the gamma and saturation?

 

There doesn't seem to be a native program that will open the .icc file. Not sure what I'm supposed to do with it if I can open it.

...Adding, I've been using these settings from an earlier post in this thread. When I change these setting to Gamma:1,1 and Saturation:10 the screen becomes very washed out, almost like there's a haze over it.

 

I guess so. Perhaps there's an error in the sequencing of the updates if you try to do them all at once. A number of them require reboots to take effect. Perhaps there's an update file that requires a previous file be fully reboot-installed and doing them as a single batch causes an error. These are just layman guesses.

You could do an image back up of your updated system so that you won't have to do a full restore from scratch.

 

Do you know the "Windows Color Managment"? You can find it in the Control Panel. There you can switch between different .icc files.See the following links if you want to know how to use it:
Color management settings: frequently asked questions
Change color management settings
First, you have to add the profle, and then you have to set it standard for the display.

The advice for "Gama 1.1" and "Saturation: 10" is ONLY in combo with this profile. With the native profile, it will looking washed out, I agree with you.

 

Ok, I've added the profile using the "Add" button on the "All Profiles" tab. However it's unclear to me what exactly I should do to "set it standard for the display."

There are no options other than add/remove on the "All Profiles" tab. The added profile does not appear in the "Devices" tab and all the option buttons there are inactive. Do I select it under "Advanced" > "Windows Color System Defaults" > "Device Profile"? There's nothing on the Microsoft info pages you linked to suggest I do this and it's unclear from those pages exactly what I should do. (FYI there's just a single user set up on the system.)

Thanks for the help. Don't want to F- things up by making the wrong choice.

 

Ok, if you have added the profile in the "All profiles" tab, than you have to go into the "Devices" tab. Select the T430u display (normaly named "ThinkPad Display etc."). There, click the button "Add" (or however this button is named, to descripte this is quite difficult for me, because I use a German Windows, and the names are a bit different maybe). Select the profile you want to add to you display. If you have added the profile to the display, then select the profile in the list and press the "Use this as standard" button. Have fun with the better profile. After you did this, I would recommend to set Gamma to 1.1 and Saturation to 10, as I mentioned earlier.

 

As I mentioned, on the "Devices" tab all of the options are disabled, including the "Add" button. At the top, the Thinkpad Display is selected. Also, there is no "Use this as standard" button on the Devices page. There is a "Set as Default Profile" button ("Add" "Delete" and "Profiles" are the other button options) -- all are disabled from use.

If I go to the "Advanced" tab and click "Change System Defaults" it brings up an overlay of the "Devices" tab with the option buttons enabled, however I don't want to do something that would change (or prohibit me from resetting to) the original 'factory default' settings -- so I'm not altering anything there until I'm sure what I'm doing.

 

Please, show us some screenshots. I can´t imagine that this tab is disabled. It looks for me this way (German text):

 

Here they are. Note that all of the option buttons on the Devices tab are inactive.



Note that if I click "Change System Defaults" at the bottom of the "Advanced" tab it brings up an overlay of the "Devices" tab with the option buttons enabled,

 

Ah, I see what you are doing wrong: You have to activate the "use my settings for this device" checkbox.

 

I don't see any differences when using the color profile you advised. But if I adjust the Gamma and Saturation to 1.1 and 10, the color is getting better in my opinion but these settings work well for both color profiles

 

Are you sure that you have selected the new profile and then clicked on "Use as Default profile"?

Between those profiles there is a big difference. The normal profile is a bit bluish, the new one is nearly neutral.

 

Yeah I am pretty sure about that. When I clicked "Set as Default Profile", there was no difference

 

Ok, duh, I don't know why I didn't try checking that box. I've added the file, set it as Default Profile and made the gamma/saturation changes and .... well colors do look a bit truer, some even different, but whites still have a slight blue tint and at least some web pages look a little washed out. Maybe there's only so much I can expect from this panel.

Thanks again for the help.

 

My battery life cycle is now 2. I changed the charge mode to start charging when the battery is below 90% and stop at 95%. Do you guys think it won't increase my battery life cycle anymore?

 

I recently had a chance for a brief hands-on with a T430u. Screen quality was typical Thinkpad, but otherwise I really liked it - except for one thing. The sharp front edge of the palmrest felt really uncomfortable against bare wrists. A lot worse than unibody Macbook Pro, or a recent HP Elitebook or Dell Latitude E-series. Subjectively the rim surrounding the palmrest was slightly above the level of the palmrest, and the inner edge of the rim felt sharper than the outer edge - sharp enough to worry about possibility of getting paper cuts.

This palmrest experience is really the primary thing keeping me from buying a T430u for myself. I wonder are they all like that, or did I just happen to try a particularly bad one?

 

@tvtu On mine the rim and palmrest are even and although the edge angle is pretty severe it has never bothered me. I can see how an uneven edge with the palmrest below the edge could be trouble.

 

anyone knows how to stop battery cycle count from increasing? Mine is already 5 even I already set the battery to stop charging at 95%

 

Anyone knows if this lenovo notebook stand works with the T430u? Lenovo Essential Notebook Stand - Overview
It's not in the hardware compatibility list as you can see, but I don't see why it won't work..

 

That's a pretty cool stand. Looks like it would fit just about any laptop.

 

Hello, just purchased to 430U a couple weeks ago I'm getting used to it and really like it.
I have installed win XP mode and office 2007 for work software programs. Still a computer novice...
Have a couple of questions.
There are so many programs is there any bloatware I can delete?
And, just got a message from Lenovo- Some systems have shipped with a mSATA SSD device without the ExpressCache software that is needed to enable the device as a cache.
I followed these instructions and do not appear to have this drive. Or do I have it and do not see it?
Open the Start Menu, type DiskMgmt.msc, and press Enter to start Disk Management.
At the bottom of the Disk Management window, identify the mSATA SSD device. The 16GB mSATA SSD is 14.91GB. The 32GB mSATA SSD is 29.82GB.

 

Hello, All.

Ok so I bought this t430u today after being quite impressed by its light design and the fact that it has a 1TB hd, 8Gigs of ram as well as a decent i5 processor.

What sucks is this and what's really upsetting me -- the hard-drive is only a 5400rpm drive. I guess I can fix this issue easily by replacing it.
However -- for some reason this part I missed and although not so much a big deal it still gets under my skin finding out that the highest resolution this screen supports is 1366x768! Wow!

I also have another thinkpad s430 which I bought and although it has an i5 but half the ram and half the hd size it does have a higher resolution display.
The part that gets me is they both have same nvidia/intel graphics chips.

Did lenovo cheat the t430u by skimming on the LCD?

 

I've had this laptop a couple years now. Have only a couple of ..... situations.
My battery life is terrible. I get about 1 hour on a full charge. I have tried the maintenance feature for the battery, but it doesn't seem to do anything.
I can't get into windows virtual pc. Tried every password I could think of.
When it comes out of sleep mode it reboots.
And has anyone deleted the entire Q recovery drive yet?
Thanks much for any help.

 

What do you mean 'windows virtual pc' ?