Trying to decide between TP X230T or TP Yoga

Hi folks,

Coming here from the "what notebook should I buy" sub-forum. They sent me here to get more info on these two products.

I've had a Macbook for the past five years. It's been a nice experience overall. I'm a busy student: I want my computer to have problems rarely-- and when it does, I want to be able to get it fixed as quickly and painlessly as possible.

I assumed Apple was the only company remotely like this. It's been so long since I've had a PC that I didn't know about on-site warranties. They seem great in theory, and I've heard... somewhat good things in practice.

I'm considering switching away from apple for 2 reasons: 1) I want a new computer and for the specs I want, I'm not sure I can afford apple, 2) I REALLY want a digitizer screen.

This has led me down a winding road. Most companies and products from here List of Windows 8 and RT tablets and convertibles with stylus have various problems. Many are too small for a "this is my only computer," many have build quality/ firmware concerns (e.g., sony flip), and almost all have lousy customer service.

However, Lenovo might be a good choice! Here's what I'm thinking:

a) Thinkpad yoga. Nice looking laptop. About 200-300 outside my ideal price range, though.

b) Thinkpad X230T. Also nice looking laptop. I could buy one on ebay for cheap. Before doing this, I would check with the seller to confirm that I can upgrade the warranty to on-site.

I'm leaning towards the latter. I guess my questions are:

1) Is my buy on e-bay idea feasible, if I want an onsite warranty?

2) Am I missing out on anything by going with the older X230T? There's stuff I know of, that doesn't seem like such a big deal: last-gen processor (but it's still so fast!), not-as-high resolution (I'll live), etc. But I don't know a ton about the product, or what's changed since its release, so any input welcome. Additionally (maybe more importantly): Any known issues with this unit I should know about?

3) Likewise, anything I should know about the newer thinkpad yoga?

4) That super-popular "I'm switching to Apple" thread on the front page of this forum has me a bit worried about customer service and build quality. Anyone who specifically has on-site service have any words of encouragement? Or words of warning?

Any help is appreciated!!

 

I have the on site warranty on my X230t.

The service is great. You call IBM and tell them what the problem is with your machine and if it's a hardware issue , they send the parts to a technician in your area and then the technician generally goes to your house , workplace , etc. the next business day (after you call).

 

eBay is a always little more dicey. You've got to read the description carefully and ask questions cause you never really know what you're getting until you get it. Sellers, in my experience, with high feedback tend to shade meanings more than sellers without it.

 

I went with the X230t from ebay.

Probably planning on upgrading to Windows 8.1, and eventually upgrading to an SSD

Anything I should know? I read somewhere about worse battery life on Windows 8.1 on this computer, is that true?

 

Congrats and good luck.

Battery life is likely to suffer. No Power Manager in W8 to begin with...although people have been tweaking the W7 version with varying results.

Personally, unless you *absolutely must* run W8 for whatever reason, I'd stick with W7 on X230T. The machine was optimized for it, and never really certified to use W8, although it will run it, likely with some issues.

Do bear in mind that you'll also receive *zero* support from Lenovo for any OS that the machine wasn't shipped with, be it W8, Ubuntu or OS/2 Warp...

 

The IdeaPad Yoga 2 Pro has the Power Manager, which allows you to reset battery, set a battery charge threshold that protects the battery, and it also has an ability to switch on rapidcharge if you want to. All of which are missing on the Thinkpad for some reasons.

 

Maybe Lenovo wants to kill the ThinkPad line?