Used 12"-14" Thinkpad under $500?

Figured I would ask this here since I'm looking only at Thinkpads. However I will also consider other options of equal or greater build quality.

I've been out of the market for a while and I'm not up on my hardware, so I need some advice. My previous notebook was a Toshiba Satellite circa 2003, and it finally died a few days ago. I've used some Thinkpads for work and been impressed with the build quality so I'd like to get one for myself.

I'm looking for something between 12" and 14", with full-size keyboard.

I'd like to be able to dual-boot with Linux.

I do mostly web/email/word processing/productivity, plus video and music, and occasional light gaming (RTS, older FPS). I don't need a superfast machine, but I do a lot of multitasking and like this to be as smooth as possible.

I have my eye on the X120e, which I understand is a "netbook plus" in terms of performance. However, I live in an area where used laptops are plentiful, and I see many T, X, and R series Thinkpads between $300-$400 on Craigslist. Most of these are running Intel Core 2 chips and have otherwise equivalent hardware to the X120e. This is tempting to me, but I'm a little wary of these used machines because I'd like to get 5 years out of my new notebook, and these used ones are often 3-4 years old already.

So, how does the CPU and GPU performance of the X120e compare to T60, T61, R61, or X60 machines? Will the X120e be useful for longer compared to a last-gen notebook?

 

You could look at a T400 and upgrade some of the parts later. x200 could be an option but you won't be able to do serious gaming with the 4500MHD.

If you get a _61_ make sure you get it without the Nvidia chip.

 

If you plan on running Linux, or if you're interested in the fabled ThinkPad durability, avoid the X120e. It's a great Windows netbook, but that's all.

My advice would be to get a used T61/T400 and upgrade it with more RAM and an SSD. You can do that for under $500 easily, and you'll wind up with a very durable, rather powerful machine.

 

i think you're in the range for t400 t61. and i agreed with Tsunade. dont get the nvidia flavour. it will just wasting your time. as for smoothnes and multitasking. just upgrade the RAM into 4GB. that should be enough. 7200rpm hdd or else ssd. it's all depend on your budget.

 

Good info guys! Some more from my end:

Gaming is a low priority. I do like power, but portability, ruggedness, and long usable lifetime are higher priorities.

How does the Core 2 Duo generation compare to the AMD e350 in terms of performance?

How about an X61? There's one locally for $350.

 

Considering that the E350 is 90% the performance of a 1.6GHz Athlon II x2, it's really not that fast. A Core 2 Duo at the same frequency should in theory be like 50% faster or something. Synthetic benchmarks found here. Can't help you with much else, though, as the W520 is my first laptop.

 

@OP. This seems a decent deal:

Lenovo Outlet - ThinkPad X200 Refurbished - Discounted Laptops, Cheap Laptops, Refurbished Laptops, Discounted Desktops, Cheap Desktops, Refurbished Desktops

I'd camp their Outlet site, you can find nice deals.

 

For supreme portability, you are probably looking at a new x120e or an older x200.

Core 2 Duo does beat out the Fusion APUs but normal usage you won't really see a difference.

x61 is a decent choice but IMO 350 is too much as you can find x200 for that price and they are more powerful and you get Penryn chips. Also because of the 4:3 aspect ratio of the x61, your keyboard is gonna be skewed as it isn't widescreen. Now if that x61 had SXGA+ then that's another story.

 

Sounds like the x200 is what I want. I'll camp the Lenovo Outlet and see what comes up. The x200(s) I see on Craigslist and Ebay are going for $600-$750, so I'd love to know where I can get one for less, aside from Lenovo Outlet which doesn't have any at the moment.

 

Yeah, you don't want to pay $600+. For $700-800ish you can already grab X220. The $400 X200s (plural of X200) are gone now.

Outlet is very dynamic place, but I found nice deals quite often. I will be there now and then too as I am shopping for some 14-15" Thinkpad for my dad.

The only downside of Outlet shopping (apart from occasionally having a greater chance of getting a lemon; you can return it) is that all the laptops come with 1 year warranty and you can't extend it - at least AFAIK. On the other hand, replacement parts for these are really easy to find online.

 

If you can get the x200T for around your budget or a little more, it would be well worth it. I just didn't know how great the display is on the x200T until I got the Dell e6510 w/1366×768(wxga). O boy! So if the display from the x200 is inferior to the x200t, then go with the x200t!

 

My T500 is far faster than my X120e, which gives it a more "snappy" feel. That's not to say the X120e isn't good, though--it's quite the capable machine. The GPU of the X120e is more powerful than the T400/T500's integrated graphics, but is weaker than the discrete graphics of either (only slightly weaker than the T400's I believe, but quite a bit weaker than the T500's).