What's the deal with the thinkpad's looks?

Why do such great, reliable notebooks have the get dragged down by FLAT, PLAIN, BUSINESS-ESQUE looks. I realize looks aren't everything, especially with computers but i hate how my thinkpad's looks don't represent it's hardware. My friends come up to me and ask me why i have a notebook from the 90's.

 

I personally love the looks.

Current OEM's try way to hard, IMO.

 

Why do you care about the way others look at your laptop?

 

Ya i actually love this look as well. the solid black finishing with the red dot. ive even got compliments from tech-free girls how they love the design. lol

...it would be kinda embarrassing if a business man with black suit on had a alienware laptop. lol

 

A good analogy would be the Jeep Wrangler. It's an icon and the exterior design only changes slightly from one generation to the next. Underneath, it may get all new mechanical parts...but the look from the outside is largely unchanged.

I suppose Lenovo (and IBM before them) subscribe to the "If it ain't broke, don't fix it!" philosophy. It's worked well for them so far....

 

lol i think that quote goes to all the crazily riced civics out their.

 

Other than the fact that Jeeps are ugly IMO

I actually really like the look of the Thinkpads - it was a large factor that drew me into purchasing one. Asthetically, the only 2 changes that I would very much welcome would be 1) a more durable lid coating (I'm talking about the corners especially - even with my care, the movement of the laptop in its sleeve in my backpack has already worn down one corner slightly ), and 2) bringing back the red lines and blue dots on the touchpad buttons!

 

i love the looks of the thinkpad. im getting tired of the flashy hey look at me laptops. also because of the flat ibm finish it hides scratches really well and best of all no fingerprints woohoo.

the only beef i have with thinkpads is they havent gone to led. a non glossy led screen would be a nice update.

 

The T400 was offered with an WXGA+ (1440x900) LED matte/non-glossy display until a few days ago. The option was pulled (temporarily) due to supply chain issues. The T500 also offers a non-glossy LED display, but only in WXGA (1280x800) resolution.

 

nice info thanks allfired up. I was actually playing around with a T400 config today but didnt see the option so figured it just wasnt available. if that option comes back it may sway me to purchase. that was the only negitive i saw. the x series they have with the 12 inch screen and for 650 also caught my eye.

 

thinkpads are honestly hit or miss with some people. i personally love the "business esque" look because it is simple and clean. as others have pointed out, no fingers prints and the finish makes the laptop much easier to grab onto.

 

If you want a bright colored gold-plated exterior with all the bells and whistles showing outside, then Thinkpad probably isn't for you in the first place.

 

i guess there are just 2 types of laptops.
solid no reflection ibm laptops compared to like a samsung x360 all glossy and color black and red. i believe it has everything glossy look.

 

you could use the matte black as a blank canvas, paint it, sticker it, etc.. I personally like the understated look. Clean uncluttered design is always good. If your friends bust your chops, just say it's "retro" and all the cool kids are doing it.

 

Actually, Lenovo DID revise the look quite a bit for the ThinkPad SL-series. They even have a glossy lid. Most ThinkPad aficionados don't consider them "real" ThinkPads though.

Personally, I think they're rather ugly. If they were the Judd family, the SL would be Wynonna and other ThinkPads would be Ashley.

 

Another way I think about my "plain, old, ugly" laptop is that nobody will want to steal it unless they know what it is. It looks like a piece of crap to the untrained user .

 

That is a good point. Leave a Macbook sitting in a coffee shop, and turn your head to grab your coffee when your name is called, and it'll be stolen

 

I love the look of a ThinkPad. It is all business and iconic. Also, the matte finish holds up over time. My T40 still looked practically new after 5 years of heavy use (a little wear at the corners, but otherwise it looked brand new).

Lenovo's head designer David Hill, has a quote about the ThinkPad look in this article on building the x300 - "I'm a bit tired of looking at silver computers," "I'd never wear a silver business suit."

 

Black never goes out of style!

 

Simplicity man...Plus most people think its too old school to jack anyways but most of us have hummers running underneath this "plain" look

 

Personally, I'm sick of laptops that look like toys. I don't think I'd ever got to a medical conference with the blue colored Dell Inspiron or the Alienware machine I used to have years ago. Well, not if I wanted to be taken seriously that is.

 

First of all, as stated in my original post, i'm not all concerned with the looks of it; i'm just curious as to why my core 2 notebook looks like it packs a pentium 3. Obviously aesthetics DO play a very important role in consumer purchases (See Macs), the thinkpad is a dynamic series of notebooks. I use mine for music production, though i have friends who use them for other things like school work and gaming. Why not keep the toned down look but lose the tie?

 

That's all sort of relative. To you and your friends it may look like it packs a pIII whereas I see a Thinkpad and say "Hey, there's a very dark and smooth looking piece of hardware, who knows what it might have under the hood?" Whereas when I see a big dumb Dell Studio/Inspiron (no offense) I already know the max punch it could possibly have and the quality of the machine itself.

Maybe people who don't know a lot about laptops are still impressed by the color of the lid and I'm sure companies like Dell, Sony, HP, Alienware, and Toshiba all take advantage of that by pumping out laptops in all shades of the color spectrum. For me, looks come last. I want functional superiority, first and foremost.

I'm curious though, let's hear how you'd change the look. Dell was in exactly the same spot about 10 years ago and added the big silver line across the back with the Dell circle. Then they started making them with colored lids and haven't looked back. If you ask me, that's not an improvement so much as it was just a stand-out way to advertise their new line.

Another thing to consider- Thinkpads are meant for the business-esque look. Their site doesn't have a drop down menu which asks you "for home or for business" because business is all Thinkpads are. Solid matte black is just how they see minimalistic professionalism, and it turns out that a huge majority of their customers are on board with that. Only lately the Ideapads have emerged for the flashy 'home user' who doesn't want that business savy look.

 

i personally dont listen to people that is badmouthing thinkpad design. they themself are not exactly savy i'd say. some of the laptop that peple praises are gonna look like a bad joke in a few years time. alienware i'm looking at you, yes you.

for me, i think it looks functional and timeless, there is a certain profesional air to them that i like, it is a nice break from the apple design (i also use apple computer). and i also like that they dont attract attention, meaning that people dont know how much i pay for the laptop , only savy people know what it is.

but saying that... i think the W700 is pushing it.

 

I think it's clean and elegant

 

I am a fan of ThinkPads (I've owned a T42 and an R61, both were great) and I've had good experiences with the Dell Latitude D-series (D630 & D830). The Dells were solid systems, but they were the dullest looking laptops I've ever used. The exterior was dishwater gray and inside was a darker gray. The overall look was very generic.

The new Latitude E-series really impressed, especially compared to the D-series that it replaces. Apparently, the folks at Dell put some serious effort into the design of the new model and it shows. They also took a page from the ThinkPad playbook and made them BLACK.

In my opinion, their efforts should have been focused on their consumer notebooks. They don't have a strong product in the entry or mainstream consumer market. The entire Inspiron line is outdated and the Studio 15/17 feel cheaper than most netbooks! The lids being offered in every Crayola color and the crazy designs only make them more chintzy!

The Brushed Metal Black exterior, which is standard, is very understated and appropriate for a business environment. Unable to leave well enough alone, the E4300/E6400/E6500 are also available in a Bright Red and an Electric Blue color. Even worse, the 12.1" E4200 is offered in those colors and in "Quartz Pink"! It looks like it's been doused with Pepto Bismol!

 

There’s always the more consumer friendly IdeaPad—your friends might approve. Leave my “secret” Core-2-packing ThinkPad unmolested please.

 

Exactly. I can't stand these Dells (and others) that look like they're made for 13 year olds.

It doesn't look like it "packs a Pentium III"; it looks like it's made to work. (Guess what? It does.)


As for the "why so plain looking?" question: because their major market was, and still is, businesses. They want professional looking notebooks. They got it. Lenovo has reacted to the recent consumer interest in ThinkPads (SL series), but just not in the way some people would like (apparently yourself).

 

That's really all that needs said, right there. Personally, I think it's the *other* notebooks that lack visual appeal. The OP, like a lot of people, seems to be under the misconception that ThinkPads lack style. Actually, they have a very distinct style that appeals to many.

 

Thinkpads are solid because they are built for function THEN design. I personally love the looks. There are too man notebooks out there with flashy colors, "Rainbow" led's and glossy screens, but i am pretty sure the case was designed first then, the hardware was crammed in.

 

I guess you either like it or you don't. If I ever get into a pissing match with my friends over who has the nicer laptop, I'll make sure to demonstrate everything that I can do with my ThinkPad that they can't with their laptop, short of intentionally dropping it. Then we'll see who's still smug after that.

 

quoted for truth

 

plain black = classy

 

And here I had my hopes up for a T400 "Hello Kitty" Edition! :laugh:

 

Well then you obviously are not the market intended. The whole point is the tie...conservative look. Consumers want trendy; thinkpad users do not.

We would all love better screens though, but that isn't necessarily about the looks.

 

I love the look of my T61. If I was buying a new laptop based solely on looks, I'd get a Dell M1530, or HP something-or-other. To me, the Thinkpad set's the standards for a pure, mean, straight to business looking machine

 

Also all that "look" stacks up an extra thickness and weight. I would hate that happen.

 

As others have said. I love the looks as well. It was one of the things that I loved about it, all black and sleek. Professional and business like.

 

I would be very disappointed if Lenovo was to drastically change the look of the Thinkpad. If I see someone with a Thinkpad, I know what they have. It is unspoken, yet understood. If I see someone with a Mac, I think of a herd mentality. I'm sure all his friends must be impressed. The Mac is great for certain purposes and rock solid at what they do, but for serious, raw computing, I will take a Thinkpad. It looks rugged and like it was made for work and not to be handled with kit gloves.

 

Personally, I love the way the Thinkpad laptops look. I've always found them to be aesthetically pleasing and, like many have already said, I'd be very disappointed if Lenovo did anything to change the way they look. They should, instead, concentrate on making sure another keyboard debacle never occurs again.

 

I've been hooked with Thinkpads since my first one back in 2001: a powerful A22e with a measly 800MHz Celeron processor and 256MB of RAM, which unsurprisingly it's still rocking with maxed out memory and a 100GB HDD.
I got critized by a classmate that said my previous Thinkpad (a T42p) was like an old Renault, hehe yah right. He uses a Sony that looks all beated up, have a green line on the screen because he dropped it on a factory.
I've seen robot programmers at automation process in the industry use solely Thinkpads, I remember one guy had a T60p 4:3 and another T61p widescreen hooked with the teach pendant of a robot. So I'm really proud to use something that differentiates me from the other people who thinks flashy is the .
I would trade anytime any other brand with a new Thinkpad.

Also functionality as said before is its priority. User serviceability is quite high, parts replacements are easy, RAM, keyboard, heatsink are not a mess to replace unlike with other brands.
Also I don't know any other brand that offer the 'Air bag protection for the HDD', I know there are the free fall sensor HDD's, but starting with the T41 you don't need a FFS HDD to keep your data safe when the laptop receive an impact.

Long live the black beauty.

 

Hear, hear!

 

Probably because they ARE business laptops?

 

Really? What makes them catered to business lifestyles aside from the looks?

 

yeh the day i got my T400, my first Thinkpad, i brought it to school to start using it for schoolwork. we're sitting there doing some excel stuff and a classmate from nearby comes by and says "oh cool you have one of those IBM computers from the 90s".

i giggled and told him i just got it. its cool though, people think youre using a POS but its so beastly.

and no, i dont agree with you. i like the look, one of the main reasons i got it.

 

Are you a troll?

 

Will you dress up like fashion style when you go to interview?

 

you've never had a real job, have you?

 

People actually get offended/question why you get a ThinkPad. I guess having trendy designs is the only reason for getting a notebook.

 

No need to get personal, it only retracts from your credibility.