Where are the reviews for the T400/T500/W500 - DEAD - DEAD

Hey,

I am very surprised by now that we still have not seem any reviews on the new models. Any ideas what is taking so long. Did lenovo not send out the models for NBR to review them? If so.. SHAME SHAME SHAME.. Who wants to buy one without a review first.. Stupid marketing move

 

so inpatient m8,they were just released,you have to wait a little

 

I agree about being impatient (hence why I haven't ordered yet), but with most new tech items, reviews are usually up weeks/days before or, at least, the day of release. It is very odd we haven't see one review.

 

I doubt you will see one soon since Lenovo plans on shipping them the 3rd week of August. Most people for a est shipping date of 8/26 or 8/27 but if you call in they will tell you late Sept because of shortages of parts

 

Here's a translated (Czech) review of the ThinkPad W500.

 

I am rele hoping I get mine late august.. Id hate to wait till september..

 

I asked a rep about the ship date today and he sounded annoyed by the question, he must be getting it alot. The rep said there was no reason he was aware of that they'd be delayed, and even if that were the case the shipping estimate would change on the order itself .

Edit: Has anyone seen any reviews for similar Montevina laptops, with DDR3 and the like?

 

Nope.. and the review for the w500 isnt working i saw the first page but after that it doesnt work anymore

 

I have to admit that like the OP, I too, am just a little impatient at this point. I am really interested in the new T-series models and want to know what people have experienced thus far. Oh well. I guess I just have to wait a few weeks.

 

I also wanted to get a review of my T400 before I buy it....but I figure that if I had to wait for the review and order it....then I will get my laptop long after my school starts....not to be impatient but the x200 gets reviewed already.
Anyway, I am putting trust in Lenovo that their new Thinkpads would be as great as their previous ones.

 

Wanted to let you guys know that the T400 review is in progress (I can actually talk about this one, it is in MY hands right now). The new thinkpads are rolling out slowly, but from what I can tell about this one, I LOVE it. ~8.7 hours on the 9 cell battery

I will answer a few questions here or there if you guys want, but keep em short and wait for the full review to show up

 

wow wow!!!
8.7 hours????

 

Hey Kevin,

That is amazing news. Are you going to do a full review or the first look review? I was wondering if there are some functions that require Vista to run? I only got 1GB of DDR3 ram (i thought it would be cheaper to buy 3rd party...I was wrong). I got the XP pro downgrade until the price of the ram drops

 

Well this is with VERY light activity (typing, aim in background, etc). Websites that are more graphic or flash heavy bog the CPU and drop the battery life faster.

Both actually. Everything inside the notebook should work just fine with XP. Cant say much about the turbo memory or anything though.

Oh and for those curious, these are the system specs

T9600
ATI dedicated graphics
7200rpm Hitachi drive
2GB ram

and idle power draw at 60% brightness is 10.59w!!!

 

Very cool, even the T9xxx models are good on power...

 

I really love so much about this notebook, but I am also depressed that they no longer offer a FlexView IPS alternative. Gotta compromise somewhere, and battery life twice of my T60 is going to make me buy one of these I know it

 

Quick question... is the 9 cell annoyingly large, or manageable?

 

Same size as any other thinkpad 9 cell battery. Only difference which is really odd is the thing is bent up at an angle. The full review will cover part.

 

That battery life almost makes me want to get one. Although I do like my T61p's gaming power. I am looking forward to the review.
Tim

 

Good to hear a review is in progress. It'll be interesting to hear how the graphics switch work. I hope we'll see the review by Friday!

 

t500 for me its gonna be by the looks of it. Unless someone comes out with a quad core with switchable graphics....

 

Very good news to know that T400 is in review process. I doubt I will actually get 9 cell battery. I wonder how much time you can get for 6 cells, maybe 5.8 hours?

 

Everyone is wondering if the 6-cell sticks out. Can you put that question to rest?

 

http://forum.lenovo.com/lnv/board/message?board.id=T_Series_Thinkpads&thread.id=13811

 

Hey, nice to hear that someone is writing a review for T400 and that it is a very good laptop, hope it will come out soon....kudos to you Kevin

 

Very glad to hear the review is in progress! Kevin, can you say something about the graphics? Is it actually 3470 or 3640? How about its performance?

 

According to the tabook, it's a 3470.

On an unrelated note, over 8h with the 9 cell is really awesome. I wonder how much the 4 and 6 cell would hold. It would certainly be interesting to have a 4 cell that holds close to 3-3.5h. It's more appealing to have a flushed fitting battery than one that sticks out.

 

Very much looking forward to a review....

On a different note...I wonder how much battery life I can get from 6 cell + ultrabay?

 

Who is Kevin?

 

Which one? Kdawg the mod Kevin or the Kevin admin Kevin?

 

Any word on the W500 review Kevin?

 

So based on the 8.7hr figure, we could easily expect 3 hours of battery life out of a 4 cell and 5 hours of the 6 cell.

Based on the WHr provided by Lenovo...
4-cell: 37.44
6-cell: 56.16
9-cell: 84.24

 

I don't get it... won't a t400 have better gaming performance than its equivalent in the t61 series??

 

nowhere near the t61p

 

Nowhere near the 15.4" T61p. But in comparison to the 14" T61p with its crippled 64bit memory bus, the HD 3470 is a pretty good substitute.

 

The T400 is the 14.1" version of the T61 while the W500 and T500 are equal to the old 15.4" T61 and T61p will have graphics cards equivalent or better than the old ones. I honestly haven't been following the T500 closely so I don't know if it will have a dedicated graphics card option, but I know the W500 will since it is the work station model.
Tim

 

Wanted to mention that the 9 cell in our review unit calibrated out the ~88-89Wh.

 

Hey, kevin, i have a question. Did Lenovo correct its mistaken of the previous T61, like bad screen? What changes are good or bads?

thanx man!

 

Does your review T400 have LED screen? Because that idle power consumption you mentioned is impressive. Lenovo states that their LED screens draws around 2W less than CCFL screens.

 

Any physical difference between T61 and T400 chassis?

Looking forward to the review. Thanks in advance!

 

That I am not exactly sure about, it is the 1440x900, but no visual markings and the model number doesnt bring up anything about what type of screen it is.

 

I would like to see what kind of battery life the LED + 25W processor (P8X00) + X4500HD + SSD nets you.

Kevin, if you don't mind, can you find out if the ATI dedicated graphics in the T400 / T500 can perform hardware acceleration of CAD programs. Most consumer grade (Radeon / GeForce) graphics cards will not do this, which bothers me why Lenovo would put them in Thinkpads!

 

9 hours is very good, but numbers are misleading and their is a good reason for companies to send out review units- generate hype, like right here, right now. Keep all that in mind.

Battery performance will be up, but realistically, you won't get 9 hours. I personally think it's irresponsible and misleading for Kevin to just say "I LOVE it. ~8.7 hours on the 9 cell battery" in original post. After all this is a 3rd party review site, not an affiliated site filling spec sheet with pretty numbers.

 

Wait for the full review, different situations are going to have different power idle levels. The review will go over a few scenarios. If you read my posts I also mentioned that was under VERY light activity.

Oh and my T60 for the life of it could never get anywhere near that low wattage value even on lowest brightness and locked in power saving mode. The T400 is doing it at 60% bightness and chilling in adaptive with me workin in the background.

Remember, this is just a forum post where I am commenting on things while I complete my review. Nothing is official, just friendly chit-chat

 

so dude..any phisical change compared to T61?
Any improvement in it's design???

thanx man.

 

Minor things like redesigned feet and a few extra curves in different spots. For the average person comparing each model you could consider them twins.

 

Oh, that's good.

Hey, i forget to ask u if the THINKPAD logo in the chassis, has the . of the I shining with a LED light!

 

Make sure if you want a deal to use the cpp site. From my contact at lenovo she said the program has changed drastically and it can be used for contractors, friends, people who opt in from the general public etc etc.

They have the best discounts on T400, T500 and the W series.

ie, T400 starts at $1130 on lenovo.com, T400 on CPP starts at $960

seems like an easy decision to me!

 

i got a good question... how do you switch from integrated to discrete graphics? Do we have to open up ThinkVantage, or is there a physical switch?

 

Stop posting here Kevin and finish that review!!!!