X201 on the way :)

Thanks . Which upgrade were you referring to? The RAM, HDD, battery or windows 7 professional to ultimate?

Btw, the t410 is a pretty amazing machine! most of the managers in my office have a t400 - I happend to try one out, and that was the tipping point - I'm a convert now

 

The windows anytime upgrade.

 

Direct from Microsoft, it's $129.95 for the Windows 7 Professional to Ultimate upgrade.

 

yup - that's the one. I'm specifically looking for the 'boot from vhd' feature. I don't think it's available in professional.

 

Correct. Ult or Ent is required for that feature.

You can get the precise feature list in the Windows 7 Product Guide at Download details: Windows 7 Product Guide

 

@halobox - thanks!

all right! D-day. I'm just a few hours away from the x. I'm just not able to focus on the work today

 

Okay, got it!

It's one thing to see it in pics and a totally different thing in person. I'm blown away.

It's much sleeker and lighter than I thought it would be - the screen is better than what I anticipated. Did a quick startup/shutdown and it was totally worth the wait.

More when I get home

 

Congrats !
Dont forget to make some pictures and post them here.

 

My thoughts exactly. The main reason I ordered X200 is because I have seen few Thinkpads in person. They look ugly only on pics with crap cameras.

 

Lenovo uses multiple suppliers, some better than others. In particular, the AUO screens are poor, while the Samsungs like I got are pretty decent. Congrats on the machine. I wouldn't trade mine for anything on the market now.

 

Congratulations!

Now do a clean windows 7 install (PAWNS VISTA) and you're good to go!

 

I like Vista and it's not that different from Windows 7. The funny part is everyone's in love with Windows 7, but what's it based on? Vista of course and other than a few tweaks, they're very similar.

 

Vista is okay, but the uber intrusive confirmation on various activities does get in the way. Vista laid the foundation stone for the User Interface of Windows 7.

 

Like what?

 

for some reason, every time i move a files across between two different hdd or do any editing on certain files, then the confirmation box would kick up, which annoys me.

 

I've never seen that. I think Vista with SP2 runs just as well as Windows 7. Perhaps there's some feature I'm not aware that makes a difference, but I've not found it.

 

Have you used Windows 7? The differences are greater than you think. See Download details: Windows 7 Product Guide for exact details.

 

Windows 7 is so much different than vista it is not even funny. If you actually use the many functions of windows 7, especially in the desk top area with multiple programs opened you will know just how different the operating systems are. My mom told me to upgrade every computer in the house to windows 7 because no one wanted to use vista anymore.

 

Yes, I had it on my main desktop until the 30 day trial ran out. I didn't mind it, but didn't think enough of it to spend money on it. Plus there's one program I use, which does not work with W7.

 

Thanks Veer! Sorry for not posting pics so far - will do them in a couple of days when I'm doing the upgrades. Anyways, there's still another half to go, I need to get my money back from the reseller (hopefully this week)

Right - I had been poring over pics of the x201 since April, nothing prepared me for what it turned out in person

I got lucky I guess . Thank you, this one is a keeper!

Yup! I need to buy a new HDD first (maybe in a day or two). Every thing else is ready (including the installer prepped on the USB drive) Thanks a ton!


@all - Windows 7 wouldn't be as good if not for vista right? what say?

 

This is my personal opinion. I absolutely respect ZaZ and everyone else - I have my own preferences based on my own usage of both windows 7 and vista on my X200 machine.

I hate windows vista on laptops (I have no problem with it on a desktop). It takes so long to finish loading at startup (minutes not seconds). Watching it resume from hibernation after I walk into lecture hall or coming home was a downright embarrassment. How can it take so long to start? I had a P8400 core2duo with 3GB ram and I stripped all unnecessary drivers. What is it trying to do? With win7, it stops the 100% processing grinding within seconds of login password.

Once it's up I don't see too much of a difference compared to windows 7 other than the fact that win7 can work on very very slow machines while vista doesn't. But that's why I like it. Works on my 6 year old desktop well. (I'm disregarding all the tweaks win7 has compared to vista. you can look up reviews on your own. You all say win7 is just based on vista but tweaked. But then wouldn't it be a better version of vista? One you would prefer to have if both were the same cost/ran your progarms correctly?)

 

I guess we can agree to disagree on this one and there's nothing wrong with it. What I'm saying is not that it's worse, but I don't find it significantly better enough to spend money on when I'm happy with the Vista. I don't know, perhaps I'm not one to notice extras in W7. To me Vista SP2 runs quite well.

 

I have to agree with ZaZ on that... I was comfortably running win vista x64 with 4 gigs of RAM on my old HP. Vista has been quite usable and stable after SP2.

just that windows 7 feels snappier on machines with fewer resources. the user experience is not too different when you're running 4+ gigs of RAM. I have experienced this first hand on my dad's compaq (with 2GB DDr2 RAM). He's pretty frustrated with the slow speed!

 

Glad you are happy with Vista. It ran well on my T61p, too. Let me ask a different question which I think I know the answer already.

If you purchased a W510 or T410, would you order Windows 7 with it? Assume the price for any other OS is the same.

 

I would, and did. I have been using XP, Vista and 7 on various machines concurrently over a few years, and I admit: I am very happy with Windows 7. In fact, the present convergence of various technologies, Windows 7 being one, makes the experience much more pleasant than before.

I would be equally happy if they called it Vista Plus or Vista SP5 or whatever. To the market, a sense of breakout is needed. Perception is crucial.

 

Thinkpad experts I have a question,
just purchased a X201 from Lenovo 2 weeks ago,got the Laptop yesterday and noticed after unboxing that it does not have a touchpad,I thought that when the x200 was refreshed with x201 that the touchpad was one of the changes?
EDIT
just checked their website and now I see it can be configured/added to system build for an extra $20

 

Yea, I guess some people don't want it. It's pretty small on the x201.

 

Hey there, guys.
I got my x201t a few days ago and have been "playing" with it ever since .Got some questions

1) where can i check out my current power consumption. I tried looking in the control panel and couldnt find it

2) Are there any tricks\settings to maximize batery life? I turned off all unnecessery running services, AEro.

3) how many hours do u usually get while browising+ occasionally inking

 

1) under Thinkvantage Power Manager battery section, it tells you how much battery power you are consuming. It is not the most accurate method of gauging the power consumption.

2) If you use windows basic scheme in win 7 that boosts the battery life by about 10 to 20 minutes.

 

Looks like I just brought my sister into the fold, too. She needed a notebook for college, played around with my X200 for a bit, and ended up getting one off of Buy.com for a good price. About identical specs to mine, too!

As far as OS choice, I've migrated to Win 7 on both my X200 and T400. The interface took some time to grow on me, but in the end I kinda like it. I have nothing against Vista and have used it on my earlier ThinkPads; they ran it just fine with no complaints.

I think OS choice is a largely personal decision. You choose what best works for you. Each one out there has advantages, disadvantages, and a unique feature set. They're a tool, just like the notebook itself. You choose the one which fits your needs the best.

 

I think Vista stability (or rather unstability) largely depends on the particular hardware. From what you guys are saying it seems it works fine on Thinkpads.

On other computer (e.g. Dell XPS m1330) it worked absolutely terrible. Same thing on my Dell desktop. Before Win7 came out I just used XP, it worked way faster and more stable. On the computers I used... I found the overall speed (from clicking on folders in Explorer to running programs) in win7 to be much faster and WAY more stable than Vista.

About Power consumption... you can try BatteryBar (free program) and see if it's any more precise than Thinkpad's tool.

 

All right - I've been having the x201 for a week now. Due to stringent office pressures, I've been setting up my stuff slowly, couple of programs at a time. My impressions below:

1) The size is just spot on! Sufficient portability, and decent amount of screen estate for most purposes.
2) The thinklight is probably the single best feature - I turn off the lights, set the screen brightness to 2/15, turn on the thinklight - no one gets disturbed
3) It's dead quiet - apart from the noisy seagate 5400 rpm disc inside it. I didn't have the time to buy a WD scorpio black as I originally intended to do. I'm now waiting for the next gen SSD's that will come out sometime next year. I'm putting the money as soon as 512GB SSD's hit the $400 mark.
4) Thinkvantage tools are actually useful - the two best tools IMHO are the update and the power manager. I don't use the access connections app for managing wireless connections. Just use the native windows 7 features
5) The keyboard is a JOY to type on. silent and very slick. The mouse pad is sufficient, haven't spent much time with the nub.
6) The screen is way better than what I anticipated - movies and pictures look okay.
7) Experienced video corruption when playing few HD videos - the screen would just get garbled. The files play well on my WD player. not too sure what's happening with this.
8) Loses lots of charge when it's sleeping - the battery dropped from 100% to 81% when the laptop was sleeping for approx 10 hours. No devices were connected to it. Is this normal or abnormal?
9) I find it very hard to leave it every day and go to work
10) It's FAST! Video encoding with handbrake zooms now...

I will post up some pics, hopefully this weekend. BTW, I still haven't gotten my money from that reseller yet!

 

Wait til you do handbrake on a quad core. The X20x are the little engine that could and great Thinkpads. Congrats on the machine. What's the story on you other machine?

 

9) that's why I carry it with me.

I didn't like the whole updates thing. I find it extremely distracting and annoying (especially that Windows popup dialog reminding me to restart every 4 hours), so I tend to disable updates on every possible thing that has it. While ThinkVantage is pretty decent, I only use Power Manager and Access Connections.

 

@Zaz - I wish ... No more IT related spending for the next 5 years, so this is what I should be happy with!

I wish I could - my workplace has pretty strict policies about carrying any electronic devices!

btw, any thoughts on point #8? Lost approx 20% of the battery charge when the machine slept for around 10 hrs. is it normal? - I haven't seen this with my earlier laptops - they would drop 3-5% max.

 

well..well...! knock on wood, this day is going great. I've finally got my money back.

If you're in India and thinking of getting a thinkpad, never deal with these guys. Absolutely dismal! They sat on my money for two months without doing a thing.

All's well that ends well .

 

I had a great day yesterday. The FedEx guy shows up like three minutes before I'm going to walk out the door with my X200t. Otherwise I would have had to wait another day as signature was required for the delivery. I did the warranty look up on my X200t when I got it. Not only does it have the three year warranty, but it's also got accidental coverage too, which costs like $200+, woohoo! It wasn't even listed in the item description on eBay. Then I managed to pick up a genuine X200t eight cell battery for $60. That's outlet pricing, where I've never seen the eight-cell anyway. We'll see about today. The only thing that sucks about the deal is I sold my external drive. I've got to wait for the new one to arrive to a can swap my SSD over and install Windows.

Great to hear you got your money back! Since I've never been to India, I'd love to go some day, I doubt I'll be doing business with them, but it's duly noted.

 

@Zaz oh you got a X200t now... so what prompted you to get the new machine and dump the X200?

 

Post Deleted.

 

Seems that way doesn't it. I got it mainly for the drawing. I like to dabble a bit. I got a Wacom, but I recently lost the pen. It kind of pissed me off it cost $35 for a pen, when I got the thing for $40, so I dropped $800 on a tablet. Once I sell my X200 it shouldn't cost too much and I always kinda wanted a tablet anyway.

 

@ZaZ - congrats on the tablet...the 3yr warranty is terrific! I had my eye originally on the x201t - it was quickly dumped off the list when I discovered the price...!

I just checked and I have less than a year's warranty (of depot service) left. Do you think it's advisable to upgrade the warranty?

 

ZaZ if you lived in the US you'd have a potential buyer. X(

Are the wireless cards for X200/X201 half height?

 

Is there a way to check it out for the WiFi card without taking the laptop apart? I have "Intel WiFi 5100 AGN" on mine.

This made my day! Btw, grats on new tablet!

 

the wireless card is not half height.

 

it's full-height on the X200 but half-height on the X201.   there are no full-height intel 1000/6200/6300 cards that i've ever seen.

the X200/201 chassis are provisioned to accept both full- and half-height wifi cards.

 

okay, so they moved to half height for the new intel wifi cards.

 

Awesome; thanks! Guess I'll keep this 6200 card.