t400s - keyboard disappointment

Took delivery of a t400s recently.

Overall it gives a nice quality feel. The screen is better than I expected. Outdoor viewability is fine and viewing angles are fine (what one can expect from a TN panel). It feels slightly large coming from dell x1 (12inch). The acoustic characteristics are excellent (can be very quiet).

One major dissapointments though:

I thougth Thinkpad's were supposed to have ueber-keyboards?

Compared to Dell X1 this is spongy.

More importantly perhaps: The keyboard is not flush to the body. This means that if one taps a key really carefully, one gets one type of feedback (the intended I suppose). If it is tapped harder, one gets the normal feedback, plus a plasticky sound from the keyboard stricking some internal structure.

This applies to e.g., the Del or the Esc key and the arrow keys, but also to the mid-section of the keyboard (e.g., A - D). Not all keys have this feedback (H - K for example are fine).

The body also flexes around the F buttons and the thinkvantage panel, and particularly over the CD-drive.

It's a pity - because the keyboard feels very responsive where it isn't flexing/bouncing of the internal structure....

The keyboard on the Dell X1, on the other hand, is solid as a rock....



There is also the cpu whine / high frequency whine. But it's not as strong since I re-installed vista ....


Cheers

 

Your keyboard doesn't sound right -- haven't used a T400s myself, but reviews say the keyboard is excellent e.g.

http://www.thinkpads.com/2009/06/22/review-lenovo-thinkpad-t400s/

Maybe contact lenovo support, or post on the lenovo community forums for more help (hopefully from one of the lenovo reps that monitor them)

http://forums.lenovo.com/

 

Make sure the keyboard is seated properly. If you said it isn't flush maybe it isn't on right.

 

I had a Fujitsu laptop that had the same whine and I noticed that the whine went away when it was plugged in to a power source but got noisier when it was unplugged. Could it be the fan being more noisy when not hooked up to a power source ??

 

The whine is associated with cheap components being used and a big engineering flaw. All these motherboards are produced by one or two companies (foxconn I think) and both lenovo and foxconn want to "rush the product" so they can make lots of money. When the CPU goes into a low power state (idle and sometimes in battery mode), the components on the motherboard start to resonate at an audible frequency. It's just like the Therac-25 error.

This problem has been present since the Core 2 platform and still no proper fix.

 

I believe I can comment on this since I recently (4-5 months ago) moved to a thinkpad from a dell business laptop. I have to say that I agree it initially feels kinda different compared to the dell, but it should grow on you. As far as which is better, I prefer dell business circa 2006-2008 (haven't tried the newest dells yet) over my thinkpad but I think of it as more of a side-grade and not a downgrade. The whine and other issues would make me send it back to get fixed as neither is normal.

 

I wanted to mention that I have none of the flexing problems with my T400s keyboard. I tried to emulate the problems around the Trackpoint and the ThinkVantage button, but simply can't produce any flex. I type rather fast and am therefore very picky about keyboards, so I would definitely notice a problem. I have a US keyboard currently, as I purchased this machine in the States. However, I will be swapping the keyboard out in a week or so with a Japanese keyboard. I hope that one is fine!