Need advise for used thinkpad

[arunkumarzz]

Is it advisable to buy the following ThinkPad?

https://www.olx.in/item/lenovo-thinkpad ... 08b517e500

Moderator edit: Moved from initially, incorrectly being posted in the Marketplace.

[MikalE]

Not from that seller. He's already lied about how old it is. Those pictures may not even be of the machine you're buying.

Four years old. Right. Try FourTEEN years old maybe.

[wujstefan]

13" X61? DDR3?

I wouldnt buy it there. Especially given that it's not the cheapest X61 I've seen.

[rkawakami]

@arunkumarzz:

Welcome to thinkpads.com! I'd have to say that many of the members here are based in the USA. As such, you might get purchasing advice that's based upon our availability of used equipment. Like from eBay.com. The last X61 I bought was exactly four years ago. It is a model type 7676-74U that came with 3GB of memory and no hard drive. I paid just under US$50, or about 3200 rupees. And that price includes shipping the system to me. So, assuming that this laptop comes with a little bit more memory AND a hard drive with supposedly a valid OS installation AND is local to you, then US$100 might be a fair price.

However, as the previous comments have said, this laptop is much more than 4 years old (first X61 systems were released around 2007 and were withdrawn around 2010), does NOT use DDR3 memory (it's DDR2), and does NOT have a 13" screen (all X60/X61 systems are 12.1"). That alone should tell you the trustworthiness and/or personal knowledge of the seller.

[arunkumarzz]

Hello Everyone,

Thanks for your response.

I wanna buy a used thinkpad at cheaper price just to install ubuntu on it. I dont use it regularly and also heavily.

I guess that is a good priced laptop if he is not lying about anything(battery).

Thanks,
Arun Kumar

[jaspen-meyer]

Hello Everyone,

Thanks for your response.

I wanna buy a used thinkpad at cheaper price just to install ubuntu on it. I dont use it regularly and also heavily.

I guess that is a good priced laptop if he is not lying about anything(battery).

Thanks,
Arun Kumar

He says it is a 6-cell battery. I don't think there is such a thing as a 6-cell battery for the x61.

So, he's lied about:
1. the age (it was made in 2007, not 2013)
2. the ram -- it is ddr2
3. the battery -- it is either 4-cell or 8-cell

7200 INR is a lot for that machine.

I have about 10 x60, or x61, machines, and use them only for linux. If you want the cheapest machine possible, get an x60 without a disk and without ram, or just 512mb, or 1gb of ram.

For my spare linux machines I put a 16gb ssd in.

x61 screens can be very dim (80 -100 nits) if the machine has been used a lot. The light in the screen is a CCFL. This light, and the invertor board which powers it, can be replaced with an LED backlight kit from China.

[rkawakami]

The photo of the battery (#2 in series of 4) shows an 8-cell design. You can tell by the fact that it sticks out from the laptop all of the way across the back side. The 4-cell battery fits flush with the back and does not stick out at all. Note that the seller hasn't really told you much about the battery other than it is supposed to last about 2 hours. Under what operating condition is unstated (2 hours idle? Light use? Heavy use? "Backup", to me does not really describe it.). You don't know the age, how many recharge cycles it has been exposed to (both will give you an idea how long it might now last) or whether or not it is a genuine Lenovo battery or an aftermarket.

If your intention is to dump Windows 10 and install Linux, then I would be patient and wait for another X61 to show up. Why pay for something you're not going to use? I'm sure that the seller has inflated the price of the laptop because it already has an OS installed. If you were going to use W10, you should note that it was never offered by the factory as an option on the X61.

I wouldn't go as far as calling the seller an outright liar; there is a small chance that he has no idea about Thinkpads or the X61 in particular. It could be that he has OWNED the laptop for 4 years, doesn't know anything about computer memory (assumed, or was told incorrectly that it uses DDR3) and measured the LID dimension and assumed that the screen was the same size underneath. In short, I'm not making any excuses for the seller; merely telling you that it's up to you to be knowledgeable about what you are buying. That you came here to this forum and asked some questions means you are already on the right road.