T61 was stolen, what to replace it with?

[askdefj]

So, my rental car was broken into while I was traveling to Vancouver for my Grandmother's one year memorial. Ironically, it was in a paid parking garage where I thought I would be safe. I guess not... Perfect timing, as my first day of the spring semester is tomorrow.

Anyways, I was running a T61/2.0 centrino pro core duo/4 gb ram/win 7. I loved everything about it and it seems like it's going for ~$300 used which is not too bad.. especially for a college student. But, I'd like to try a 12" Think pad, the thing is, I can't afford something like the X200. X40s seem to pop up for $2-300, but I'm not sure how they compare to the T61 performance wise. All my computers have been running Core Duo for the past couple years and have grown to love it.

I don't do much other than word processing, surfing the net, and watching videos in HD online. I'm sure the X40 can handle the word processing and surfing the net part, but I'm a bit anal when it comes to watching videos online as I want it to be as smooth as possible. Nothing choppy.

Oh and also, I love windows 7. Looking for something that will run that decently. If all else fails, I can always go back to the T61. Any suggestions?

Thanks!

[georgelam]

Welcome to the forum! (and sorry about your stolen T61).

Anyway, the X series is great for a college student having to carry it around campus. The X60/X61 series seem to fit what you are looking for - except for a small number of X60 with the Core Solo T1300, almost all of them have either a Core Duo or Core 2 Duo. The X60/X61 have the standard voltage processors while the X60s/X61s are variants of them with low voltage processors. Look here for more details:

http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Hardware_Specifications

You should be able to find one in good condition in the $300-$400 range on eBay. Due to various reasons (older and slower cpu, the extremely slow 1.8" stock PATA hard drive, to name a couple) I would stay away from the X40/X41 unless you know exactly what you are doing.

There was a thread about 5 months ago started by someone who was looking into an X6x series ThinkPad. You may find the information helpful:

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=79929

[j-dawg]

Sucks about your T61. Find the guy and eat his intestines.

That takes time, though, so until you can get your just desserts, may I recommend following the above poster's advice. I have used an X41 and my own X61t, and the difference is pretty big. The tablet uses a low-voltage processor, too, so a regular X61 will be even faster.

[Eudoxus]

I think that X61 or X61s should be the right machine for you. Look in the marketplace here pn the forum as from time to time you can find nice machines there.
Good luck!

[visionviper]

X61 is a great choice and if you have a bit more money to spend the X2xx ones are great too.