Thinkpads Forum

Sorry to be late to the party, but I just started back on to the Forum yesterday. However, this is a very interesting post to me as I've spent a lot of time around this generation of machine. Right now I have a mostly finished R500 (can't find the HDD cover) a dead nVidia T61 and a Z61m (Titanium) all taking up room under my bench!

There are all too good to get rid of, but I can't figure out what to do with them. Like the OP, I was thinking of having one in the "shop" to look up PDF schematics etc. and maybe turn another into the replacement for my A31 mobile server project.

Too many options! These are just such excellent machine and capable of doing almost anything that it's difficult to figure out which direction to go!

Z61m is an interesting one to keep. Of that generation it is the most equipped, with Firewire, S-Video, Infrared, and Card Reader. Contemporary Thinkpads like the R60 had all but the Card Reader, and the T60 only had the IR. The next gen lost the IR except for the standard screen T61, and only R61 kept S-Video. Also who needs a rollcage when you have a titanium lid.

TPFanatic wrote:Z61m is an interesting one to keep.

+ 1

Also who needs a rollcage when you have a titanium lid.

LOL so true.

I think 770 series are interesting as well. Obviously they are just TOO underpowered for today's use. When you take that machine apart, you find that it is basically like a desktop with Power, GPU, CPU, modem, etc. as separate boards. It also has a DVD-ROM drive and MPEG2 decoder for my 770ED but unfortunately the power board failed so it is a piece of junk now. It has amazing screen of its time and you can get SXGA if you have the later models, it has a pair of speakers even louder than A3x with just as decent quality. It has Ultrabay II which is 100% hot-swappable without putting the machine to sleep. The eject mechanism is also interesting. It is the first ThinkPad to have a newer scroll button and press-to-select for the trackpoint, and also one of the only models that does NOT have a easily removable keyboard, unlike its predecessors. You have NO LED on the keyboard bezel but instead you get a screen that shows all the status. I loved that machine so much and I felt very sad to discover the death of the power board.

IMO the best T400 you can buy with Intel ONLY graphics is the best standard machine.

I think its hard to get one for that much since you're asking for a machine with a charger, legit operating system, *some* battery and an ok hdd.

I personally would have questions about that... I mean you guys know most of our modus operandi by now... we buy ex lease machines sometimes sans hdd but even if it had a hdd, its either too slow or its on Vista or its had thousands of hours on it... how can you trust it?

So you slap in a $50 ssd. that ups the cost.

Then you add Win7 Slic, that's $100 saved.

No charger? I dont care I have a box full, thats $30 saved.

So a WORKING practical $100 Thinkpad w/ charger isnt that easy even with the Thinkpad archaeology skills I have.

Just wondering if OP is back and if (s)he is still interested...