Thinkpads Forum

Heyho,

I'm not sure about my future Graphicchip.

I want to have a very silent notebook but since i selled my
desktop PC i also want to play some, more or less, old games
like Warcraft3/Quake3/Call of Duty2 on the weekends.

It's already clear for me that i do not want a X1400 chip, as I
already read that these chips get very warm, meaning the fan
is spinning all the time. I also read that the X1300 gets like
20° cooler like the X1400.

Can anyone tell me if the fan runs significantly more often with
a X1300 than with a Intel GMA chip?


Thanks guys !!


PS:
If I'll buy the Book with the X1300 card, is there a possibilty
to deactivate it and work with the Intel GMA chip? (this would
assume that any T60 has already an OnBoard-chip - I don't
know if that is the case)

PS2:
I also heard about some T60s fan "beeping" (I guess thats
maybe not the correct english word for it) in a very high sound. I
would also be happy about any information whether this is
also the case with the X1300/Intel GMA. Thanks!

I have an x1300 and it doesn't get hot at all. I don't think it would be all that different from the x1400. In general, the GPU's will only get hot under heavy 3d gaming, which is the case with almost any 3d card out there. In all honesty, the spinning of the hard drive on my T60 is louder than the fan ever is on my machine, so regardless of which video card you go with you'll have to deal with that. I have a fujitsu drive, and I am told that those are the loudest of all, so you may want to avoid that.
As for being able to turn off the discrete GPU and fall back onto integrated graphics, this simply is not an option. Very few manufacturers want to pay extra to put both on the motherboard as its extra cost that the user probably won't use. The only exception I know of is the Sony Vaio-SZ which has a switch that enables/disables discrete graphics. However, in order to use the switch, one has to fully shut down and turn back on the machine before changing the switch
As for the fan "beeping", I'm not quite sure what you're referring to. Like I said, the fan noise isn't all that noticable to me when compared to the whirring of the hard drive. I hope this helps you out some.

To give you my take, the laptop is only loud under heavy CPU and/or GPU load. The fan speed never exceeds 3500rpm, and at 3000rpm it is a fairly quiet noise of flowing air.

The other posters have already told you what you need to know:

1) In the T60 series, the motherboard has EITHER the GMA graphics or the discrete (X1300/X1400/v5200) chips, not both.

2) The fan/noise issue is not an issue in my opinion. Either you have the discrete chip or you don't and when you're doing heavy use of it (gaming) it will get hotter. But, the fan is relatively quiet, even at high speed. I know that many people on this forum are concerned about these matters (small noise variations) but in my opinion and experience, the T60 is "almost silent most of the time".

3) I've installed Windows Vista on a second hard drive and used it for a while so I can tell you that you will want 2 things in your T60 if you want to run Vista on it in the future: a discrete GPU and more RAM.

So, I suggest you look for a Core Duo T60 with a X1300 (like the model I have) if you want to be sure you have a quiet machine that can run Vista. And, when you install Vista, plan on installing 2GB of RAM (although 1GB is fine with XP). I think it will become harder to find a Core Duo with X1300 in the coming few weeks. They are all being replaced with Core 2 Duo and X1400 chips (which is what I suggest you get if you care about Vista).

There should be some great deals on Core Duo T60's soon, though.

I hope this info helps. Let me know if it does.

Hey,

thanks to everybody who posted here for your help!


@kulivontot
1) I have no problem when the GPU gets hot and the notebook
loud under 3d-action because the sound of the game will make you
miss the fan-noises. BUT I've read in the german Thinkpad forum
that the X1400 gets so hot (70° in idle, 90° in 3d-work) that the
fan has to run all the time even if you're just surfing or just writing stuff.
Thats what i do not want while writing or surfing.

2) Thanks for the information about the fujitsu drive!

3) The beeping is supposed to be a hot topic in the thinkpad world.
At least ive read much about that in german and US forums. Its
some failure in the cooling-/fansystem that creates this very high
frequency sound (like the alarm devices of cars)

@perry_78
Yep, I know that the fan runs lesser with a X13 than with a X14
(because there are 20° difference). So the conclusion should be
that it runs even more lesser with a GMA GPU which runs with 40°
in idle mode, shouldn't it ?


@wallybear
Thanks for infos!!

But I'd rather go along with linux than windows vista. But I
probably can't hold off installing it :)

--

I just can repeat my mainproblem:
Fan-noise difference between Intel GMA, X1300 and X1400 in
-IDLE MODE-
I don't care about the noise under heavy performance :)

I would really appreaciate more answers !! :D

Thanks

hello :-o

Seeb wrote: I just can repeat my main problem:
Fan-noise difference between Intel GMA, X1300 and X1400 in
-IDLE MODE-
I don't care about the noise under heavy performance

This is exactly what I want to know as well.