Thinkpads Forum

in one of the posts here (i can't easily find it now) someone mentioned that they had read a number of reports that said the t60 14" 1400x1050 display wasn't very good.

can someone confirm or deny this?

That's what I want to know as well.

How different it is between

14'1 inch XGA

and

14'1 SXGA apart from resolution difference?

I have the T60 2623D6U, and it has the 14.1 SXGA (1400x1050).

I never liked the glossy screens because of their glare and although it is not as good as my desktop screen I think that the monitor is fine, or at least for me.

The viewing angle at least horizontally is fine on the screen, I don't like having a really wide viewing angle horizontally as it allows other people to easily see what it is you are doing. If you want to watch movies on it and have other people watch it off of your monitor you may have problems with the horizontal viewing angles and dislike the lower contrast.

Vertically, the viewing angle is not what I think is optimal as I find that for dark content (darker movies, darker games) I find that I have to adjust the tilt of the screen more to watch / play them.

When viewing my screen at various viewing angles I found that the worst was darker content. When browsing the net, reading email or even playing brighter games I found the viewing angles to be completely fine. The lack of viewing angle is only apparent on the darker content which I have only really found in some movies and games.

If you play a lot of games, you may find that you have to manually set the screen resolution to 1400x1050, as most games I find just have the resolutions hard coded to 800x600, 1024x768, 1280x1024 leaving out "weird" resolutions such as 1400x1050. I find this fine as I like the higher resolution screen, others may find it a little annoying.

I would have liked to have a little better contrast and mostly a larger vertical viewing angle with the laptop, but I think that it is fine. Personally, I find the higher resolution adds more value than the smaller viewing angle detracts from the overall value. Its very rare that I am in a situation where I wish for more of a vertical viewing angle but it does happen (primarily when watching Battlestar Galactica (1978 version).)

Jedacite wrote:I have the T60 2623D6U, and it has the 14.1 SXGA (1400x1050).

I never liked the glossy screens because of their glare and although it is not as good as my desktop screen I think that the monitor is fine, or at least for me.

is the 14.1" 1400x1050 t60 display glossy?

the SVGA+ suits me perfectly... though the angle might not be enough for everyone, but its enough for the one user.

besonen wrote:

Jedacite wrote:I have the T60 2623D6U, and it has the 14.1 SXGA (1400x1050).

I never liked the glossy screens because of their glare and although it is not as good as my desktop screen I think that the monitor is fine, or at least for me.

is the 14.1" 1400x1050 t60 display glossy?

No non of the thinkpads have glossy screens. Correct me if i'm wrong...

I was first unhappy with the SXGA+ screen of mine, but eventually got used to it. The light leakage is only apparent when going from a high quality screen, and as mentioned before, only with dark content.

I find the screen perfectly satisfactory, but that said, it doesnt compare to the Macbook Pro ones for example.

besonen wrote:

Jedacite wrote:I have the T60 2623D6U, and it has the 14.1 SXGA (1400x1050).

I never liked the glossy screens because of their glare and although it is not as good as my desktop screen I think that the monitor is fine, or at least for me.

is the 14.1" 1400x1050 t60 display glossy?

I guess that I wasn't very clear in my post. My laptop is not glossy, which suits me fine as I do not like glossy screens too much due to glare.

The problem with the reviews is that you never know which screen they reviewed.
Notebook manufacturers always have a variety of suppliers for a screen.
If you check the hardware manuals and some listings of enthusiatists who disassembled notebooks you end up with screens from 3-8 different sources (BOE, Hydis, IDTech, LG, Samsung, Hitachi, Quanta, Sharp, AU...)
Unfortunately the screens differ a lot!
On the T4x series you can have 200-350 contrast ratio and 100-170 nits. It is a lottery.

If you happened to get a very good screen and it goes pinkish, keep it and replace the worn out CCFL ($20), instead of asking IBM to replace the whole display and get a new crappy exchange (happened to me).

in one of the posts here (i can't easily find it now) someone mentioned that they had read a number of reports that said the t60 14" 1400x1050 display wasn't very good.

can someone confirm or deny this

?

No, please see if you can find that post and find what the actual context of the post was. SXGA+ is a great screen, but it's still relative to what you are used to, if you've been accustomed to XGA then at first SXGA+ will be a big step, but like mentioned above once you use it for while it is hard to go back. I recommend having one laptop with XGA and one with SXGA+ and compare for a few days.

beeblebrox wrote:The problem with the reviews is that you never know which screen they reviewed.
Notebook manufacturers always have a variety of suppliers for a screen.
If you check the hardware manuals and some listings of enthusiatists who disassembled notebooks you end up with screens from 3-8 different sources (BOE, Hydis, IDTech, LG, Samsung, Hitachi, Quanta, Sharp, AU...)
Unfortunately the screens differ a lot!
On the T4x series you can have 200-350 contrast ratio and 100-170 nits. It is a lottery.

This really ticks me off...If Lenovo wants to buy screens from several manufacturers, then they should demand the same specs so that ALL ThinkPad buyers know what they are getting. If you are E-Machines then having a range of specs is ok to reduce costs of an entry level machine, but when you are paying premium dollars for a ThinkPad, then we should expect Lenovo to be a little more picky about the specs from different manufactures.

I have a new T60 with 1400x1050 screen. As another person noted, the side-to-side viewing angle is good, but the up-and-down is not good. I think it's really quite bad, in fact. I'm constantly tilting the screen back and forth to manage contrast of the screen for me. I can't imagine what this will be like when I am trying to work in a confined space, like in an airplane.