T61 - Day 4.

[tomh009]

Actually, the widescreen is slightly larger in overall surface area than the 4:3.

Sorry, no, 4:3 really is larger. Given the 14.1" diagonal measurement, a conventional 4:3 panel is 95.4 square inches while the wide-screen 8:5 panel is 89.4 square inches.

[cshbc]

Thanks for the great write-up. I was quite torn between the panels but after reading your review, I went ahead and ordered the WXGA+ for myself. I can't wait, ETA 8/30! WOOOOHOOOOO..

Seriously though, thanks for taking the time to include all your background information. It makes a difference to know what your opinion is based on! Besides, if your 60 y/o eyes can read the screen well, I imagine my 30 something eyes will do just fine!!!

I received my T61 4 days ago.

Before I give you my impressions of this laptop, I think it's important to tell you about my background. This may help you decide how much credence you can have on my comments..........
.............
I honestly can't see anyone being disappointed with what's included in the T61 package, no matter what specs they get. The quality, reliability all seem to be in the tradition of the Thinkpad series.

[Greg Gebhardt]

My T61 - 7664-17U arrives tomorrow and am looking forward to it. Anyone have any comments on this turbo RAM thing, mine is listed with 1gb of turbo RAM.

Does it really speed things up?

[Jimco]

My T61 - 7664-17U arrives tomorrow and am looking forward to it. Anyone have any comments on this turbo RAM thing, mine is listed with 1gb of turbo RAM.

Does it really speed things up?

AnandTech's review showed that it actually slowed things down. However, Intel has said that the drivers aren't optimized and that we should expect to see much better performance from it soon. Hard to say.

I did have TM in mine ordered directly from Lenovo, but since Lenovo is now delaying shipment of T61s for quite some time, I canceled and went with an almost identical unit from PC Connection, but no TM.

[cshbc]

There's a thread about it, and I could not find the one that Jimco refers as well..

My T61 - 7664-17U arrives tomorrow and am looking forward to it. Anyone have any comments on this turbo RAM thing, mine is listed with 1gb of turbo RAM.

Does it really speed things up?

[Jimco]

. . .I could not find the one that Jimco refers as well..

Here it is:

http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=2985&p=4

[cshbc]

Thanks Jimco!

. . .I could not find the one that Jimco refers as well..

Here it is:

http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=2985&p=4

[nxman]

jjfcpa thanks for the review good to know that T61 is maintaining the Thinkpad quality.

[whizkid]

Actually, the widescreen is slightly larger in overall surface area than the 4:3.

Not according to my numbers. Going from a 14.1" diagonal, and assuming square pixels, the area of a 4:3 screen is 4*3*(14.1/5)^2 or 95.43 square inches.

Using WXGA and 14.1" (a 1.667 aspect ratio), and some help from Pythagoras, I get an area of 1280*768*(14.1/1493)^2 or 87.68 square inches or 91.9% as large.

Using WXGA+ (1.600 aspect ratio), I get 1440*900*(14.1/1698)^2 or 89.35 square inches or 93.6% as large.

While my numbers may not be exact, any 14.1" widescreen will always have a smaller area than a 14.1" 4:3 screen. The highest area with a 14.1" diagonal would of course be a square, and would get smaller until you have a display that's one pixel tall.

(sigh. I should read the entire thread before posting.)

[pianowizard]

any 14.1" widescreen will always have a smaller area than a 14.1" 4:3 screen.

The word "wide" probably misleads people into believing widescreens are larger than 4:3 screens with the same diagonal length. Perhaps widescreens should be called "shortscreens" instead to prevent such confusion.

[turnerpr]

The word "wide" probably misleads people into believing widescreens are larger than 4:3 screens with the same diagonal length. Perhaps widescreens should be called "shortscreens" instead to prevent such confusion.

LOL.... I agree!

[brnf]

..for a given diagonal, a square has the maximum area of any rectangle, so a 4:3 screen has more area than a WS.

[jdj]

I read the anandtech article on readyboost, but in my experience/opinion on my T43P upgraded to vista, I feel it has definitely reduced my hard drive running in turn performance seems better. It is a pain to have a USB memory stick stuck on the side so seeing it built in would be nice. I posted that somewhere in these forums and a member suggested to add another gig of ram but I didnt see as much (if any) difference. Total unscientific, just user experience.

JDJ

[paragc]

Agreed

But technically speaking, 4:3 screen is not a square either. For a given unit square, it is 4 units wide and only 3 units high. For sake of argument, one might consider a 4:3 as widescreen if a conventional widerscreen (16:10) did not exist. Perhaps we could also use the term widerscreen for 16:10

[tomh009]

5:4 - SXGA
4:3 - conventional computer displays and TVs
8:5 - "widescreen" computers
15:9 - European movies
16:9 - most modern movies, "widescreen" TVs
47:20 - "widescreen" movies

So what does "widescreen" mean, anyway?

[Talon88]

:::

Of cause WXGA have more display area.

14" WXGA 16:10
- 1280 x 800 = 1024000 pixel

14" XGA 4:3
- 1024 x 768 = 786432 pixel

So, which is having more display area?

:::

[SkiBunny]

Yes more pixels, but a smaller surface area. That's a mathematical fact - see the math a few posts up.

Tall screen is superior to short screen, IMHO.

[jjfcpa]

Yes more pixels, but a smaller surface area. That's a mathematical fact - see the math a few posts up.

Tall screen is superior to short screen, IMHO.

Not for software development. The wider the better.

It's a proven fact that your eyes can move side-to-side faster than they can move up and down.

[tomh009]

Tall screen is superior to short screen, IMHO.

Not for software development. The wider the better.

Personal preference there, too. For running something like Visual Studio, my preference would be two 4:3 screens, one for the development environment, and one for the application.

It's a proven fact that your eyes can move side-to-side faster than they can move up and down.

... but they have a hard time following very long lines. That's why most magazines and newspapers use a multi-column layout.

[Dead1nside]

Personal preference there, too. For running something like Visual Studio, my preference would be two 4:3 screens, one for the development environment, and one for the application.

Totally agree, dual monitors, one with the dev environment, one with the app.

[jjfcpa]

Not for software development. The wider the better.

Personal preference there, too. For running something like Visual Studio, my preference would be two 4:3 screens, one for the development environment, and one for the application.

It's a proven fact that your eyes can move side-to-side faster than they can move up and down.

... but they have a hard time following very long lines. That's why most magazines and newspapers use a multi-column layout.

At the office I use a Dell 27" widescreen, so why use two monitors when one will do what you want. However, when not tethered to the Dell LCD, a nice compact widescreen like the T61 works just fine for me.

[TheLaptopGuy]

Just got my T61(1440x900) and 1st thing I noticed when I turned it on was some light bleed at the bottom. Not very noticable when in Vista. Anyone else experience this?

Thanks

Todd

[gunston]

is there a option for T61 14″ Regular aspect (4:3 ratio) SXGA+ display ?

[pianowizard]

is there a option for T61 14″ Regular aspect (4:3 ratio) SXGA+ display ?

Not yet, but there will be.

[gunston]

is there a option for T61 14″ Regular aspect (4:3 ratio) SXGA+ display ?

Not yet, but there will be.

i would wait for it, together with Intel Turbo memory.

[danila.benhur]

Greeting,

Thanks for Your great review.

But I'm very interested in how much quiter and cooler this model is. Could You please check fan speed and temperature with TP Fan Control program while ideling and then for example run some 3D demo and post both results.

Here is the last messages on this software
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... &start=570
And here You can download it
http://staff-www.uni-marburg.de/~schmitzr/tpfc.zip
And here people share output values
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=17733

I'd really appreciate You efforts.

[Fidicinal]

Actually, the widescreen is slightly larger in overall surface area than the 4:3.

Not according to my numbers. Going from a 14.1" diagonal, and assuming square pixels, the area of a 4:3 screen is 4*3*(14.1/5)^2 or 95.43 square inches.

Using WXGA and 14.1" (a 1.667 aspect ratio), and some help from Pythagoras, I get an area of 1280*768*(14.1/1493)^2 or 87.68 square inches or 91.9% as large.

Using WXGA+ (1.600 aspect ratio), I get 1440*900*(14.1/1698)^2 or 89.35 square inches or 93.6% as large.

While my numbers may not be exact, any 14.1" widescreen will always have a smaller area than a 14.1" 4:3 screen. The highest area with a 14.1" diagonal would of course be a square, and would get smaller until you have a display that's one pixel tall.

(sigh. I should read the entire thread before posting.)

I actually meant that the T61 widescreen has an overall larger volume than the 4:3 T60. I wasn't referring to the screen, but to the entire laptop.