Thinkpads Forum

Hello,
I have a T60 15.4" widescreen (8744-5BU) for personal use and a T60p 14.1" (2008-83U) for work. I bought my T60 widescreen in January and had always suspected the keyboard was overly soft, and lacking the typical IBM "crunch"; ie, the keys seem to depress too easily and not deep enough. Well sure enough, the T60p keyboard is noticeably stiffer and more "IBM-like". Anyone have similar thoughts? What can I do? Help!
Thanks!

PS: I have also noticed that the T60 widescreen palmrest plastic is of finer grain than the T60p.

There are three kinds of T60 keyboards. Which keyboard you get is luck-of-the-draw.

Chicony - good but soft. Most people find this keyboard the least desirable, with a "mushy" feedback
ALPS: very good. The action is a little stiff, but still very accurate and comfortable.
NMB: excellent, with just the right amount of tactile feedback and resistence. There have been better Thinkpad keyboards, but NMB is the best you can get on a "thin" notebook. I used to think that T60 NMB keyboards were fiction until I (finally) recently got one.

If you keyboard is substandard and you suspect that it's underperforming, you can call Lenovo/IBM and request a keyboard swap-out. This web page gives keyboard part numbers:
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-62728

Beware: Lenovo/IBM has started taking Chicony keyboards and putting a sticker over the Chicony label to re-part them as NMB keyboards. If you see a 39T0958 sticker over another sticker (Chicony, 39T7178), you've been had.

Ron, take a look at the linked pic from EBay. Is that an NMB? Also is there a way to tell what keyboard is installed on a T60 without taking it apart and looking at the keyboard?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... otohosting

Nope it's Chicony.

ryengineer wrote:Nope it's Chicony.

Well, unless the seller is very helpful (and knowledgeable), it would seem to me that it would be very difficult to get an NMB off of EBay because it almost seems like you need to look at the thing. Many sellers list 39T7178 39T0958 as the same part.

This is NMB, atleast that's what the fru # says.

Very informative post. Thanks! I seem to recall that my T60 widescreen had a NMB - someone posted something where you could check by serial number or something. Although, now I am not so sure...

So it seems that the T60 widescreen had an ALPS while the T60p had a NMB. The ALPS seems too soft. The NMB is more "IBM-like".