T61 4:3 SXGA+ Review T8100 2.1GHz, X3100 w/PICTURES

[agarza]

Background

Had been a IBM Thinkpad user since 2001. In the past I used an A22e with Celeron 800MHz, in 2002 upgraded to a T30 with P4-M @ 1.6GHz, in 2006 I switched to a stunner T42p which has at the time of its release my 'dream Thinkpad' considering my student budget. The latter served me well, but I got annoyed by the fan issue and overall heat machine so time for upgrade, preferably:
- The latest model from Lenovo that would sport the now ditched 4:3 resolution,with the same resolution as my T42p: SXGA+ -> T61
- Cool & Quiet
- Same Thinkpad quality, little hesitant now that Lenovo took over IBM
- Get rid of the GPU failure related to the T4x series
- Intel Core 2 Duo Processor. Maybe find a good 45nm processor Penryn that would last me at least 3+ years
- Light gaming (same games I used to play on my T42p: San Andreas, NFS Most Wanted, FSX, etc.)

My T42p came with a Dothan 1.8Ghz processor, 1G RAM, 40GB HDD, SXGA+. Basically pretty reliable although I did not took care well on the screen as it become scratched and then buffed with Brasso

Ordering

Bought a new T61 4:3 off e-Bay with 1 year warranty left

Specs

- T8100 Penryn 2.10 GHz, 45nm
- Intel X3100 integrated graphics
- 1G RAM as ordered (2x512MB actually)
- 80G 5400rpm Western Digital hard drive
- Supposedly according to one source from eBay my SXGA+ display is made by Toshiba
- Vista HP32
- IBM WLAN
- Express card, PC card
- 6-cell battery
- CDRW/DVD Combo

Pretty basic setup, no fancy BT or Fingerprint reader.

Ergonomics

Keyboard
The T61 keyboard it feels clickety compared to my quiet NMB keyboard I got for my T42p after I bought it. Still getting used to it, no flex whatsoever

Mouse/trackpad
Actually miss the red stripes, the touchpad is relatively small but I don't have any issues when using it. Love the trackpoint as I always had with previous Thinkpads.

Screen
Medium leakage at the bottom of the display, annoying when watching a widescreen movie or clip. Certainly more brighter as the one on my T42p but certainly this one have a lot of light leakage as said. There has been complaints on the quality on the T61 LCD's and I could agree but comparing this to other things I gain from where I'm upgraded I'm quite satisfied with the display.

The off-center screen is simply not an issue. It certainly seems weird to have the LCD off-center if I look at it but guess is all part of the design of the antennas and such.

Size & weight
Very similar in weight

Fan noise, heat

This is where the T61 shines. Lenovo did a good job redesigning all the heatsink/chassis vents so that heat is also dissipated passively through the keyboard and IMO the ExpressCard to. (the left palmrest feels at the same temperature than the right considering it has the HDD below I'm surprised to see heat has so many exits. The bottom of my T42p would get hot specially at the center of the machine and also below the touchpad (where the WLAN is and the southbridge are located). No such problems on the T61.

My T42p CPU has been undervolted using NHC, and although that the bottom still gets hot. In conjunction with this I made the fan to not run too often. T61 fan do not have the pulsing bug found on T4x models.

Build quality.

Mixed opinions, "The T61 is not as bad as people say" - it has its pros and cons. I don't have any creakiness or softness in the case that I would call bad. Overall the sturdiness on the T61 is better comparing to the T42p, although on the T61 the left bezel, just left to the left Shift key the plastic seems that is loose and if you tap it will make a cheap plastic sound, not soo great. Palmrest build is different on the T61, I like it and much more sturdy than the T42p one. Don't like the WLAN manual ON/OFF switch, it also feels cheap when you tap on it.

The laptop is firmly closed, no bulge whatsoever. The hinges are very fight (which I like ). There's no play on the battery compartment. I have not tested yet the battery duration during standard usage, but will do later.

Performance/Vista & CPU Power

Absolutely Vista was a nightmare to use, having only 1G of RAM made the OS to use the HDD as a virtual memory which resulted in extreme slugness. I burned Recovery Media and proceeded to immediately wipe the disk and install XP SP3 following the guide at NBR.

The T8100 did the 32M Wprime test @ 0.47seconds. Blazingly fast to my daily needs

Battery life

Later

Gaming

Plays fine, San Andreas @ 1024x768 with stock GMA965 drivers.

Heat

As mentioned the T61 is cool as a dream. Even undervolted the processor with RMClock at the lowest voltage available and the CPU would rarely shoot up the 58C tops. My T42p Dothan used to shoot the mid 60's when stressing and the GPU (which was a FireGL T2e could reach a temp of up to 80C). I'm just glad I went with the X3100.

I still find the fan is ON almost all the time, so I just download TPFanControl and set it the way I was I wanted.


Additional Comments:
- When powering on the T61 the fan does not come at full speed like it did on 'original' Thinkpads
- The later of the BIOS startup splash screen is different, Lenovo biased.
- Additional Power LED implemented on Lenovo designed machines.

I think I made the right move to move to the latest and last 4:3 T series Thinkpad it will ever be made at time. Maybe if I waited for another 6 months or so it would be difficult to get one of these machines new. The fact I got a Penryn processor makes my investment a good one. Cool and quiet, no BSOD's or problems with hardware so far. Soon I will upgrade to maybe 3Gigs. I don't plan switching to Vista, simply hate it.

If you plan on getting a Thinkpad and simply hate those WS versions get a T61 4:3 while they last. Maybe in the future I would get a 14.1 WS Thinkpad, don't think they look ugly. Let's see how the machine lives up to Thinkpad life span expectancy now that I don't intend to replace it anytime soon.

Pictures: (along comparing it to my old T42p):
http://thinkpads.picturepush.com/
ENJOY

[dr_st]

Thank you for the nice review and pictures.

I wonder how one can have a Penryn with one year warranty "left". Surely it was bought less than a year ago, so it was bought with either 1 or 2 years of warranty, which would mean that by now it has either about 0.5 or 1.5 years left. How much warranty is on it really?

I assume that the offset screen is really not noticeable during work, it's just something a bit annoying when you suddently look at it and think "why the hell did they do it?". I also think that the offset screen is not as bad on the 4:3 models as it is on the widescreen. Certainly, the 4:3 T61s are much nicer looking (outside the offset screen they look almost like 4:3 T60s).

You should be happy with getting one of the last exemplars of a dying breed. I myself recently purchased a used 15" SXGA+ T60 - the last non-Tablet IPS laptop in modern history. Together with the 14" SXGA+ T60 I have from work, I feel like I'm in the posession of a couple of rarities, which makes me very proud.

Enjoy your cool new toy!

[Harryc]

Nice review. What's with the money and the cell phone in the pics ... trying to impress the ladies ?

[crazyfrog]

Nice review. What's with the money and the cell phone in the pics ... trying to impress the ladies ?

No. His camera won't be able to focus if he didn't put something bright on his black buddies.

Let me tell you how to take a picture of black things:
1, lay something bright on it first;
2, half press the shutter button and let the camera focus;
3, remove your focus aid stuff and press the shutter button down.

You need to try several different stuff to make the camera capture the brightness correctly.

[agarza]

Nice review. What's with the money and the cell phone in the pics ... trying to impress the ladies ?

HAHA, the pics with the watch and the other stuff is just to impress, indeed. I guess there should be a Speedmaster Omega on the pic, but hey I'm on a budget, my point is that Thinkpad is a senior brand respectable so it should considered a luxury laptop, I heard Thinkpads were considered the Cadillacs of laptop, what do you think.

crazyfrog, thanks for the advice will take some pics later.

dr_st, yes I think the machine was bought some time ago, this was my only chance to get the 'dying breed' shipped to Mexico. eBay seller was pretty friendly, actually he was a she. Laptop was shipped from Michigan. Warranty expires on 10-2009. I have never had actually to use really the warranty service, the only machine I owned in which I had 3 complete years was a nice T30 bought in 2002. Later than that my old A22e needed a hard disk replacement just one day before the 1-year warranty expired.

I paid for the laptop 880USD + Shipping. Guess is not a bad deal, considering it's getting rarer to get the 4:3 models. Actually 2 weeks ago I saw a similarly spec'ed T61 listed on MercadoLibre Mexico (the ebay of Mexico, kind of) for a similar price, but with XGA screen, 2G of RAM and DVDR burner, sold too fast actually.

Edit. An off-topic question, what's the flavours of T61 batteries, 6 & 9 cells, I heard about the 4 cell version, does my T61 have the 4 cell?

[flypenfly]

Lenovo Thinkpads are the Jeep of the computer industry.

Not very well built and materials aren't top notch but they are extremely tough by design. Usability also isn't the best with dim screens through the majority of it's laptops and tiny trackpads.

BMW/Lexus would be Apple laptops. Superbly built and uses some of the nicest materials for a mass production consumer product while being priced up market. They also have very good usability with giant trackpads and generously bright screens but they're also not nearly as tough as a Thinkpad to physical abuse.

[mybellyisempty]

the 4 cell battery is only found in the 14" widescreens. they also have a 6, 7, and 9 cell, apparantly.

the 14" standard and 15/15.4" screens use 6 or 9 cell batteries.

[dr_st]

Lenovo Thinkpads are the Jeep of the computer industry.

Not very well built and materials aren't top notch but they are extremely tough by design. Usability also isn't the best with dim screens through the majority of it's laptops and tiny trackpads.

BMW/Lexus would be Apple laptops. Superbly built and uses some of the nicest materials for a mass production consumer product while being priced up market. They also have very good usability with giant trackpads and generously bright screens but they're also not nearly as tough as a Thinkpad to physical abuse.

So to you usability is defined by screen brightness and the size of the touchpad?

Let me remind you that Thinkpads used to have IPS screens, that are far superior to anything Apple ever put on theirs, no matter how bright. Thinkpads also have trackpoints with three mouse buttons. Apple's touchpad may be as big as a football court, its still a touchpad which is useless by design (not to mention that they don't even have a right mouse button, sheesh).

[flypenfly]

So to you usability is defined by screen brightness and the size of the touchpad?

Let me remind you that Thinkpads used to have IPS screens, that are far superior to anything Apple ever put on theirs, no matter how bright. Thinkpads also have trackpoints with three mouse buttons. Apple's touchpad may be as big as a football court, its still a touchpad which is useless by design (not to mention that they don't even have a right mouse button, sheesh).

Keyword there is USED TO, as in they do not anymore for a long time now. Apple's LED backlit screens which they've been using for some time now exceeds all current Thinkpad screens that is until Lenovo has very recently caught on using LED technology on a few select models.

Apple's huge trackpad with multitouch is something I wish my T61p had. I can use a trackpoint just fine but I'm much quicker with a fast and accurate trackpad especially with multitouch. Obviously you've never really used a modern macbook for any length of time as it's trivial to right click with one hand.

A trackpad is not even close to useless by design, in fact it's a lot more usable for the great majority of people than a trackpoint.

The T61p light is also pretty pathetic compared to a backlit keyboard offered by Apple. Another usability limitation vs a Macbook Pro. Somehow, Lenovo has also managed to mess up the light according to recent reviews.

I'm not entirely sure you understand what Usability means.

I have had several laptops and still have a 17" Mackbook Pro, and a few Thinkpads so I can compare directly. As far as basic physical usability, the MBP exceeds the Thinkpad by a great margin. However, in terms of brute physical strength, the Thinkpad of course wins. Both are handily beaten by the Toughbook though in this measure.

Thinkpad's greatest strength right now isn't innovation or quality, it's price. You can get some very nice machines bargain hunting even more than a Dell.

[Marin85]

These are the first real-life pics of T61 4:3 I see. I was very curious in the past to find some, but google mostly shows 14 inch widescreen models.
As to ThinkPads being Cadillacs, there are some tiny ThinkPads with quite long battery life. Cadillacs are not that tiny, also one has to tank them quite often

Cheers

Marin

[crazyfrog]

Another Lenovo ThinkPad T61 14.1-inch Review with real-life pics.

[Marin85]

Thanks for the link! The review is quite interesting.

[dr_st]

Keyword there is USED TO, as in they do not anymore for a long time now. Apple's LED backlit screens which they've been using for some time now exceeds all current Thinkpad screens that is until Lenovo has very recently caught on using LED technology on a few select models.

While LED screens are nicer than CCFL-based in some ways, the LED lighting does not compensate for the low quality of the TN panels. All it does is make the screen brighter and the colors more saturated. BTW it was not so long ago that IPS screens disappeared - the T60 still had them. And while Thinkpads lost this advantage, they are now getting more and more LED screens, which also offset the comparative advantage of Macbook screens.

Apple's huge trackpad with multitouch is something I wish my T61p had. I can use a trackpoint just fine but I'm much quicker with a fast and accurate trackpad especially with multitouch. Obviously you've never really used a modern macbook for any length of time as it's trivial to right click with one hand.

A trackpad is not even close to useless by design, in fact it's a lot more usable for the great majority of people than a trackpoint.

We'll just have to agree to disagree. I do not want to turn this thread into a trackpoint-v-touchpad discussion, because it is completely off-topic, but you will find people with both opinions, and for every person claiming that the Macbook has superior usability due to an advanced touchpad, you will find a person saying it is inferior due to absence of a trackpoint. At least among experienced business users, which are used to business-grade laptops and trackpoints.

The T61p light is also pretty pathetic compared to a backlit keyboard offered by Apple. Another usability limitation vs a Macbook Pro. Somehow, Lenovo has also managed to mess up the light according to recent reviews.

This I agree with, although personally I find neither necessary. I never use the Thinklight, because I don't need to look at the keyboard to type, and if I did, the brightness of the screen is sufficient in 99% of the cases.

If you wish to continue this discussion - perhaps a moderator should move the posts to a new thread in general/off-topic, because it seems totally irrelevant to this thread.