Thinkpads Forum

Hi all,
I need some help figuring out what to do about my LCD. I'm a photographer who's on the road quite a lot. I love my T61, it's been a workhorse, but the weakest link is the LCD. I've upgraded to SSD and 8 GB of RAM.
I saw from another link that screenaid sells replacement LCD's but are they the same quality or are they better? I'd be willing to pay for IPS screens if that was available. When I'm at home and compare what I see on my LCD to my CRT, it's night and day. I know its not a fair comparison. What suggestions do you guys have? Should I also change the backlight? Is that even possible? I have an old 14" w/ 1440x900 resolution. I need something that produces better whites and viewing angles. I never know if I'm setting levels right because slight tilts will throw everything off. Help!

George

geohsia wrote:I need something that produces better whites and viewing angles.

Sell your T61 and get one of the tablets. That's your path to better whites and viewing angles. There's no IPS available for the T61.

FredGarvin wrote:Sell your T61 and get one of the tablets. That's your path to better whites and viewing angles. There's no IPS available for the T61.

Unfortunately the tablets don't have the same performance or configurability. I'd rather save up for the W series. I know there isn't IPs available. Are the aftermarket replacement LCDs the same quality as the original or are they better?

W700 dual display is the creme de la creme of Thinkpads IMO.

geohsia wrote:Unfortunately the tablets don't have the same performance or configurability. I'd rather save up for the W series. I know there isn't IPs available. Are the aftermarket replacement LCDs the same quality as the original or are they better?

True, but the tablets have the viewing angles, which is what you're after. The W series do not offer them. Depending on what you're doing with your notebook, the better CPU may not make much of a difference. If you're willing to open your machine and void your warranty, the X200 AFFS screen swap is a possibility, see the details here. The X200 would get you up to a Penryn Core 2 Duo, which would be better than your T61.

I'm not aware of any T61 LCDs that are significantly better than what you've got now. Probably the two best more recent Thinkpad LCDs are the high brightness LCD offered on the T400 and LG WSXGA+ offered on the T61/T500/R61/R500, though neither will compare to an IPS.

If you can do with less ram, the easy solution would be to just pick up a T60 with IPS.

If you need it for your job, have a look at the newest HP with IPS (Yes, that's correct, IPS) LCD.
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=58&t=86215

T60p IPS has my vote...

FredGarvin wrote:Sell your T61 and get one of the tablets. That's your path to better whites and viewing angles.

But the sensor layer makes the screen look a bit grainy and fuzzy. Consequently, the tablets' IPS (or IPS-style) screens are nowhere as good as those of the 15.0" T4* and T60(p).

I agree with others that a T60 or T60p with IPS would be the way to go for the OP.

All, thanks for the replies. The T60p's with Flexview is a good option but I have no idea where I can get a decent one today. Will it even work with SSD's and Vista 64? I feel as though I'd be going backwards. I was hoping that the W501 would be good enough but someone mentioned that viewing angles are poor so that's out the door. The HP is certainly an interesting option but later posts indicate it is not an IPS screen.

Besides finding a used beat up T60 on eBay, where else can I go? Is the W501 screen that bad?

There's always the option of a Frankenpad 15" T60/p with T61 motherboard.
It has been done before. Search this forum.

geohsia wrote:Besides finding a used beat up T60 on eBay, where else can I go?

How about our own Market forum? Best shop worldwide!

pianowizard wrote:But the sensor layer makes the screen look a bit grainy and fuzzy.

Yes! I've never noticed anyone else say this, and have really wondered why so many people rave about the tablet screens. I've got an X41t in great shape with bright screen, but prefer an X40, even with pressure marks on the TN.

In addition to vague dust/fuzz appearance, I see a tiny bit of a rainbow effect. Reminds me of cleartype, where resolution is increased by using each subpixel of red, green, and blue independently, ignoring regular pixel boundaries. To my eyes, cleartype gives a shimmer or rainbow to text. Loved the idea until I saw an onscreen image demo, and when XP arrived, I hated all the font smoothing effects including cleartype.

I can vouch for the T60p 15" with ips infact. I have a qxga in it right now, with the uxga boe hydis lying around. I was going to do the motherboard swap with my 14.1" t61p, but it's motherboard is partially damaged (looooonnngg story, shorted something when trying out qxga and uxga on the thing subsequently gave magic smoke, i'm very lucky that i figured out how to interface with the inverter board to manually adjust and turn on the backlight, here's one of the many pictures of trying to fix things http://terpconnect.umd.edu/~justintc/MyImage.jpg)
I can still do it, just that the slipshod hacks that I did may make transferring the motherboard difficult.

Only thing is i wish the qxga was brighter, but other than that it's great for viewing photos, that is if your computer is sufficiently quick enough. Recommend using fast picture viewer. Currently there's a guy on ebay selling ibm sealed refurb t60p's for a very nice price, got mine for 520$ buy it now, bring that down with cashback and ebay bucks and it's a decent deal. It came almost as if it were new in packaging, so I don't think there's anything to worry about. They also come with a 90 day warranty, which i'm still trying to figure out. Apparently, I have to go through IBM and not lenovo, and IBM doesn't seem to want to pick up their phones...
Edit: hmm i just came across this other thread, i suppose proceed with caution http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=86129 if you are to buy from this guy

anyways here's some pictures that i took when unboxing (warning most of these are hi-res) sorry some of them are a bit blurry, kind of hasty, just wanted to start using it
http://i.imgur.com/74dA6.jpg
http://imgur.com/iMTYw.jpg
http://imgur.com/YZGdi.jpg
http://imgur.com/WszTB.jpg
http://imgur.com/E7Mn5.jpg
http://imgur.com/7wMz4.jpg
http://imgur.com/RmYA0.jpg
http://imgur.com/tdwTK.jpg