Thinkpads Forum

Hi all! I'm new here but I'm about to buy a X61 and wanted to get some advice. First a little background.

I'm 21. I've spent the last three year in the military as the computer section head and senior network administrator of a medium sized unit.

As of the end of August I will be a freshman at Columbia University in NYC studying engineering. About two years ago (After seeing a Toshiba tablet) I decided that a tablet was going to be my laptop of choice for university. Having used ThinkPads in the army, and doing some research now, I've come to the conclusion that the X61 is the one for me. I'm a little torn about my configuration though.

I was going to get 4GB dual channel ram (2x2gb), but it's very expensive (ups the price by like $750) and I read this article convincing me against 4GB.

Now I'm torn between 2x1GB for a total of 2GB ram (the min I will run a vista system with) in a dual channel configuration or alternatively get a 1GB stick and a 2 GB stick for a total of 3GB single channel. The 2GB configuration will give me better ram access speeds because of the dual channel (and it will be cheaper) but I will be sacrificing a full gig of ram.

Most of my computing is Office/Internet with some photoshop/minor programming and a little CAD work. I do a TON of multi tasking [read:procrastinating] (I have over 30 tabs open in firefox now) and so 3 GB of ram would be most useful especially since I'll be using Vista. Having read an articlea bout the benefits of dual channel, I'm not particularly impressed and so I'm leaning towards the extra ram.

Thoughts? Thanks a lot for your input!

-Ben

your best bet is to get 512mb configured with the system and get an aftermarket 2gb stick which you add to later if you want. I just picked up 2x2gb for 84 each (that OCZ special on outpost). Computer vendor ram is always way overpriced.

If you get Vista x64, get 4GB of aftermarket RAM as suggested above. If you get Vista x86 just get 3GB of aftermarket RAM, again.

Also, if you do decide to go with 64bit Vista, read the thread entitled "X61 Tablet and Vista x64" - it should contain enough information to get everything (including all of your RAM) in Vista.

Antioch wrote:Also, if you do decide to go with 64bit Vista, read the thread entitled "X61 Tablet and Vista x64" - it should contain enough information to get everything (including all of your RAM) in Vista.

I read that thread. I'm def going with good old 32 bit. Not enough 64 apps available. If you read the first link I posted above you'll see that even though under x64 your OS recognizes 4gb, half the 4th gig is reserved address space. I'm not sure I have the energy to start buying ram and installing it myself (not that its a big feat). I kinda just want to have a perfect product out of the box...

Note that even though most apps are still 32bit, they run just fine on a 64bit system. The x64 vista OS is way more stable than the x86 system in my experience.

OP: Just get 4gb. I have 2gb and wish I would have bought the 4gb. Just get it from newegg or something.

bludman wrote:

Antioch wrote:Also, if you do decide to go with 64bit Vista, read the thread entitled "X61 Tablet and Vista x64" - it should contain enough information to get everything (including all of your RAM) in Vista.

I read that thread. I'm def going with good old 32 bit. Not enough 64 apps available. If you read the first link I posted above you'll see that even though under x64 your OS recognizes 4gb, half the 4th gig is reserved address space. I'm not sure I have the energy to start buying ram and installing it myself (not that its a big feet). I kinda just want to have a perfect product out of the box...

Ordering RAM takes five minutes. Installing it takes one minute or less.

mgags7 wrote:Note that even though most apps are still 32bit, they run just fine on a 64bit system. The x64 vista OS is way more stable than the x86 system in my experience.

OP: Just get 4gb. I have 2gb and wish I would have bought the 4gb. Just get it from newegg or something.

I know next to nothing about x64. I was under the impression there are a bunch of problems with driver compatibility and software compatibility...

The issue is availability of drivers. Lenovo has 64-bit Vista drivers for everything built in to the computer. But for other stuff (printers, scanners, cell phones etc.), it's still hit or miss.

For applications the situation is better: Well-behaved 32-bit applications run fine. The only real nuisance is that things like browser plugins are often 32-bit only, forcing you to use 32-bit rather than 64-bit applications. Still, they do run.

(64-bit Windows XP is a whole other question. There, drivers are a significant problem. But for a tablet, Vista seems to be the more popular option at this point, so it's not such a big deal).

To me the choice is clear: either buy the system with 1 GB and add 2 GB, or buy with 512 MB and add 2x2GB, depending on what configurations are available to you. (You are in Israel, so I assume that you cannot buy a CTO model.)

Now, if you really, really, really don't want to deal with aftermarket memory, and you will run 32-bit Vista, I would get the 2x1 GB as the 2 GB modules are really rather ridiculously priced at Lenovo (as at other laptop vendors). You can always upgrade next year or the year after when you switch to 64-bit Vista.

And, really, 2 GB will be fine for what you are doing. The only real memory hog is Photoshop ...

tomh009 wrote:To me the choice is clear: either buy the system with 1 GB and add 2 GB, or buy with 512 MB and add 2x2GB, depending on what configurations are available to you. (You are in Israel, so I assume that you cannot buy a CTO model.)

I'll be ordering my computer to NYC (in terms of shipping dates it just makes more sense). I think I should be able to order CTO models...

Tom, I see your X61 on order is running 3GB ram. Did you get 1gb + 2gb after market or did you order 3gb. I assume you are running 32bit?

Even though it sounds like 64 seems to run pretty smoothly, people appear to be apprehensive about switching (myself included). Are these fears unwarranted?

I'm doing 1 GB from the factory plus a 2 GB aftermarket module. It really is quite easy to do: shut down the ThinkPad, remove a screw on the bottom to remove a cover and expose the memory slot, insert the module, replace the cover and the screw.

There are a number of people happily running 64-bit on the new X61 tablets:
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=44764

However, apart from being able to use 4 GB of memory, there is little benefit to running a 64-bit OS so far and some hassles (limited antivirus options, for example, and 32-bit browser plug-ins). I waited for the X61 instead of the X60 to have that capability, but I don't expect to switch to 64 bits until maybe sometime next year as 64-bit applications begin to appear.