X61t impressions after 1 week

[smartypants]

Just want to let everyone know my impressions of the x61t after one week of use. I don't have much time to organize my thoughts, so these are just going to be in point form in no particular order.

- Small, compact form factor. It's the smallest laptop I've ever owned, but also the most powerful one so far. Granted my previous laptops were the Dell Inspiron 8500 and Toshiba Satellite A10, but still...
- It's a little on the heavy side especially with the 8-cell battery. It's not comfortable to use it as a tablet while standing up, at least not for longer than 10-15 minutes. Your left arm would be pretty tired. I still enjoy the tablet function in a classroom environment, where I put it on the desk and use it like a notebook.
- The battery life with the 8-cell is only satisfactory. I get about 4.5 hours from it, with all default configurations. I'm sure I could squeeze more if I turn off wifi/screen brightness/various other tweaks. But 4.5 isn't bad for my purpose, I just expected a little more.
- The screen is beautiful (I know because my parents complain the text is too small ). It attracts fingerprints like no tomorrow. If you're going to use the tablet feature, get used to having a dirty screen. Fingerprints are not noticeable at all when the screen is on, they only show up when the screen is off/blank. I haven't yet found an efficient solution to clean the screen.
- The keyboard is not quite full-size. It feels a little small the first time you type on it. I don't have fat fingers so I was able to get used to it after 5 minutes or less. The crtl key is right beside the Fn key, and that takes some getting used to if you use ctrl+c, ctrl+v a lot. I still alot of times press the Fn key instead of the ctrl key. Luckily, Fn+c and Fn+v doesn't do anything at all, so it's not like you can press the SelfDestruct button by accident (no, there isn't actually a self destruct button...) Key action and response is solid, don't have any problems with that.
- The speaker is a the BOTTOM of the laptop...what's up with that? I don't really care that much, since I'm not looking for a media center or anything, and I usually use my headphones for music, but it's a little strange.
- The lack of a CD/DVD drive does not pose any problems whatsoever. I was able to boot from an external USB Lite-On CD/DVD burner the first time I plugged it in.
- The wireless is a little hit-and-miss for me. Sometimes I get great signal when other laptops are struggling, and sometimes I get no connection when other laptops are working fine. This depends on a lot of factors though, so my experiences here definitely isn't representative.

That's all for now.

[smartypants]

Oh, I was also able to install Ubuntu (using wubi) with no problems. Wireless doesn't work all the time for me though, but, again, could be just my particular set of circumstances. The tablet feature doesn't work yet. but if you don't need tablet functions in Linux, wubi+ubuntu works like a charm.

[j-dawg]

I had a tiny bit of buyer's remorse after buying my tablet but over the last six months, I've come to realize there wasn't a better choice.

Now if I could get my hands on an X200 Tablet, that would be pretty sweet, but aside from that I'm not sure there's another laptop I'd rather own, although you're right that it's a bit on the heavy side.

[rek]

- Small, compact form factor. It's the smallest laptop I've ever owned, but also the most powerful one so far. Granted my previous laptops were the Dell Inspiron 8500 and Toshiba Satellite A10, but still...
- It's a little on the heavy side especially with the 8-cell battery. It's not comfortable to use it as a tablet while standing up, at least not for longer than 10-15 minutes. Your left arm would be pretty tired. I still enjoy the tablet function in a classroom environment, where I put it on the desk and use it like a notebook.

I came to the tablet from an X60s, so the added weight and bulk was pretty noticeable. Not so much the laptop being much bigger, but the footprint is much 'squarer' than a typical 4:3 subnotebook (especially with the 8-cell)

I distinctly remember thinking, "gee, it's almost the size of a T", until actually comparing it to a 14" notebook and realising it's not really that much bigger than a normal X. The ThinkPad logo on the top cover is further offset than the normal X, which seems to trick you into thinking it's bigger than it actually is.

- The battery life with the 8-cell is only satisfactory. I get about 4.5 hours from it, with all default configurations. I'm sure I could squeeze more if I turn off wifi/screen brightness/various other tweaks. But 4.5 isn't bad for my purpose, I just expected a little more.

I agree about the battery life. It's decent, but not as good as you'd expect for the big X series battery. Unlike the non-tablet version, it's not possible to run easily for a whole day on the 8-cell battery. Not a deal breaker though, I think it's a reasonable enough compromise for the tablet functionality and Flexview.

- The screen is beautiful (I know because my parents complain the text is too small ). It attracts fingerprints like no tomorrow. If you're going to use the tablet feature, get used to having a dirty screen. Fingerprints are not noticeable at all when the screen is on, they only show up when the screen is off/blank. I haven't yet found an efficient solution to clean the screen.

In my experience the Multitouch screen is a horrendous fingerprint magnet (a bit of irony, given it's meant to be touched), the SXGA+ screen seems no worse than a normal panel. This is in regards to X60t panels, not X61t -- I believe there's a subtle difference in the kind of coating that is applied to the X61t screen.

- The keyboard is not quite full-size. It feels a little small the first time you type on it. I don't have fat fingers so I was able to get used to it after 5 minutes or less. The crtl key is right beside the Fn key, and that takes some getting used to if you use ctrl+c, ctrl+v a lot. I still alot of times press the Fn key instead of the ctrl key. Luckily, Fn+c and Fn+v doesn't do anything at all, so it's not like you can press the SelfDestruct button by accident (no, there isn't actually a self destruct button...) Key action and response is solid, don't have any problems with that.

Welcome to the world of X-series You get used to the short keyboard after a short while.

- The lack of a CD/DVD drive does not pose any problems whatsoever. I was able to boot from an external USB Lite-On CD/DVD burner the first time I plugged it in.

Agree 100% -- I think of internal CD/DVD drives as a waste of space and weight in a notebook. The only time I ever need one is to install the OS; everything else is sent over a network, or a USB memory key.

- The wireless is a little hit-and-miss for me. Sometimes I get great signal when other laptops are struggling, and sometimes I get no connection when other laptops are working fine. This depends on a lot of factors though, so my experiences here definitely isn't representative.

The Atheros ("ThinkPad" branded) wireless card is much better in picking up a signal and finding distant access points, compared to the Intel. (That said, I haven't noticed the Intel card to be particularly bad...)