Thinkpads Forum

Hi,

First of all... please excuse my grammar. After studying in the US for 5 years, my English is still crappy
And if someone already answer this question before, could you please link me to the post please X(


Recently, I'm trying to decide on the following 2 laptop: x200 and t500. I had a really good experience with my old x60, but after I got my x61, it was terrible. It was loud and hot, and the battery life was terrible too.

I read a lot of posts about x200s. Most people mentioned that it has very good battery life (4.5 hrs for 6 cells?) and it's not hot nor noisy like x61. However, I'm planning to write some code on this laptop. I really love the part that it's light and small, but I'm really worried that when I'm coding (compiling etc), it might get really hot and noisy, and the battery life will drop (I know it probably will... but by how much?)

I have tried my friend's T500, it does not have any problem with heat nor noise, but it's sooo heavy comparing to x300. Anyone who has and code on x200s, please let me know what you think about using x200s for coding


--
Chen Wei

Works fine for coding and it is very lightweight. I'd recommend using an Intel X25-m SSD which is what I use because it makes compiles and SQL queries work much faster than a hard drive. The version 2 of the Intel SSD will be available very soon after a bug fix and costs $230 for 80 GB or $450 for the 160 GB.

See:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLi ... ntel+x25-m

bottom two items on page.

I've been using the x200s for coding, mix of Eclipse and .Net. Very very satisfied with x64 performance (Vista 64, but I guess its close to time for System 7). My work has lots of very long xml tag names, the extra resolution of the LED screen is a huge help for stretching editing windows widely. As suggested above, do get the SSD. If any specific questions regarding coding use, please ask.

.

Thanks for all the great responses

Right now, I mainly code in Java. When I compile my code on my old x61 (for my current project, I use maven or ivy for build), the fan on the x61 makes a lot of noise when I do "mvn install", and it does get really hot. I thought CPU is the one that generates all the heat (which makes the fan keep running on its max speed).

Since I'm not planning to play any game on this, my main concern is just the heat and the noise. All this laptop for would be just some coding, email, etc. If x200s or x200 do not have these issues, it should be a great choice, right?

By the way (I know... I should read from other post...), according to lenovo site, x200 is faster than x200s, but x200s can last longer. Since I will be coding on it, which one would be better to get? I'd assume

X200: shorter battery life. Less heat and noise when I code?
x200s: longer battery life. More heat and noise when I code?

I would expect the X200s to be cooler due to the low voltage CPU. But that's just expectation. Haven't really fiddled with any of these X200 series.

Lenovo's Tabook rates the X200s battery life as 30-35% more than the X200 given the same battery capacity.

my main concern is just the heat and the noise. All this laptop for would be just some coding, email, etc

Heat and noise: Before, I was using an x60s, it would heat up much more around the palm rest area when going into debugging and the CPU was running up to 50% (1 of 2 cores maxed out by Java), now on x200s in x64 eclipse it is going way over 50% (sometimes 80% or 90) when running some stuff, and heating up much less. It's my impression that it is quieter but I haven't measured the sound, and I'm coming off an earlier model than you are.

As to comparing x200 and x200s for development, my observations are:

a) the LED screen's extra resolution made more impact for editing/debugging code than anything else coming off the older x60s (the LED screen can have really wide text strings in windows), also the extra brightness is helpful if in strange locations (campground tables, whatever).

b) debugging speed difference is stunning, but probably due to CPU cache and SSD more than CPU speed. I'd suggest the SSD for sure (makes Java compiles many times faster), and 6MB CPU cache over the 3MB cache of older chips. Maybe worth trying to get the SL9600 (on some of Lenovo's other country web forms, such as FR, and available for a while on US site, and maybe special orderable or in stock at some dealers).

c) a detriment to the LED screen is if you want the WWAN, you'll have to be handy with small tools, and install antennas yourself (per other forum threads).