Thinkpads Forum

Picked up my new Thinkpad T410 yesterday. i5 processor, 6300 ultimate, bluetooth, 3GB mem, x64 windows 7, etc etc. I did not opt for a different hd than the standard because I had a brand new 120 GB Intel X-25m ready to install. Well after playing with the system for a whlie I decided it was time to make the recovery disks and install the new SSD drive. The system was so slow for me, it was a real eye opener what an SSD drive will do for you. I had forgot how spoiled I was.

Unfortunately though, I have not been able to make a set of recovery discs yet. After learning how to disable the automatic power down of the DVD drive which was causing me headaches, I attempted to make the recovery discs three times and failed each time at various points...usually disc 2 though. Finally I gave up and just cloned the drive to the intel SSD via a external USB enclosure, then swapped drives and everything is fine. Now the system is much more responsive and in general a real pleasure to be on. Amazing what one simple part will do for your system.

the first thing I did when my T410 arrived (and before turning it on) was swapping the HDD for the Crucial C300. I installed a fresh version of windows 7 x64 professional, office 2010, drivers, updates, etc.. I then formatted the 250GB HDD that came with the T410 and it is now being used as an external sata drive. yes, I totally dumped the windows image and included software that was pre-installed. Spoiled, yes. What would we do without the benefits of SSD's? I remember not even a couple years ago these didn't exist.

I believe to reach full circle of reliability and durability that a Thinkpad should be, the SSD is the most important upgrade.

No argument there. I've been using a loaded T410s for a while and even when using 91% of my 4GB RAM, the system is ridiculously responsive thanks to the SSD.

A word of caution on the reformatting though: if your laptop comes with Lenovo's Enhanced Experience preload, loading a fresh install loses all their tweaks and customizations for ThinkPads. I've been ridiculously impressed with EE performance and wouldn't want to lose it. Though, I don't know how you can tell which systems came with it and which didn't. I know they were introduced about the time of the first generation Core i3/i5/i7 processors, so the T410 generation, but the cut-in time is really not known.

I dont have SSD but cant tell you that on my T410 there is NO difference in performance, boot and shutdown times between clean Win7 install and Lenovos factory EE Win7 install.

You guys are tempting me to get an SSD

crashnburn wrote:You guys are tempting me to get an SSD

I'd say that (aside from a RAM upgrade if required) an SSD will have the best ROI of pretty much any upgrade you can make.

Thanks to the SSD, my X40 now feels faster than my T400. And it's not even a particularly fast SSD, either, due to the 1.8in form factor.

I'm holding off getting one for my T400 because I'd like 120GB and prices are still a little high at €2/GB...

vēer wrote:I dont have SSD but cant tell you that on my T410 there is NO difference in performance, boot and shutdown times between clean Win7 install and Lenovos factory EE Win7 install.

This is my experience as well.