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w520 fhd screen good?

W500/W510/W520 and W700/W701 Series
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euless
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w520 fhd screen good?

#1 Post by euless » Tue Sep 14, 2021 9:43 am

hi,

i am thinking about getting a w520 with the TN FHD (1080p).
i read some really old review that said this TN FHD is as good as IPS.
Is this true?

i have a t440p with Intel® Core™ i5-4300M and HD+ TN (1600 x 900), but i am not happy with it, and will replace it.
Mainly because palm rest gets warm, even under moderate load. i believe there is a design flaw. I thinking of replacing it with something that doesnt give my hand heat rash...and better display.

the old review also said the w520 runs very cool, because a big machine has good heat dissipation.

RealBlackStuff
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Re: w520 fhd screen good?

#2 Post by RealBlackStuff » Tue Sep 14, 2021 10:22 am

Look for a better SSD for your T440p, that's the cause of your 'hot hand'.
In my T440p I have 'only' a 250GB Samsung 860 EVO in the main bay, and that doesn't even get lukewarm!
Lovely day for a Guinness! (The Real Black Stuff)
Lenovo: X240, X250, T440p, T480, M900 Tiny.

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atagunov
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Re: w520 fhd screen good?

#3 Post by atagunov » Tue Sep 14, 2021 1:23 pm

I have this same screen panel in my used W530. It is quite nice but I wouldn't say it is excessively bright. It's okay for use indoors, but nothing outstanding and not much overhead. I expect that to be the case with all these panels - as they're well used by now. I second the suggestion to try and get T440p running nicely - lots of people are happy with it. My main reason for not having one is that I prefer classic keyboards :)

You should also be able to upgrade the panel in your T440p and your upgrade options are quite wide - it takes same panels as the newest 14" Thinkpads I believe. The famous low-power IGZO panel for example is within your reach.
X220, 2 *T520

euless
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Re: w520 fhd screen good?

#4 Post by euless » Wed Sep 15, 2021 11:42 am

I have tried everything on my T440P. The left palm rest is still get warm. I even took out the Kingston SDD, and ran it from USB (Debian Linux). So, I have been running with the main drive bay empty.
When I took the Kingston out, I can feel the Kingston is cool...but the mother board just above the Kingston is warm. So, I think the Kingston is not the problem.

It really annoys me, that doing simple task can get the palm so warm. All I have been doing for the last 15 minutes is on Thinkpadforum reading and writing this post, and no other app open, and the palm rest is annoyingly warm.

My sister has a Lenovo Z51, so I was able to do side-by-side comparisons. Her Z51 and my T440P both has similar CPU temperatures while working youtube playing 10 minute long 720p video, but her Z51's palm rest did not get warm at all. She was working on her Z51 for 3 hours on some 3D graphics program for interior design, and her Z51 still has a cool palm rest after 3 hours of running a 3D graphics program.

My T440P has the integrated graphics. I read that some people replace the heat sink with one from the model with Nvidia graphics. These heat sink are supposedly better. But, alas, these heat sinks are quite expensive. And I don't know if it will make enough difference for my T440P. I don't want to throw anymore money into the 440P.
Last edited by euless on Wed Sep 15, 2021 12:11 pm, edited 3 times in total.

euless
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Re: w520 fhd screen good?

#5 Post by euless » Wed Sep 15, 2021 11:57 am

Okay,...

One thing I forgot to try was updating the BIOS. Currently my T440P has 2.49 BIOS. The latest version on Lenovo website is 2.55.

Should I try updating the BIOS?

theterminator93
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Re: w520 fhd screen good?

#6 Post by theterminator93 » Thu Sep 16, 2021 1:53 pm

I found the factory FHD in my W520 to be a little awkward to adjust to, being a high gamut panel. I don't recall it being a terrible panel, but it's not as good as an IP panel. Having been spoiled by nice IPS and AFFS panels prior I opted to retrofit in an IPS display.
T480 with T25 keyboard | T25 | W520 i7-2860QM·Quadro 2000m·IPS FHD | T601F T9900·NVS 140m·LED AFFS UXGA
T420 IPS FHD | X220 IPS FHD | T61p·T61·43·42p|X13 Yoga G3·220T·301·41T·24·23·22|G41|A31p·22m|i1200|TransNote
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Masi_K
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Re: w520 fhd screen good?

#7 Post by Masi_K » Sat Oct 30, 2021 1:46 am

I've used many years my 520 with gamut panel in everyday use. With those downloadable color calibration files for windows colors are bit left to blue and green and little for the red. Beside that it is great display indoors. When calibrated with file and rest by eye with test images it beats modern basic displays hands down wich are awful to watch. It is barely okay for in car usage during sunshine. Mutch better for that than my previous in car usage R61 with the cheapest display form the factory though.
600A->T20->T43->T61->W520 ->T14gen1 AMD

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