Thinkpads Forum

Owning a T61 and looking to buy a T/W500, I want to find out about the hinges. The ones on my T61 are awful and have a lot of play and definitely detract from the overall feel of quality. Is it not the case on the 500? I didn't find any posts on Google, nor on here, so I'm hopeful.

Externally these look to be the same hinges as on the T61, but the manuals use different part numbers, so no sure way to tell whether they are the same without disassembling the machines.

I would expect T400/500 to be just like the T61 in this regard, but it has been suggested here that not all hinges on T61 are created equal. There are two vendors - Kato and Reel, and one of them (forgot which) is supposed to be of better quality.

Most of the T61 units (14") at my work have crappy hinges with lots of play after about 1-2 years. The T400 machines we have seem to be OK for now, but there is no way to know for sure yet whether they use better hinges, or maybe just happen to use the better of the two vendors, or maybe it's only because they haven't been around for as long yet.

Thanks. I noticed play as soon as I got my T61, so the fact that it isn't really an issue with the 400/500 models is a good sign that they should be at least decent. The screen on my T42 is still rock solid and has only the slightest bit of play, after (ab)using it since 2004.