A31p - a decade later (LONG)

[kfzhu1229]

I have a A30 in daily use now (of course with TPfancontrol that turns on the fan at 60C CPU degree as GPU degree is not available so that the GPU does not get toast) with a TP-LINK USB wireless card, new battery which gives me 2-2.5hrs of batt life, upgraded 1.2Ghz Pentium III M which runs exteremely cool: MAX 66 degrees under 100% load which is not something I have ever experienced with any laptop, even with my T530i it gets to 90C but at least it does not throttle its CPU. ATI Radeon 7000 which still does play games like half life 2, Quake 3, Plants vs. Zombies, etc. 60GB Toshiba HDD, original 14.1" XGA which is kinda yellowish now, 2 Ultrabays (Left with CD-RW right with DVD-ROM), 1GB (2x512MB PC133 SDRAM), Windows 7 ultimate x86, and amazing speakers. For A31 at least it still does run the latest browser, for A30, only these Chinese browsers which still give support for XP and IE11 works for latest version due to the lack of SSE2. You have to download Spotify 9.x to get around with SSE2. A30 is a joy to play with, especially when I was shocked how Windows 7 works on a machine that is pretty much as old as myself. Some people may laugh at me using a computer that age, but they have nothing to say when mentioning that usually computers this age for them are discarded, if not broken long time ago.

[gdrunk]

I managed to keep my A31 (1.6GHz P4m 512MB RAM) in fairly routine use up to around 18 months ago when DRI1 graphics support was dropped from FreeBSD. While OpenGL still works with the new DRI2 drivers, the 2D & 3D performance is very much lacking, to the point where it's become unpleasant to use.

It's a shame really. Using a lightweight browser like Midori was still a viable way to use it day to day. Livestreamer and VLC meant that you could stream youtube videos at 480p quality without issue (until the new drivers killed the performance). I havn't found a laptop since with such a pleasant sounding headphone output. Only my 600E has a nicer keyboard.

I plan to swap it onto NetBSD, which still has the old drivers. I won't let it go without a fight. The A series models are absolutely epic laptops. I figure I can get another year or two of patient light use out of it.

[kfzhu1229]

Actually for A30 and A31 which is better? Pentium III lacks the SSE2 support. Pentium 4 is known to heat up but I haven't touched A31 before... My A30 goes up to 68 degrees max if fan 6 or more is turned on. However, I optimize Windows 7 a lot. I know what I should install and stay away with all kinds of unnecessary stuff that slows down the computer. As a result, my A30 in Win7 is faster than the Northwood Pentium 4s in my school running in XP. I have never experienced slow downs in terms of system apps other than internet browsing in my A30. However, A31 has better graphics enabling it to play 480p without pain while my A30 at PIII 1.2ghz (upgraded, not an official option for the specs, original 1ghz) and Radeon 7000 480p mp4 video is really a pain. DVDs and older uncompressed 480p video files work fine. For output, I don't think I even should use headphones on my A30 as the internal speakers are so good with reasonably decent bass and treble. Too bad mine is the 14.1" version

[ajkula66]

Actually for A30 and A31 which is better?

Neither is suitable for being more than a glorified typewriter nowadays, truth be told...

[kfzhu1229]

The A3x series suit more for speakers more than typewriter...
True they are all 14+ years old and modern apps don't run properly. But isn't it nice to see these computers make Win7 fly? Since you don't use it daily, it also means that you bring less garbage to the computer and in the end my t530i ran win7 slower than this machine after 3 years of heavy use before I flash it to win8.1 then to 10

[ajkula66]

The A3x series suit more for speakers more than typewriter...

I've been saying for years that the audio quality found in A3x series has yet to be matched by a newer ThinkPad...but they do make for a great typewriter as well.

But isn't it nice to see these computers make Win7 fly?

That's not how I'd describe my experience with A31p and W7....anything newer than XP is painful IMO, and outright counterproductive to run. Obviously, YMMV.

[600X]

I've been saying for years that the audio quality found in A3x series has yet to be matched by a newer ThinkPad...but they do make for a great typewriter as well.

Considering Lenovo's trend in the audio department since they took over, I reckon that the A30 series will remain the king forever.

I use Windows 2000 on my A31p which runs pretty well, even with a HDD. However, I've been considering switching to Linux on my older machines, just like I have in my newer ones.. Not sure which distro yet, but something with the upcoming LXQt interface seems quite intriguing.

[kfzhu1229]

I personally prefer w2k more than xp. I feel like 2k is much snappier than xp
But considering that w7 is still supported, I switched everything such as T23/A30 or newer and T42 and older into w7.

[Pokrzept]

Considering Lenovo's trend in the audio department since they took over, I reckon that the A30 series will remain the king forever.

Well I'm not sure how do you feel about T440s speakers but when I first time turned on my L450 I was wondering where things went wrong and who the hell decided to put speakers in the middle of bottom cover... Everytime I hear any sound from it I do feel like I'd put my head into aquarium. IMHO x60/61 mono speaker lost its leadership in a matter of worst audio system in any thinkpad I used.

But back to the topic: how does W2K performs in a matter of web browsing? Do most developers browser did not dropped support for this system?

[brchan]

About 6 months ago I tested windows 2k as a VM with the latest firefox and opera browsers available for 2k. Most pages rendered pretty well, and I could even watch youtube videos without any issues IIRC.

[kfzhu1229]

I've used w2k as my main OS 1.5 years ago and I used Firefox 12.. pages render fine, just that PIII is not enough to render some of today's Web pages while 1.5 years ago a PII 266 render everything but YouTube fine. Now Facebook require something like a Pentium M 780 (2.26ghz) to load without too much lag. My PIII 1.2ghz A30 still renders the pages but it gets stuck every time there is shadow involved such as seeing who liked a post or seeing the details of a picture/video.

[ajkula66]

Now Facebook require something like a Pentium M 780 (2.26ghz) to load without too much lag. My PIII 1.2ghz A30 still renders the pages but it gets stuck every time there is shadow involved such as seeing who liked a post or seeing the details of a picture/video.

That's because *real* ThinkPads were not designed to be used for menial labour such as checking Facebook, and will protest vehemently when such an offense is thrown at them...

[600X]

Considering Lenovo's trend in the audio department since they took over, I reckon that the A30 series will remain the king forever.

Well I'm not sure how do you feel about T440s speakers but when I first time turned on my L450 I was wondering where things went wrong and who the hell decided to put speakers in the middle of bottom cover... Everytime I hear any sound from it I do feel like I'd put my head into aquarium. IMHO x60/61 mono speaker lost its leadership in a matter of worst audio system in any thinkpad I used.

But back to the topic: how does W2K performs in a matter of web browsing? Do most developers browser did not dropped support for this system?

With the T440s, Lenovo has finally reached the year 2006. They are similar to the T60 speakers. In a way the audio is worse however, because the DAC is the second biggest pile of crap I have heard on a ThinkPad so far, being beat only by the X220.

Windows 2000 runs quite well on the A31p. I use Aurora 5 (very old Firefox version) which works quite fluently and can also play 480p YouTube to some extent. Websites like forums load fast, heavier websites can be sluggish however. Obviously, it's not safe using such outdated software but then again, I'm from a time where security wasn't such a big concern, so I guess I just don't worry as much about these things as others.

The reason why I use Aurora 5 is because back in 2011 when it was new, I used it on my 500MHz 600X with Windows 2000 and I remembered that browsing was very fluent and I could even watch 240p YouTube on it, so I reckoned that even in 2015/2016, a 2GHz A31p should benefit from this browser.

[brchan]

If you have linux and won't be needing much JS or Flash/video content, Dillo, followed by Netsurf, are extremely fast and lightweight. In fact, Dillo has been tested to give a good experience on a 486 cpu with modem connection. Netsurf will actually handle some limited JS, but animations won't work.

[kfzhu1229]

Now Facebook require something like a Pentium M 780 (2.26ghz) to load without too much lag. My PIII 1.2ghz A30 still renders the pages but it gets stuck every time there is shadow involved such as seeing who liked a post or seeing the details of a picture/video.

That's because *real* ThinkPads were not designed to be used for menial labour such as checking Facebook, and will protest vehemently when such an offense is thrown at them...

I know these things are not designed to be used like that. Sure it can still sit in a office and do some ms word 2k7. And in fact it is faster than my 2010 lenovo netbook which had a Atom N450 or something which takes 3 minutes to start WXP. It is still a pleasant to use this computer as speakers or office use. Also games like Half Life 2 runs really acceptable for its age unless you bump up its resolution beyond XGA.

[ajkula66]

I know these things are not designed to be used like that.

Good. Your smartphone is your friend for FB, Twitter, Instagram and so on...NOT your classic ThinkPad...

Just fired up my A31p after more than a month and yes...it's a thing of beauty. Just like hearing an ancient carb engine start and happily rumble. Firefox 3 on W2K and it feels like the old days on this forum...

[kfzhu1229]

You should also fire up Spotify and do some audio streaming... It is only it's speakers that made me switch my T42 for this A30... I didn't experience any Tp that has better audio than this thing except my 770ed

[Pokrzept]

Just fired up my A31p after more than a month and yes...it's a thing of beauty. Just like hearing an ancient carb engine start and happily rumble. Firefox 3 on W2K and it feels like the old days on this forum...

Hahaha you made me laugh, what a good start of a day Some mental disorders cannot and should not be cured. Collecting and running old thinkpads just for fun makes same sense for a common people like spending a sunday afternoon in the garage when the weather is bad just to listen to the sound of old sport cars engine.

[friedrich-eugen]

Well,

it is now more than 15 Years ( not quite sure), that I had my/our first A31P and that I did use it on a daily basis for more then 10 years... I had it run with XP, 2.6 Pentium IV M, 2GB memory and fully loaded. After a longer time of not being used it decided to "retire"...

Two machines with 2.5Ghz CPU have gone to a user, who probably handed them to his kids, as they were the ones of my twins before they changed to X61s (most unwillingly). Two machines I managed to revive this winter, it took very much time to get them up and running, both with spare 2.5Ghz CPUs and max memory.

One is runing XP with up to date tools and AV-protection, all the latest security updates ('til the end of support) and it is as swift as it can be, given the limitations of its design. It will be used for older games... (May be that works, I'm not sure and it is not me trying it). One is runing Windows 7 Pro, up to date, same tools, same protection. It is definitly slower, but it is usable and a reliable machine of last resort...

While trying to revive some more A31Ps, as I don't manage to throw my spares away, I find it very difficult to judge the state of my spare boards and on my spare CPUs, while it may well be that the true problem ist GPU-cooling while testing for rebuild. Security chips and Bioses are another, it is rather easy however to understand whether a display is a sound or a dying one.

All the same:
It is really high time for Lenovo to match this level of professional performance, versatility and - after all - reliability under todays circumstances and with todays techniques. I'keep mine as an example of historical value, as I will, in case I manage to repair it, an AST-Ascentia 950N/910N

[thinkpadcollection]

Like anyone with A31p, how is the performance feeling using P4-m 2.6 vs original 2.0GHz which I have right now?

Cheers, thinkpadcollection

[ajkula66]

Like anyone with A31p, how is the performance feeling using P4-m 2.6 vs original 2.0GHz which I have right now?

Will you notice the difference? Yes.

Will it be huge? No.

Is it worth it considering the rise in temps that will follow? Not in my opinion.

Making these machines as fast as possible made sense 6-7 years ago while there were still capable of running the race as daily drivers. That's a bygone era now.

Fact of the matter is that these CPUs are 15 years old by design and that while having the fastest one *might* make the machine feel a pinch snappier, these systems are showing their age big time, more and more with each day that passes...

[kfzhu1229]

The thing for a Pentium 4 M is that the number of Ghz makes no sense. a 1.7ghz Pentium 4 can barely catch up with a 1.2ghz Pentium III M Tualatin (of course, without SSE2) and far not comparable with a 1.7ghz Sonoma Dothan Pentium M. There are many lame guys out there who believes that a 3.8ghz Pentium 4 can outperform a 1.8ghz 6th gen i7... Well yea, the number looks prettier... However, they are still usable in my opinion if you forget about the heat production, at least they are faster than the coppermines... A 3.0ghz Pentium 4 560 Prescott can still handle basic tasks in Windows 10 just fine, what do you think?

[thinkpadcollection]

Aware of the P4 performance silliness thing in old days (when I did not own any notebooks) even I had was buggy even with good Asus VIA based chipset AMD socket A based on Barton CPU instead of P4 in first place. Even I borrowed & tried new (P4 based) 2.4 celeron kit and returned it next day. I also had a old & recapped Dell dimension 8300 with northwood 2.8C which was reliable and met reasonable need from appox 2004-2010. Now Asus AM2 Phenom 550 (Dual core 3.1) w/ 16GB and Dell optiplex 780 w/ E8400 & 16GB, badly in need of E8600.

Some day will replace 780 with i core CPU homebuilt box using Asus board, yes still.

Cheers, thinkpadcollection

[TPFanatic]

Today I installed Fujitsu Wifi drivers on my A31p to get WPA, as explained in this thread: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=9895 Since my USB ports are bust and Bluetooth is finicky, this makes file transferring much easier with the newer machines. It's a speed demon with its whopping 5 Mbps!

[ajkula66]

Today I installed Fujitsu Wifi drivers on my A31p to get WPA, as explained in this thread: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=9895 Since my USB ports are bust and Bluetooth is finicky, this makes file transferring much easier with the newer machines. It's a speed demon with its whopping 5 Mbps!

May I suggest spending a few bucks on a TP-Link "N" card? It works wonders on these older systems...

[micrex22]

One area where A31p still outshines any newer ThinkPad is the sound quality. I can’t wrap my head around the fact that the designers couldn’t keep up with this standard. T43p and Z61m both sound like tin cans when placed next to an A31p, and their newer cousins fare even worse. A lot worse.

I wanted to expand on this point. IBM had designed many amazing machines in the late P4 era (it was almost a golden age of neat design: 2003 - 2004).

What's odd is that I also noted a P4 IBM workstation I have has the best sound quality I've found onboard on a desktop. I was wondering if it was something analogous to the P4 boards, or maybe sound IC quality just went downhill; RealTek is awful. Although this isn't in regards to the squeaker cans (since it just has a mono PC speaker) but the actual line output. The SNR is fantastic although that may be due to P4 boards having a lot of grounding due to the heavy VRMs.

[600X]

I was wondering if it was something analogous to the P4 boards, or maybe sound IC quality just went downhill;

It's the latter. Most ThinkPads prior to the P4 also had pretty decent soundcards, although the A31p is without a doubt still the best. Starting with the T60, things got worse rapidly. The T40 series was also good IMO, but still a step down from the 30 series.

[kfzhu1229]

Starting with the T60, things got worse rapidly. The T40 series was also good IMO, but still a step down from the 30 series.

Well that is the reason I'm abusing my T43 and maxed out its capability in terms of hardware upgrades and also Windows 10. Even with a T43 I would still prefer A3x sound quality, it is more of a portable speaker and a typewriter than anything else. Comparing to its previous generation T22 in Windows 7, A30 (Tualatin 1.2ghz, even though thinkwiki says it only supports up to 1.13ghz) is certainly twice the speed of a T22 (Coppermine 900mhz), making A30/T23 a pretty usable Windows 7 laptop and T22 has to stick with Windows 9x/NT 4.X, 5.X

[agarza]

I've been reading this thread as I took the plunge to buy a used A31, with Pentium IV 2GHz, 512MB RAM, 20GB HDD, however I don't know the screen resolution, they are selling them here in Mexico in a 2x1 (buy 1 get another for free) quite cheaply - around $111USD! The seller have listings for R51's, T40's, and X61, but this kind of deal made me curious.

I have no actual pictures of the laptop, but on the publication it says "Aesthetics: 70%-90%", "Working Order: 100%"

It will get here by Friday, will post some pictures once it's on my hands.

I would like to ask:
1. What are the differences between a A31 vs A31p? XGA/SXGA+ on the A31 versus UXGA only on the A31p's?
2. How reliable are them?

Obviously I don't intend to use it as my daily driver, but to keep it as a collectable ThinkPad, this machine brings me memories when I was studying college, one classmate I think had a A30 or A31, at the time I was using a ThinkPad A22e (which was my first ThinkPad), it had a 700MHz Celeron Processor and 128MB of RAM running Windows 98.

[ajkula66]

I would like to ask:
1. What are the differences between a A31 vs A31p? XGA/SXGA+ on the A31 versus UXGA only on the A31p's?

Correct. A31 was offered with weaker graphics and lacks the S-Video-In port as well. Not that it's a huge deal nowadays.

2. How reliable are them?

Not. Reliable. At. All.

Also bear in mind that the youngest one will turn 14 years old this year.

Obviously I don't intend to use it as my daily driver, but to keep it as a collectable ThinkPad, this machine brings me memories when I was studying college, one classmate I think had a A30 or A31, at the time I was using a ThinkPad A22e (which was my first ThinkPad), it had a 700MHz Celeron Processor and 128MB of RAM running Windows 98.

They are the best typewriter with an integrated screen on the planet, bar none.