Your first thinkpad?

[Temetka]

I received my first TP last night. Its a X31 (2672-58U) for free. It came with two X3 bases with 2 DVD CD-RW and two disket drives.
it has 768 ram and I am going to bring it up to 1.5 gig and add a wirless card.
It also came with Office 2003 pro.
I was going to drop $1100 on a brand spanking new computer but this will do me just fine

I am going to use her to finish school and thats about it.

Wow! Those X31's are great little machines. Even better when they are free. Welcome to the forums and I hope your Thinkpad will serve you well.

[ahe]

My dad got one of the first Thinkpads in the early nineties. The previous "portable" I had been playing with was one of the suitcase computers, and I thought the Thinkpad was awesome when he got it. Especially when I heard they went to space. Unfortunately, I almost never was allowed to play with it.

When I moved to Australia in 2004 to go to Uni, I needed a laptop, and decided on the R50p after some research. The speed and the 1600x1200 resolution has been great, and I've been generally happy with the purchase.

I haven't really been able to use it for playing games or for graphics applications (unless I was sitting under the air-con with freezing fingers), as you might have inferred from my other two posts. I've had the system board replaced twice under warranty, and I'm very happy with their efficient service. Too bad they haven't been able to fix the overheating issue yet.

[cmarti]

My first thinkpad was a T23 i use it for six months sell it and after that i adquire a T40 upgrade it to the max and then a 600X then a 770Z i love this later and didn't want to get rid of it for i give it to my mother in law she is taqking good care of it. I then got a X60 and got bored with the T40 so i end trading it for the T60z that i currently have.

So i currently have the X60 and the Z60t that you can see in my sig.

Carlos.

[i-SnipeZ]

Mine was a 385. If I remember correctly, 200mhz, 64mb ram, Windows 2000, 10gb hard drive. Loved it, still do, sitting in my closet with the rest of my thinkpads i don't use much anymore.

Admin note: Merged new thread with existing (read: dead) one from a couple of years back.

[ajkula66]

My first one was an A20m, 700Mhz, 12GB and 128MB RAM...long since parted out and gone...however, my original "work" ThinkPad (that prompted me to get one for personal use) is still alive and kicking, almost a decade later, T20 with a 13.3" LCD, 650Mhz and runs W2K like a champ...

[IBMlenovo123]

T42 2373-5TU, 2004. Soon after that, Lenovo, former Legend 联想 took over IBM's PC divison for 1.x billion USD. Some say T4x series is the pinncle of IBM ThinkPads.

I say as long as they keep David Hill as the chief TP designer, good things will keep coming., Anyone read his blog btw?

[t140568]

I don't remember the exact model thinkpad it was, but it was one of the 3xx series. I got it for free from my former manager when I worked for Pizza Hut many moons ago. I remember its 486/4mb ram. Used it til it literally fell apart beyond reasonable repair.

[GatorHawk]

First TP: 365XD, 8+32MB=40Max, CD-ROM, NiMh, 810MB HD, 800x600, W95.

I've since loaded W98SE on it and boot it up on occasion. The keyboard on this planted the seed of how important having a good keyboard is on a laptop. Also use a IBM Model M clicky keyboard for the Desktop.

[Kyocera]

380ED I bought from a guy standing in line at Radio Shack who said he couldn't find a battery for it so he just wanted to get rid of it. Used it for about two years in the field, then sold it to a fellow tech who used it longer than I did.

That's when I was bitten by the TP Bug

[AlphaKilo470]

In 2004, I bought a 380ED from a friend for $60. Used it daily until early 2006 and loved how nice the keyboard was, how durable it was and how well it ran Windows 98SE (since MS still supported it back then).

[hausman]

My first ThinkPad was a 760ED: Pentium 133MHz, 16MB RAM, 2.1GB HD, 12" XGA, etc. I don't recall if it came with Win 3.1 or Win 95.

It got stolen about a year later and was replaced with a 770.

[Thinkpaddict]

I am afraid Dorian beats me as far as earlier models go. The first Thinkpad I had the privilege to behold and touch was an X31 in late 2004. I had only had one other laptop before that (a Toshiba Tecra 8100) but this was my first Thinkpad. I immediately fell in love with Thinkpads from that moment. I actually returned the X31 a couple of weeks later due to intermittent BSODs, and decided to replace it with a refurbished T23 which I got direct from IBM and which didn't disappoint me either. After that I got several more Thinkpads. The one I am most partial of is an X24 (from which I am typing this message.) It still does everything I ask of it, which includes dual booting Windows XP and Ubuntu 8.04 Linux, plus running a Win XP VM inside Linux via Virtual Box. I find Thinkpads to be functionally precise, reliable, and aesthetically the most pleasing computers ever made. I will probably have more Thinkpads in the future, but I will never forget the X31 that, while I ended up not keeping, sparked my admiration for these fine machines.

[miketoro]

I bought my first and only Thinkpad, an x30, in 2003. I had just graduated from college and was living with my folks, working a temp job in a hospital. I had been building my own desktops for years at that point, but was planning an extended trip across the country. I felt it was time for a laptop. I read everything I could and narrowed it down to Toshiba and IBM. But something about the x-series just charmed me. Broke as I was, my friends and family thought I was crazy for considering $3,000 on a computer. When I made the commitment and called IBM I was sure I wanted the fastest, sleekest model they had – that’s, I think, how I wanted to feel. The x30 had just come out and was something of a flagship. The sales person on the phone took my order then paused. "Hey," he said, "You know next week we're starting a huge promotion on the x-series. If you wait a week you'll save -- hold on a second -- you'll save almost $700." To this day that still amazes me. Everything but my credit card number was in his sales system. I called back a week later and saved $700, but my friends and family still thought I was crazy. Who would spend over $2,000 on a laptop? Six years later they've all been through almost as many computers. My x30 is going strong. It was easy and fun and inexpensive to jack-up the memory to a gig. I expanded the hard drive to 100 gig 7,200 rpm and switched out the wireless card when g came along. I've dropped it probably 100 times to no effect save a cosmetic crack on the bezel near the bottom of the screen. When the UltraBase broke, years ago now, IBM didn't ask any questions and mailed me a new one right away. I write for a living these days and everything I’ve ever written worth reading I’ve tapped out on this here keyboard.

A few months ago a memory slot went bad and my gig of ram was cut in half. The paper trick hasn’t solved it. Even with the 100 gigs things are getting tight. I’m even considering wireless n. It’s time to move on. I’m thinking about an x301, but I still love my Thinkpad and I’ll have it forever. I love my x30. It’s been dependable in five states now with all my moves and twice that many apartments. Wherever I go, my Thinkpad has been there. Can’t say that about most things in life.

[thinkpadinside]

I think I was 10 when I shared a T40 with my mom. I picked up a dead T30 for free, a 600E for 10 bucks, then my X41T for 300. All of them except the 600e run dual boot OS X and Windows

[emeraldgirl08]

Is my current T30!

I have a brother who is in the market for a laptop and refuses to get a Thinkpad. I told him they have a reputation for toughness and reliability.

He says he wants one that looks good!

Ugh.



I love my Thinkpad. It's the very first computer I've purchased on my own! Not unless you want to count WebTV! Remember that one folks? I plan on keeping this T30 up until I can afford to get my paws on a Thinkpad that has at least 128 or 256 mb of VRAM. I multitask and it seems the more VRAM available the smoother the images would be rendered. I also have Ubuntu installed so if I can get a laptop that can handle those cool looking effects turned on- that's the one for me!

Don't get me wrong. The T30 can do most of the effects but I want a Laptop that doesn't break a sweat when doing these things.

I also love the strong exterior plastic it's encased in and oh musn't forget the keyboard! It's sturdy and sealed nicely (I saw the video of someone pouring water on their keyboard).

Yay Thinkpads!