Thinkpads Forum

At my last job, I had a T450s that was nice. I think I actually prefer this T450, though. The coating feels a bit better, and I actually like the rough keys. I don't have them to compare, but I wonder if the keyboard has a bit more travel (which if so, I like)... the keyboard feels slightly better, though the one I bought doesn't have a back-lit keyboard (and I'm missing the old Thinklight still, though I see the value of a built-in webcam and at least it has that).

I absolutely hated it when they took away the touchpad lower buttons, but I have to say that this touchpad isn't bad.

I was able to get these specs for $600:
i5-5300u processor
1X8GB RAM
128GB SSD
Windows 7 Pro (currently upgrading to Windows 10 Pro)
HD+ 1600X900 screen (my favorite resolution at this size)
3-cell battery
3-year depot warranty

I plan to add 8GB of RAM, which currently would cost $30-32, and a ~500GB M.2 SSD (I have my eye on the $130 480GB one by MyDigitalSSD). I also may upgrade the warranty if I can.

I'm upgradeing from a T420 that saw pretty decent long service under tough conditions, but now suffers BSOD when picked up wrong (likely due to a cracked motherboard) and has a broken hinge due to the lousy old hinge design. I could get the hinges fixed, but at some point dumping money into the machine didn't make sense to me. But try as I might, I couldn't configure a decent new T series for much less than $1,000 US.

This machine will be my outside-of-work workhorse for the next few years, and I'm going to baby it. I'm glad it's got enough ThinkPad DNA to keep me happy. I'm loving the form factor, with the thinness, borderline rubberiness, and fact it's not wedge-shaped, and really almost everything about it.

I contacted Lenovo to verify the warranty, and found out that it's actually a three-year on-site! I can't believe how much I love this laptop for the money. I'm having to restrict the urge to upgrade the heck out of it, which would make it less of a good deal.

Great to hear your new T450 is a nice fit.

The backlit keyboard has smooth keys and the non backlit keyboard has the rougher key finish. If you wanted the backlit keyboard installation is quick and it is plug and play.

Happy ThinkPadding!

Brad

Brad wrote:The backlit keyboard has smooth keys and the non backlit keyboard has the rougher key finish. If you wanted the backlit keyboard installation is quick and it is plug and play.

Thank you! The wife and I are both liking the rough keys so far, but it is tempting to get the backlighting, and I may do that sometime. This rough keyboard is nicely clickety-clackety and has enough travel to keep me happy, and it's mostly about the typing for me... and while the backlighting would help if I were working late in bed or something, I can type fine in the dark anyway.

So my list of potential upgrades for the T450 currently runs as follows:
1. RAM (just upgraded from 8 to 16 GB for $26)
2. Keyboard ($35-40 currently, not bad)
3. 2.5" SSD (would probably go with the 480 GB Sandisk Ultra II for ~$110 currently, but will wait until I need it)
4. M.2 SSD (MyDigitalSSD 480GB is currently $130)

So in one potential future I wind up with 960 GB of storage and 16 gigs of RAM for $866, with a backup 2.5" 128GB to revert to with my applications and Windows 10 already installed. Not bad! And later, for what I expect to be significantly less than $300 (currently $330), I can install 32 GB of RAM. The laptop will not be a limiting factor in what I can do over the next few years... it'll just be me.

Sitting here with the T450 next to my old, still-booting T420, here are my impressions on the external aspects:

1. The T450's chiclet keyboard is ever so slightly wider. Of course, there are little spaces between the keys on the T450, and the T420 has speakers left and right (don't miss 'em). The T450 keyboard feels much better while typing and has comparable key travel--and note I LOVE my T420 keyboard to this day.

2. The keyboard layout on the T450 is more efficient. There are no Scroll Lock, Home, End, etc. buttons which I never use, Print Screen is in a better location, etc. However, I wish the Delete key were bigger.

3. The T450 is thinner and not wedge-shaped, sitting on a flat surface, both clear wins for the T450.

4. The T450 is much lighter.

5. The T450 is silent, while the T420 runs its fan often at idle and is quite loud when it does by comparison.

6. Due to the hinge design, the T450 top of the screen bezel is noticeably lower (would help on flights, I suppose) and it doesn't have such a giant, ugly bottom bezel appearance as the T420. I used to like the old taller screens (4:3 but also 16:10 as on my X201), but the bezel layout of the T450 isn't as in-your-face wasteful.

7. The apparent build quality of the case is better. My T420 developed cracks around the edges fairly early on, and I doubt that will happen with the T450, partly due to bay and port differences as well as materials changes.

8. The coating on all surfaces of the T450 feels nicer. Of course the T420 is worn shiny in places due to use, but EVERYTHING feels much nicer than I ever remember it on the T420.

9. The keyboard clicks on the T450 are a little louder. I like it.

10. I'm guessing and hoping the hinges on the T450 will last longer. Time will tell.

11. Looking along the side edge of the lid as I open and close it, the T450 flexes slightly, which I don't like. The same goes for the T420, maybe slightly less.

12. The T420's touchpad has dedicated lower buttons, which I like. I wish both laptops did not have the upper buttons, as I'm not a trackpoint user.

13. The T420 has vastly superior parts accessibility. Simply adding RAM involves taking off the entire bottom of the T450's case, a delicate operation not for the faint of heart. I accelerated purchase of an M.2 SSD just so I won't have to open the case again for quite some time (as I upgraded to 16GB of RAM at the same time).

The T450 is of course much faster, being newer, but I also like its overall physical usability much better (except the glaring accessibility issue) for these reasons.. and I loved my T420, X201, T60, and all the other ThinkPads I've ever owned. This one is the best for me yet.

jvarszegi wrote:The T450 is of course much faster [...]

This is surprisingly, the 5300U CPU is marginally better than a 2520M, according to different benchmarks. Are you using an SSD in your T420? If not, maybe that's why the T450 feels so fast.


http://cpubenchmark.net/mid_range_cpus.html
http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Pro ... 436.0.html

jvarszegi wrote:

Brad wrote: 2. The keyboard layout on the T450 is more efficient. There are no Scroll Lock, Home, End, etc. buttons which I never use, Print Screen is in a better location, etc. However, I wish the Delete key were bigger.

I believe you only loose Scroll Lock and Pause/break, the rest is there, especially home and end!
Am I seeing things?
http://www.lenovo.com/images/gallery/10 ... oard-2.jpg

AIX wrote:

jvarszegi wrote:The T450 is of course much faster [...]

This is surprisingly, the 5300U CPU is marginally better than a 2520M, according to different benchmarks. Are you using an SSD in your T420? If not, maybe that's why the T450 feels so fast.


http://cpubenchmark.net/mid_range_cpus.html
http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Pro ... 436.0.html

I viewed this before buying:
http://cpuboss.com/cpus/Intel-Core-i5-5 ... e-i5-2520M

I know that assessing processor performance can be tricky. Both have SSDs, although I haven't compared specs of everything in the machine (SSD and otherwise). It loads everything much faster, which might be due to a newer SSD, and compiling code is much faster for me on the T450 (neither is RAM-limited for this).

evening_hunger wrote:

jvarszegi wrote:

I believe you only loose Scroll Lock and Pause/break, the rest is there, especially home and end!
Am I seeing things?
http://www.lenovo.com/images/gallery/10 ... oard-2.jpg

No, you're right. Page left and right seem to be missing next to the arrow keys. I don't typically use those or the page up/down keys, so this doesn't matter much to me personally.

Here's my full set of upgrades for now:

$26 8 GB DDR3L 1600: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B006YG8X9Y
$124 480 GB SSD boot drive: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00M8ABFX6
$83 256 GB M.2 SSD: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00NY4VIPA/

I feel lousy at having spent that much extra, but the pain of getting the bottom cover off convinced me to do it all at once and be done for a while. So I've got this for a total cost of $833:
16 GB RAM (option to upgrade to 32 GB later, but I didn't want to spend $175 more for that now)
736 GB SSD storage, with a backup 128 GB drive in an enclosure (already upgraded to Windows 10 and with applications installed)
1600X900 screen
Windows 10 Pro
2.5-year on site warranty
... plus my favorite keyboard ever!

I actually like the screen just fine, especially the HD+ resolution, where IPS was never available IIRC. I may upgrade that someday if I have money to burn and want to do presentations or something where extra brightness would help.

Where did you purchase the laptop from for that price with warranty?

I certainly agree with many of your points! I have used both a T440 and T450 and the quality is certainly a large step up from the cheep feeling T410 (+T400s) to T430 era laptops. The rubber finish is also softer and smoother, quite similar to that on my X301.

My only complaint is that the lcd bezel below the screen is flimsy and the drop down hinges are ugly IMO. Keyboard layout isn't too bad. At least it is grouped unlike the xx30 models.