T60p - worth upgrading at all?

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traxdata12 · #1 Post by **traxdata12** » Mon Sep 17, 2012 8:36 am

Hi, I have a old T60p lying around and wondered if it was worth upgrading rather than buy a new laptop. What are people's thoughts in order to help make my mind up?

I was thinking on potentially more ram (not even sure what it has currently, will check and post) and get an ssd. Mainly on this ssd front, is this a worth while upgrade anyway? Just for Windows and the odd app, no need for huge amounts do want to take full advantage of speed without breaking the bank compared with no difference in speed - I see a lot of the ssd drives vary in read and write times...what is a good balance?

#2 Post by **Tasurinchi** » Mon Sep 17, 2012 9:42 am

Welcome to the forum!

An SSD is always a good idea IMHO, you can max out your RAM up to 3GB (chipset limitation) as well.

What operating system are you using? WinXP is not the best choice for SSD handling. Regarding which brand, everyone will probably give you a different opinion

How big should the SSD be in capacity?

traxdata12 · #3 Post by **traxdata12** » Mon Sep 17, 2012 9:54 am

Thanks Tasurinchi!

To be honest from memory it might already be 3Gb, but will need to check.

In terms of the OS, I need to reinstall and have Windows 7 Pro - both 32 and 64 bit, but again assume I will have to go with the 32 bit version. If Windows 7 is recommended anyway.....

In terms of the brand I'm not bothered, more fussed about the speed, as I say there are lots of read and write differences........capacity, I guess for the OS and odd application 60GB will be enough.

#4 Post by **Tasurinchi** » Mon Sep 17, 2012 10:30 am

I would rule out any 64bit OS version, since you cannot use more than 3GB RAM. Unless you really need the power of 64 bits, but you may be short of memory then...

60/120GB SSDs are cheap nowadays so I personally would buy the cheapest. Those *huge* read/write differences are more a benchmark thingy... I don't think you will notice huge differences in normal life, unless you really need every little read/write bit

traxdata12 · #5 Post by **traxdata12** » Mon Sep 17, 2012 10:42 am

Ok thanks, will go with Windows 7 pro 32bit.

In terms of the ssd, i'm just a little confused on how to compare and whether to be really bothered about the numbers quoted, if only for a few £'s extra. For example, even at the same price Ebuyer have:

Corsair 60gb Nova 2 SSD - 2.5" Sata II Read 270mb/s Write 240mb/s @ £47.99
or
Sandisk 64GB SSD - 2.5" Sata III Read 490MB/s Write 240MB/s @ £47.99

Anyone have any opinion on a decent SSD for sub £50??

#6 Post by **Tasurinchi** » Mon Sep 17, 2012 11:01 am

traxdata12 wrote:Anyone have any opinion on a decent SSD for sub £50??

Not knowing the market in the UK, the cheapest SSDs around here are from OCZ. I've read some horror stories regarding reliability that users left in the shop I buy here. But I have a 120GB OCZ Agility 3 that so far is performing well in my X200s (but price here is above 50£ for that one)

#7 Post by **RealBlackStuff** » Mon Sep 17, 2012 11:18 am

Don't stare yourself blind on those speeds.
The T60 can only read/write at SATA I speeds (150), so you should get a drive that is still backwards compatible to SATA I.

Cigarguy · #8 Post by **Cigarguy** » Mon Sep 17, 2012 5:02 pm

Hard to recommend if this laptop is worth upgrading or not. A lot depends on your usage and whether it will still serve you needs. Any new SSD you by will be bottleneck by the T60's SATA I interface so get the cheapest 60 GB SSD you can find. Loading XP onto a SSD is a little more difficult than Win 7 and you'll still have only 60 GB to work with. In your shoes I would seriously consider a Seagate Momentus XT hybrid 500 GB HDD. In Calgary it can be had for around $100. On slower systems the hybrid drives are within spitting distance of SSD one OS boot and program load while the higher capacity is nice. Install on XP is like installing onto any other HDD.

TuuS · #9 Post by **TuuS** » Tue Sep 18, 2012 7:14 am

Brand is definitely more important then speed when it comes ot SSD on a T60. In my mind the fastest drive in the world that regularly crashes and loses all my data would be worthless. I usually go with only Intel SSD, but have recently used some Samsung since they have had good reviews too. Best advice I can give is to get only the capacity you need and use a traditional drive in your ultrabay for storage of data. You'll find the T60p to be a fine system once you have an SSD drive and the max of 3gb ram. If you need to further upgrade you can swap in a T61 board and get sata2, faster cpu options and upto 8gb of ram as well as a faster FSB speed, but this is usually only recommended on the 15" T60p models.

traxdata12 · #10 Post by **traxdata12** » Tue Sep 18, 2012 7:20 am

Thanks for the advice, with the replies up to now, my budget and what I have read elsewhere I had pretty much settled on a samsung ssd.

I dont know about going to the trouble of updating with a T61 board, the T60p I have is the 15", but why not just buy a T61 and use that....? I have seen a few posts about FrankNpads or whatever they are referred to, and honestly I don't understand the point.

In my case I will either live with this as it is, upgrade to ssd and possibly the ram if it needs it, install windows 7 pro and thats it. For internet surfing, reading and for apps like office and dreamweaver, I think it will do, and not need to me to buy a new laptop altogether.

#11 Post by **RealBlackStuff** » Tue Sep 18, 2012 7:38 am

Those T60/T61 Frankenpads are for people who do NOT like widescreen, and who prefer the superior picture you get when using IPS Flexview screens.

Cigarguy · #12 Post by **Cigarguy** » Tue Sep 18, 2012 7:44 am

traxdata12 wrote:Thanks for the advice, with the replies up to now, my budget and what I have read elsewhere I had pretty much settled on a samsung ssd.

I dont know about going to the trouble of updating with a T61 board, the T60p I have is the 15", but why not just buy a T61 and use that....? I have seen a few posts about FrankNpads or whatever they are referred to, and honestly I don't understand the point.

In my case I will either live with this as it is, upgrade to ssd and possibly the ram if it needs it, install windows 7 pro and thats it. For internet surfing, reading and for apps like office and dreamweaver, I think it will do, and not need to me to buy a new laptop altogether.

Good planning bud. Around Calgary T61 can be had for around $100-$200 in the local classifieds. If the budget allow I would consider getting a 120 GB or higher capacity as, unlike the memory and CPU, it will still be very useful for your next upgrade.

traxdata12 · #13 Post by **traxdata12** » Tue Sep 18, 2012 8:19 am

Thank TuuS for the input.

Thanks Cigarguy, might just stretch my budget to more than 60GB....

RealBlackStuff - now you have me curious around the IPS Flexview screens, did all T60p's come with this type of screen, to be honest from what I remember when using I didn't notice superior picture quality.....

#14 Post by **RealBlackStuff** » Tue Sep 18, 2012 5:45 pm

Only the Standard 4:3 15" SXGA+ (1400x1050) and UXGA (1600x1200) are IPS FlexView, all others are TN.

traxdata12 · #15 Post by **traxdata12** » Wed Sep 19, 2012 6:17 am

Does anyone know what the max size capacity drive the t60p will recognise, if indeed there is even an limit?

I was going to also purchase a 2TB portable usb drive, but thought that I might just buy a caddy to replace the optical drive....would that work?

#16 Post by **Tasurinchi** » Wed Sep 19, 2012 6:40 am

traxdata12 wrote:Does anyone know what the max size capacity drive the t60p will recognize, if indeed there is even an limit?

There is no limit for storage AFAIK...

The caddy is a good idea, but you have to be careful with the height of the drive. The caddy takes 9.5mm HDDs, 12.5mm models will not fit, (but we may have creative users here in the forum with a different opinion)

Cigarguy · #17 Post by **Cigarguy** » Wed Sep 19, 2012 6:57 am

Most hardware without a UEFI BIOS will have problems with HDD over 2 TB. Not really applicable with laptop HDD.

TuuS · #18 Post by **TuuS** » Wed Sep 19, 2012 8:16 am

traxdata12 wrote:Does anyone know what the max size capacity drive the t60p will recognise, if indeed there is even an limit?

I was going to also purchase a 2TB portable usb drive, but thought that I might just buy a caddy to replace the optical drive....would that work?

I believe the only limit is the size the manufactures have been able to squeeze into a 2.5" formfactor. Rare exotic drives aside, the limit seems to be about 1tb, but the 750gb are more common and are generally available in higher performance models, but that shouldn't matter much since it's designated for storage, not multitasking like the primary os drive. When larger 2.5" discs become available you may find a 2tb barrier as suggested... I guess only time will tell.

As for ultrabay caddies, generics are available very cheap, but the genuine lenovo parts are currently available in the marketplace. I was fortunate to get a very large quantity of them from a corporate liquidation and still have a few left, but I suspect they will be gone within a few weeks or less.

For a usb optical disc there probably is no limit. Most of the 3tb externals have firmware to translate within the external case so that shouldn't be a problem, but if you are going to assemble one yourself, check the enclosure's specs to make sure it will support the drive you're using.

traxdata12 · #19 Post by **traxdata12** » Wed Sep 19, 2012 9:54 am

Great thanks. Didnt want to buy the hdd caddy for the optical drive bay, stick a 1.5TB or 2TB 2.5" 9mm drive in it and then find it doesnt work.....but sounds like the general opinion is that only after 2TB would there be an issue.

Funny, Ebuyer.com here in the UK have both a 1.5TB and 2TB laptop drive available -

http://www.ebuyer.com/search?page=1&sor ... 500%7c2000

Seems the 2TB is cheaper at the moment, why!?

91011 · #20 Post by **91011** » Wed Sep 19, 2012 2:32 pm

Both the drives you link to are 15mm drives and so are too thick to fit in a T60p which uses a 9mm.

http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=830

traxdata12 · #21 Post by **traxdata12** » Wed Sep 19, 2012 3:02 pm

Ahhhhh, i had not realised that, [censored]!

#22 Post by **Tasurinchi** » Wed Sep 19, 2012 4:11 pm

9.5mm to get picky...

(You don't read my posts!!!!

)

cadillacmike68 · #23 Post by **cadillacmike68** » Wed Sep 19, 2012 5:47 pm

The biggies are probably dual platter, which means we are about at the max possible with track density on magnetic media.

T60p - worth upgrading at all?

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