Buying a T23, is this crazy?

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stuartf · #1 Post by **stuartf** » Thu Dec 22, 2005 3:23 pm

OK, I just purchased a T43 for myself, love the build and all. The plan was to have my wife use the old Gateway 600, but looks like the Gateway took offense and has packed it in.

After looking at various low-end HP/Compaq/Dell I realized that I can buy a used T23 for about $350. It will be used for internet, email and word processing exclusively. If she could get two years or so of reliable use out of this, I would regard it as acceptable.

I think I would avoid Ebay and buy it straight from IBM, it gives me a 7-day look see and a 3 month (doubled to 6 by AMEX) warranty.

Comments?

stevech · #2 Post by **stevech** » Thu Dec 22, 2005 3:43 pm

Go for it.. I had (still have) a T22(900Mhz, 512Mhz, 54K 40G) for a year or so and recently the screen back light gone belly up, since I do use the machine a lot, after trying the obvious (converter, cable..) with no positive result, I decided to pick up a T2x while I investigate the problem some more.
I ended up picking up a bare T23 (1.13Mhz) off Ebay, for about $170 including shipping. Using the same hard drive but different 512MB ram, I must say I am astonished on how much better the T23 is over the T22, I am now a real fan of the machine, for the price($300+), it is, IMO, the best thing around.

#3 Post by **carbon_unit** » Thu Dec 22, 2005 7:29 pm

I think that T23's are the sweet spot right now as far as performance for the dollar. When you load them up full of ram and put in a faster hard drive they run quite well.

LtTPfan · #4 Post by **LtTPfan** » Thu Dec 22, 2005 7:37 pm

Avoiding eBay may be a good idea. I just received my second POS Thinkpad off eBay this month, the second a T30, the former an R40. I got most of my money back on the R40 but am still disputing the shipping, and have yet to hear from the eBay stealer about the T30 so I'll likely have to dispute it as well.

Guest · #5 Post by **Guest** » Thu Dec 22, 2005 8:54 pm

stuartf wrote:OK, I just purchased a T43 for myself, love the build and all. The plan was to have my wife use the old Gateway 600, but looks like the Gateway took offense and has packed it in.

After looking at various low-end HP/Compaq/Dell I realized that I can buy a used T23 for about $350. It will be used for internet, email and word processing exclusively. If she could get two years or so of reliable use out of this, I would regard it as acceptable.

I think I would avoid Ebay and buy it straight from IBM, it gives me a 7-day look see and a 3 month (doubled to 6 by AMEX) warranty.

Comments?

I had my T23 for a year now.....bought it from ebay (I was lucky to get a decent one that looks like brand new). It somehow can compete with some modern laptops today although it doesn't have a built in wifi & bluetooth but its sufficient enough to do office work, surfing, and also watching dvd's. I might get a T42p in the future.....but at the meantime I'll stick to the T23 because the power is enough for me.

jongordo8 · #6 Post by **jongordo8** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 12:25 am

yeah T23 is a good machine...and very capable of running everything you want it to do well. Max out Ram, get a 5400 or 7200rpm hard drive, and you will be very happy with it.

ttan98 · #7 Post by **ttan98** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 8:24 am

go for it , I have T22 and T23. T23 gives good value and performance. I am waiting for 1-1.5 yrs for T42 to drop below US$1000.00 refurbished model.

Guest · #8 Post by **Guest** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 10:09 am

I am really happy with the t23 I got of ebay. Nice machine that fits my needs well. Not much good for a gamer, but it is a great little pc. For email and surfing it is as good as using my destop(xp mobile @2.4 ghz) It was a very good buy.

dsvochak · #9 Post by **dsvochak** » Fri Dec 23, 2005 1:37 pm

The T23 is a nice machine that is more than adequate for most normal tasks. As far as where to purchase, you might want to contact Absolute Raleigh ( http://www.absoluteraleigh.com ). They had a number of off-lease T23's with remaining original warranty last month.

Temetka · #10 Post by **Temetka** » Sat Dec 24, 2005 3:20 pm

I bought my T23 from e-bay. It still has a 6 month warranty on it. Came off government lease in near pristine condition w / the docking station for $425. I upped the ram to 768 and added a 5400 rpm hd. Runs rather nicely IMO.

pmurray63 · #11 Post by **pmurray63** » Wed Jan 18, 2006 9:17 pm

I bought my T23 from IBM last fall for about $520 out the door. I didn't get the cheapest price, but I felt better buying it from IBM. My only upgrade so far has been to max out the RAM.

Temetka · #12 Post by **Temetka** » Wed Jan 18, 2006 11:46 pm

I just upgraded the ram to a full gig. I didn't think my T23 would be anywhere near as fast as is it now. This machine just keeps getting better and better.

cliff320 · #13 Post by **cliff320** » Thu Jan 19, 2006 12:20 am

I've got a 1.2 ghz T23 w/a 4200 rpm HD. I plan on upgrading to a T60 eventually, but do you think it's worth it to upgrade the T23 to a 5400 or 7200 rpm HD if I plan to keep this laptop for another 6 months to a year?

ttan98 · #14 Post by **ttan98** » Thu Jan 19, 2006 3:04 pm

I have a T23, with 1.2G, it also has aN ultra mode 5 IDE interface which most current laptops also have. T22 has an older interface ultra mode 3 IDE which is a slower interface.

I upgrade to a 5400rpm seagate HD. it is operating very fast now. 7200rpm HD is even better but far more expensive. 5400rpm HD is very cheap at the moment and the PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT IS DRAMATIC.

go for it, and 12 months later T40/41/42 will be available at very cheap prices, and then you can upgrade the processor to 2.0G and you got a blazing system...most importantly at a cheap price..

LtTPfan · #15 Post by **LtTPfan** » Thu Jan 19, 2006 5:10 pm

cliff320 wrote:I've got a 1.2 ghz T23 w/a 4200 rpm HD. I plan on upgrading to a T60 eventually, but do you think it's worth it to upgrade the T23 to a 5400 or 7200 rpm HD if I plan to keep this laptop for another 6 months to a year?

I just upgraded my T30s 40gb 4200rpm HDD to a 80gb 5400rpm. Sandra bechmarked the 4200 at 18mb/s while the 5400 clocked 32mb/s. In real world improvements, my boot time decreased from 3:49 to 2:46. Getting rid of McAfee active protection cut boot time down to 1:35. I paid $61 for the "new" drive, well worth it in my opinion.

cliff320 · #16 Post by **cliff320** » Thu Jan 19, 2006 6:27 pm

I will probably buy a new drive now. Just gotta get some recovery CD's ordered from IBM and I'm good to go. Any recommendations on which brands/models are better? Thanks a lot for the help!

dsvochak · #17 Post by **dsvochak** » Fri Jan 20, 2006 10:06 am

IBM is only providing recovery CD's for Windows XP machines. If your machine originally shipped with W2K, post a "wanted" and someone will probably be able to provide them at minimal cost.

Also, unless you want to restore the machine to it's original condition and then reinstall all the software and data, you would be better off with some sort of cloning software to use to copy everything to the new drive.

pmurray63 · #18 Post by **pmurray63** » Fri Jan 20, 2006 3:29 pm

pmurray63 wrote:I didn't get the cheapest price, but I felt better buying it from IBM.

And 24 hours after I posted this, my screen appeared to be dead, or so dim as to be dead. It works fine when connected to an external monitor. Trying to figure out what to do now...

christopher_wolf · #19 Post by **christopher_wolf** » Fri Jan 20, 2006 3:47 pm

Would that be a backlight problem? I know it has been mentioned before that there is a surface-mount fuse for the backlight on the System Board. Either that could have blown, of the Backlight could be going. HTH

Here is a thread that might help: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=19024

lithium726 · #20 Post by **lithium726** » Fri Jan 20, 2006 6:51 pm

Ive got a T23... had for a pretty long time and i love it. The only problem i have with it is that it does NOT like firefox. When im browsing through lots of images or go to my department's homepage (ee.ttu.edu) it lags like no other, its rediculous... pretty much unusable. im pretty [censored] sure its the s3 POS inside there. i never understood why they did that, the x2x series had a Mobility radeon.

so anyway, im picking up an X31 now, hopefully itll treat me better

system is a 1.2ghz p3, 1gb, 60gb 7k2, internal intel pro 2100 wireless, 14.1" XGA

Nolonemo · #21 Post by **Nolonemo** » Fri Jan 20, 2006 7:22 pm

A little OT, but anyone know if you can drop a T23 mobo into a T22 case -- I'd like to get a little more kick out of my T22, but not ready to spring for a whole T23

Website · #22 Post by **tfflivemb2** » Fri Jan 20, 2006 7:25 pm

If you were to buy a T23, and sell the T22, you might end up spending the same as if you were to buy just the T23 motherboard.

pmurray63 · #23 Post by **pmurray63** » Fri Jan 20, 2006 7:49 pm

christopher_wolf wrote:Here is a thread that might help: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=19024

Thanks, Chris, it does sound similiar. I've posted in that thread to see if anyone can provide more info to this ThinkPad newbie.

lithium726 · #24 Post by **lithium726** » Fri Jan 20, 2006 9:20 pm

Nolonemo wrote:A little OT, but anyone know if you can drop a T23 mobo into a T22 case -- I'd like to get a little more kick out of my T22, but not ready to spring for a whole T23

you would have to get a new CPU cooler with the board, the cooler from the T22 is not compatable... it might not even fit in the T22 case.

as someone else said, youd probably end up spending the same. T23's are like $300 on ebay now, its not a huge investment or anything.

Nolonemo · #25 Post by **Nolonemo** » Mon Jan 23, 2006 5:12 pm

Thanks for the info, I bought a T23 mobo + cpu in the bottom casing for $120, so I'll just part out the T22 bottom after the swap.

Buying a T23, is this crazy?

Buying a T23, is this crazy?

Re: Buying a T23, is this crazy?

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