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I've acquired a new Thinkpad Z60m a few days ago. After having read so much in these forums, I've decided to share my impressions with you.
As I am a bit stingy, I didn't want to spend that much on a laptop. Until now, I've owned second-hand units like a Thinkpad T21, Compaq Evo N400c oder FSC E-Series. I can also compare to a Toshiba Satellite A100 and a new FSC E-Series (that's the one I use for work).
First, here are the specs of my Z60m:
- Intel Celeron C370, 1,5Ghz, 1MB L2 Cache
1 GB RAM
80 GB Harddisk
15,4“ Display (WXGA)
DVD Writer 8x +/-
I'll just focus on the most important aspects in this review.
Build quality/exterior
As expected, this is a notebook with solid build quality and a good finish. The only annoying thing is a scratching noise when closing the lid. Anyway, the overall impression of the IBM's exterior is very good.
The keyboard is traditionally good, although it doesn't match the T21's superb quality. But compared to a brand new FSC E-Series, this keyboard wins hands-down.
The combination of trackpoint and touchpad is not perfect, but still the best one I've seen so far. Both can be used equally smooth, still I prefer the good old track point. FSC also use the combination of the two techniques, but the trackpoint is almost useless as it's very exausting to reach the buttons. After a few minutes, you just switch back to an external mouse.
I didn't know how much I was missing the T21's Thinklight until I used it again on the Z60m. This is simply a great feature.
The design is quite classic. I found the case to be a bit thick, it's not quite a slim unit. The weight is OK, nothing to complain about.
4,5/5
Display
This is my first widescreen display, and I'm loving it so far. Especially for Excel (or Open Offic Calc, to be exact) it's very superior to a normal 15“ unit. My FSC E-Series at work features SXGA+, that's also quite nice. But widescreen is simply smooth, even at „low res“ of 1200x800.
I'm glad not to have a super-brite glare-type display as I found those to be too artificial in terms of colors.
One very annoying bug is the changing resolution and rearranging of icons when closing the lid.
4/5
CPU
This was one of my main concerns. I feared it to be noisy, slow and heating up quickly, narrowing battery down to an hour or so.
But until now, I am happy with it. Using the fancontrol tool, I reduced the fan noise to a very acceptable level. Even after some hours of normal use, the temperature doesn't rise over 54°, hence the fan needn't to be faster than 2400 rpm at level 2 in fan control in my configuration.
The battery lasts at least 2,5 hours (up to 3 hours) with wlan activated and frequent use of different (not so demanding) applications (Word, Excel, Mail, Browser etc.).
In terms of speed, I can't figure out any difference to the FSC E-Series with Pentium M 725 (1,6 Ghz).
4/5
Software
To be honest, I'm always a bit sceptical when it comes to proprietary applications. I didn't like the Access Connections tool and removed it, same thing with most of the IBM stuff.
A recovery cd delivered with the unit would have been nice. I'm not entirely happy with this hidden partition to recover the system. Guess I'll stick to the instructions of building my own recovery cd and delete all this.
3/5
Other components
I'm having some trouble right now with the integrated Intel 2915 WLAN Card. I first tried out Think Vantage Access Connections but wasn't too satisfied with it. Then I went for the Intel tool which comes with the driver package and didn't like it too. Both seem like another factor to me making the configuration more difficult than it already is.
Now I stick to the integrated Windows Configuration which appears to be the most reliable one. Still I had a hard time convincing my 3com WLAN 11g DSL Router to hold up the connection to the Thinkpad without disconnecting. But now, everything works great.
Another nice feature is the Fingerprint reader which I found to be fascinating and really useful.
The DVD Writer appears to be reliable and fast after the first few tests.
General summary
That's just the notebook I was waiting for. High quality, fast, reliable, fully equipped (for my needs). Of course, you can't expect the perfect notebook at this point of price. But all in all, it's definitely a bang for the buck. Highly recommended for entry-level users or even advanced userson a budget.
Overall: 4,5/5
Last but not least, I'd like to thank this great forum for all the useful information available. I'll try to contribute in the future and give some of the things back I learned from you guys.
Regards,
Stephan
