R60E Battery Life?

[NebuK]

Hello,

since my old iBook 800mHz just died i'm thinking of getting a Thinkpad. Now, my problem is the Budget. Since you never know when a laptop dies you cannot start saving early. So i checked a local Dealer and found the Thinkpad R60E quite "cheap" and the specs still sound nice. The size and weight is no real Problem for me since i'm used to carry more heavy camera equipment around ;P.

The only things i worry about are battery life and "thoughness". The specs say the R60E goes for 5.2Hours. Now ... why do i somehow dont believe those lap-measurements. Are there some _real_ experiences on R60E battery life?

The toughness, well ... i even lost my iBook driving 30 km/h on my motobike - with no problems for the iBook. Thats a extreme example, but i'd like my new Notebook to be about as tough as that. How much worse is the R60E compared to "tough-legends" like the T40?

Any help would be appreciated ;P

Greetings
- Dario

[SafeHarbor]

Hallo, Dario,

There don't seem to be a lot of R-series lovers here at this forum. Many folks go for the sexier models.

Like plastic? That's the major feature of the Rs.

What you don't tend to read about here in regard to the Rs is cracks in the housing, noisy fans, and running hot. Lenovo advertises these things as having "mainstream performance and features," and I think that's EXACTLY what they mean.

Something to think about right now is running Vista. Does the model you're looking at have enough video RAM (not shared, I guess) to run Vista in the "Aero" mode?

My Intel-based graphics-equipped R52 won't begin to.

Also, I see that Vista is upping the ante to 1 to 2 GB for many notebook users, so figure that in, too.

Toughness? Mine is built heavy and thick. I an NOT expecting any cabinet problems. I wouldn't recommend pavement bouncing excursions, however.

Others may see this differently, but lately I've been looking at other Thinkpads and paying attention to the graphics capability. I love my R52, and it's been very good to me, even in comparison to my previous T21. But... my R is reasonable. My next ThinkPad is going to be workstation class.

Anyhow, I don't think you need to worry about lack of toughness with an R-series model.

But I seriously doubt the battery figures. I get less than 1.5 hours with the wireless card before the ThinkPad bleats. Without that, and using Maximum Life in settings, I get about 2.5 hours. I would definitely suggest getting the big battery.

Bis bald,

Lamar

[allan]

Really? I thought there were quite a few R fans here. I'm certainly one. I just mourn having my R40 stolen. One afternoon our electicity co shut us off from 1 to 4 pm. When power returned I had 48% of the battery left. Not on wireless of course.

I would agree get the bigger battery, which is what I did with the new one. Haven't run it down yet but we'll see on a trans Atlantic flight next week.

Before TPs I had an Inspiron and it always felt like a collection of loosely attached bits when I picked it up. I move my laptop around every day, between house and office and between both and Land-Rover for fieldwork, where it has had some rough workouts on GPS sessions. The TPs can be picked up by one corner and feel solid.

Plastic? So what. This isn't a Nikon F1 or a Martin guitar. It has a very short life compared with things that we we bought because we expected them to last.

My Rs have been almost totally silent - I've never heard the fan on this one, and I have to grope about underneath to find an area that is even mildly warm.

30.5 sec for Super Pi 1M!

[Terrahawk]

The battery figures may be close to the truth. My R40 gets about six hours of use with wireless on, more if the usage is especially light. I can't imagine the R60 being too much different.

[snessiram]

Battery
My 15" R60 gets with a normal 6-cell battery, wireless on and brightness a little bit turned down around 3u40min. I own a 12" ibook too and with my "turned down" brightness on the R60 I mean a little bit less than on the ibook (which is at maximum settings lower than the R60 at maximum).

Roughness
I find my R60 feeling at least as solid as my ibook. I carried my thinkpad regularly (until I bought the ibook) with no real fear.
I believe there was a topic somewhere of someone dropping his R60 when driving his bike and the only thing that went wrong with the R60 was a hinge that came loose.

Heat/noise
My ibook gets a lot hotter. To say it otherwise: the thinkpad doesn't get hot at all. (certainly in comparisation with acers and dells and the like at school) I never heard the thinkpad either, only the hard drive sometimes "clicks" when accessing it a lot. (I have the same thing on my archos hd-mp3-player) The clicks aren't loud, but noticeable.

[NebuK]

Heyho,

thank you all for your helpful answers first.

So, the battery would lie somewhere between 2-3 hours with a 6Cell and up to 4 with a 9Cell battery. I think i can afford a additional 9Cell battery.

To hear the Thinkpad doesnt get as hot as the iBook is nice - so i'm finally buying a not-replacing-the-central-heating-computer - cool ;p.

Hm, the R60E is _no_ F1? Thats a Pity. I cant use it with that lovely micro nikkor 105 2.8? Bah, nothing then ;P.

But back to topic. About Vista - honestly i dont care. The last system i would install is Vista. Since i dont want to start a flamewar or similar here i'm not going into deeper details. Wouldnt interest anyone else. (but i _have_ to state that exploiting vista due to a intel vt hack is _cool_ (btw: works with osx too))

One thing i'd still like to know: Today i looked at the R60e again at my dealer. Somehow i noticed another problem: No touchpad. Will i be able to live with it?
Are here any exclusive-touchpad-to-exclusive-trackpoint-converts? If yes: what are your experiences? Currently i somehow couldnt imagine working with a trackpoint. The thing is - when one is used to a touchpad and now is forced to work with the trackpoint. Could one "learn" to work good with a trackpoint in - say - one month?
(Yes i know this doesnt fit into topic anymore ;P sorry. I also could imagine to start a flamewar with that here. Since i havent found much about that topic in the forum i thought i'll just ask ;P.)

Thanks for the help already
- Dario

[snessiram]

I always worked with the trackpad (not so often because I didn't own a laptop myself, but I can say I was used to it). Now when I got my thinkpad, I used the trackpad too but decided to give the trackpoint a go. It was a little bit weird in the beginning, but now I'm so used to it that I even turn off the trackpad and I really miss having a trackpoint when working on my ibook. I even find myself sliding over the GHB-keys on a normal keyboard and realising it doesn't have a trackpoint.
I also use it when an external mouse is hooked on the thinkpad (for example for the middel-mouse-scrolling), something I didn't do with the trackpad.

So.... I guess you'll survive

[SafeHarbor]

Hi, Dario,

See here:

R50e's have fewer features...

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=36003

It applies to the 60E also.

Lamar

[thePCxp]

There don't seem to be a lot of R-series lovers here at this forum. Many folks go for the sexier models.

I'm an R series lover (I love all ThinkPad's) and I think that the R series and all the ThinkPad's are sexy.

I also think that the R series is as good as all the other ThinkPad's.

[NS]

Hey PCxp, i am with you.

Look at my sig. I am short of the Z series, A series, G series and legacy thinkpads. I find that all thinkpads are the same.

NS (Thinkpad die hard fan)