New t42p owner with a few questions

[lodica1967]

Hi all,

I just upgraded from a 600x to a t42p with the following:

Used ThinkPad T42p (C96) Slightly blemished
T2373C96
Add to cart
$689.00*
Sale!
Volume discount
In stock**
Intel® Pentium® M 765 2.05GHz
Microsoft Windows XP Professional Edition
2048MB/2048MB
Slightly imperfect*
80GB
15" TFT
CD-RW/DVD Combo
None
Gigabit Ethernet
56K
802.11b and Bluetooth
Fingerprint reader
3 months limited

Questions?
How do I optimize my display/monitor options to best view websites? The print is so tiny on this site now, I can't read it.
I changed the display-appearence-fonts to extra large. Doesn't help.

Any monitor tips to get the most out of my bigger screen would be appreciated.

Does this machine run hot?

Does this machine freeze when it gets to hot? Can't even use alt-ctrl-delete. Have to turn it off to reset. What else could cause this?

Thanks!!!

edit: 42p

[richk]

I assume you mean T42p, not T43p. The machine should not run hot enough to freeze up. It could be bad fan, incorrectly seated fan or bad motherboard. If it freezes up, you should send it back. Period.

If the print on the screen is too small with extra large fonts, you bought the wrong machine. You cannot change to a lower resolution with an LCD the way you can with a CRT. Some people really like UXGA screens (I use one) and some people find them impossible to use.

[lodica1967]

Yep, T42p.

That explains why my search turned up nothing!

I really love this little machine compared to my 600x, it's a speed demon. Guess I'll send it back.

Any suggestion on a similar or even a better system in the same $600 price range?

What is the "favorite" ThinkPad?

[mgo]

Any suggestion on a similar or even a better system in the same $600 price range?

What is the "favorite" ThinkPad?

Take a look over in the Marketplace section. Some reputable people there selling good units. I have two T60 ThinkPads that I like a lot. They run Vista quite well, and Lenovo fully supports them with Vista drivers and other features on their site.

For Vista make sure you have 2 gig or RAM minimum, and a 7200 rpm hard drive is a plus, but not necessary.

[lodica1967]

Thanks!

Should have mentioned I don't like/want Vista.

Any suggestions on an XP model?

Is a 43 better than a 42?

[mgo]

Thanks!

Should have mentioned I don't like/want Vista.

Any suggestions on an XP model?

Is a 43 better than a 42?

Since you don't care for Vista, your choices are still going to be very good. Most of the used ThinkPads in the Marketplace area come with XP, usually XP Pro.

The T43 has a not so good reputation for fan noise, so you might want to steer clear of that model.

I suggested the T60 units because of my good experiences with that model, and they are pretty fast with dual core processors.

The fan noise if minimal, just a slight whisper most of the time with a louder whoosh when it needs to kick out some heat under heavy load.

You don't get any annoying whine or whistling sound with the fan on the T60 units.

I saw a thread recently mentioning that a lot of T60 models will be coming out of lease, so they ought to be reasonably priced around here.

Other members will have some suggestions, too on which model to buy.

[ThinkPad]

The T42p is a great model, maybe you should check to see whats going on with your machine. Perhaps the fan was replaced and thermal grease was incorrectly applied, causing it to over heat the cpu and freeze. The 765 cpu does get hot normally.

You can always lower the resolution on your screen.

[KristianJ]

You can also increase the text size within your browser and see whether it helps that particular issue. (Ctrl + + to do so, Ctrl + - to decrease if you use Firefox)

[lodica1967]

I figured out why I am having such a hard time reading website pages. My background colors are all gone!?

For example a Tivo site I belong to has a yellow background but shows up white on this monitor. Did I somehow disable the background colors? If so how do I get them back?

Thanks again!
Julia

[Johan]

<snip>Questions?
How do I optimize my display/monitor options to best view websites? The print is so tiny on this site now, I can't read it.
I changed the display-appearence-fonts to extra large. Doesn't help.

Any monitor tips to get the most out of my bigger screen would be appreciated. <snip>

Julia:

Firs, welcome to the club of T42p FlexView/IPS UXGA owners! Unfortunately, I don't have very much time right now, but nevertheless I just wanted to say that much of that you ask about has already been discussed extensively on this forum - if you feel OK about searching in the archives, then try use the "Search" function at the top of this page - it works very well, and you will be amazed about all the gold you can dig up here!

To specifically comment your text-readability questions, I suggest that you first look in the following three threads - that wil no doubt give you a number of very usable hints. See: UXGA Text-Size Readability and lowering UXGA resolution? and 15" 1600x1200 screen - Text too small?.

All for now!

Best regards,

Johan