Thinking about which T61p to buy

[Akilae]

Hi all! Long time lurker here.

I've been thinking about upgrading from my current T43 to a T61p, but I'm not quite sure which one would suit my needs.

With my current T43 the battery is removed most of the time and the laptop is shuffled from desk to desk as a mobile extension of my desktop. It crunches numbers and plays some EVE or WoW. As I move on to further graduate studies, I'm thinking about just going for a laptop setup and forgo my desktop. I'll still be crunching numbers, running EVE, and awaiting the release of games such as Starcraft 2 and Fallout 3.

I originally thought about getting the 14.1" T61p as the perfect solution. Then I found out the 570m on the 14.1" is gimped, leaving it only marginally more powerful than the 140m on non-p models. Which means if I want full graphics power, I'll need to get the 15.4" model. However, weight is something I've been thinking of. Although most of the times my T43 sits on a desk, it has enough heft to it that my shoulder is not quite eager to move up from a 14.1". No matter which model I get, I'll be removing the battery and optical drive most of the time to skim off whatever weight I can.

So a few questions I guess:

1) What games has anybody run using the non-p 140m chip? I realize Bioshock probably won't run pretty... but does it run? At all? In theory if the 14.1" 570m and the 140m are similar, then something like Bioshock should run pretty smoothly?
2) Is the performance on the gimped 570m really not worth the premium paid over the 140m?
3) How does the T61p compare to the T43 in terms of weight and size? I've heard the 14.1" model is slightly heftier, but how much larger is the 15.4"? Does anybody have any photos for comparison? I would very much appreciate a comparison of a 14.1" T43, 14.1" T61, and a 15.4" T61p.

Any opinions are greatly welcome! Thanks!

[jonnnny]

I had the same dilemma.
I ended up choosing the 15.4" for the graphics card and the widescreen resolution.

I carry it to school every day in my backpack and it is noticeably heavier than my X41t (obviously). However, I quickly got used to it over a week or so.

I've seen the 14.1" T61p and well.. I love the screen estate and resolution of the 15.4. Not to mention the video card which I can play COD4, Crysis and Bioshock on

Not sure about the gaming performance of the 14.1" incher though.

[pae77]

I had the same dilemma as well.

I ended up going for the non wide 14.1 T61p because there really wasn't that much of price difference between that and a similarly spec'd non-p so I felt the extra graphics power (such as it is) would probably be worth it.

Love the portability but do miss the extra graphics power that the bigger p would have because when I ordered, I wasn't into games as much as I am now. So now, I probably would enjoy a bigger, higher res screen as well, although don't like the looks or the size and weight of those models. But, if I had it to do over again, I think I would probably give the bigger model a try though.

On the other hand, at least COD4 runs quite well at moderately high settings on my machine. Don't know about how the 140 graphics card would compare.

[Akilae]

jonnnny:

hmm... mind if I launch another barrage of questions then? :-p

1) Do you use the tweaked drivers I've been reading about? Or do the Lenovo default drivers work (well enough)?
2) Is it necessary to disable the dual cores in when gaming? I read on one of the T61p threads that people had to revert to single core mode in order to get games to run properly? Is it still necessary now?
3) I've never seen/touched/owned a widescreen... how do widescreens handle 4:3 resolutions? Say... I want to go retro with Baldur's Gate 2, would the image stretch, or would I get black bars on both sides of the screen, while the image is maintained at 4:3?