My first (two) X60 systems

[rkawakami]

Well, I finally joined the ranks of the "modern" Thinkpad owner . After toiling around with 600X, T23 and X2x systems for the last several years, I just bought an X60 thanks to Harryc and this post: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... 40#p549040

Some details of this new toy are here: http://www.kawakami-ca.com/ibm_x60/x60-1/ (1707-WK5)

During the couple of hours that I used the system at work, I did notice two things right away: the off-axis viewing from above and below (i.e. vertically) is as bad as most SXGA+ T23 screens (those are the ones I use most often) and the right side of the palmrest does get a little warm but it' not really any worse than the left side of a T23 palmrest where the hard drive sits.

BTW, I'm now sniping eBay for an X6 Ultrabase so look out !

[dorronto]

Congrats Ray...............

I'll be watching your post about the x60...An x60 is on the horizon for me at some point and time in the future. I'm alternating between an x31 in great condition and an x41 tablet also in good shape for travel purposes. I have an ultrabase or dock for both, though trying to sell the x4 dock here.............

Good luck and I'll be watching.

Ron

[ThinkRob]

Congrats. I think the X6x series is the best X-series currently available (at least that I've used), second only to the venerable X40. The X6x series blends the classic IBM design with modern internals to produce one durable, reliable, and surprisingly powerful little notebook.

Enjoy!

[Tasurinchi]

Congratulations Ray

My target in near future is also to get one of these little great machines. Keep us posted above your experiences...

I'm envy of the price you payed to get this beauty. I can't even dream about these prices here...

Cheers...

Tasurinchi

[Eudoxus]

Congrats!
Great machine for great price. As a recent owner of a beautiful X61s I would agree that that the screen is possibly the only weak point of X6x ThinkPads. Otherwise those are really great thinkpads.

[paul*robertson]

As someone who also went from a 600x to an X61 (in the thinkpad world) i await your posts.

[rkawakami]

Well, if some of you were looking at an X6 Ultrabase on eBay that ended tonight, either "thanks for staying out of my way" or "sorry that I won": http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... 0469434871

I generally don't like to buy items that do not have a return policy but that's also why the auction ended fairly close to my maximum bid. I also had a hard time verifying that 42W3014 is a valid FRU for a non-tablet X6 Ultrabase. From my research however, it seems to be the right one.

The X60 continues to impress me. The laptop is very quiet so far but then again, I haven't pushed it either. The keyboard seems to be a little bit "stiffer" than the T23 I'm using but that's probably more of a difference from the 4 years between when they rolled out of the factory. The parts list says the keyboard is a 39T7265, which is an NMB unit.

I'm planning to use it docked in the Ultrabase as my main "high-processing" system. That's because the best performing systems that I had before the X60 would be a couple of T41s. The total outlay so far is $335; $275 for the X60 and AC adapter, $31 for recovery disks and $29 for the Ultrabase and a second AC supply. I'm still planning to install a 2GB module. Fry's had a Corsair listed for $25 after mail-in rebate but there was only one left in the Bay Area stores. I currently have one 60GB SATA drive so I'll probably have to get at least another 100GB (or larger) to use as a backup (or bigger main drive). Not sure if I have an Ultrabay Slim DVD burner... I think there's a UJ-822 or UJ-842 around here... I really need to clean my office . And then there's the itch to get a TV tuner and see if I can use it to view/timeshift some programs. <Sigh> My cheap deal is turning out to be money sink .

Update 1/15: Well, I kept an eye out for that eBay seller and there were two more X60 systems offered up two days ago. So I got another one . Found the UJ-842 and it's working inside the Ultrabase. Planning to do an OS install this weekend if I get some time. There's a project that I have to get to for a friend first.

[rkawakami]

Received the second X60 (1707-WK5) today and it's a little bit more banged up than the first one. There's a small, hairline crack in the lid just to the left of the lid latch and a missing piece of the lid behind the right side hinge. The screen is also just a little bit dimmer than the first unit. But overall it seems to be performing quite well. I've just noticed a slight problem with the first X60 - it does not want to undock from the Ultrabase. Pushing the undock button on the side of the base, nor clicking on Windows' Undock Computer is working. Will have to look into this some more...

[Tasurinchi]

You got two X60's in 14 days!

I think I should do the same...

[dorronto]

Ok Ray................

You got me started...I just picked up a nice x60s off Ebay with a 7hr.? battery...

I'll be playing with it....



Ron

[rkawakami]

A two month update (since I was reminded of this thread by another one)...

Both X60 systems are still running fine. The previously mentioned problem about undocking has not repeated itself so I'm chalking it up to PEBKAC . Video format conversion tasks are greatly improved over using a T23 (a step forward) but when burning DVDs it takes about twice as long as before (two steps back; UJ-822 drive in the Ultrabase is slower than the UJ-840/850s I use in the T23). Maybe I should transcode on the X60, transfer the file over to the T23 via ethernet and burn there???

I'm still trying to get used to the X6 keyboard. It's the same thing I run into when using the X2x. The main problems for me is that after typing on a 600X and T23 for many years, the X6 backspace key is not big enough and the center trackpoint button is in the wrong place .

[NorrisCell]

...the X6 backspace key is not big enough...

I always have this problem when switching between X series and full size systems. I've been very impressed with my X60 thus far as well.