Wife wants a laptop finally...

[schuetzen]

I bought a T41 refurb about 3 yrs ago and immediately maxed its HDD and RAM and am using it for amateur radio (ham) digital with its XPPro SP3. absolutely no problem with it, take it to hotels etc with a PCMCIA wifi card, etc. I even bought a minidoc for it but have never used it. Hard to believe how much I love this thing... but of course, I am writing this on my real love - my 2005 MacPro with 4 - 2TB HDD, 16gb of RAM, etc and so on.

Here is the problem, my wife of 38 yrs wants a larger screen - at least a 15", as she has trouble reading the screen on my T41 (273). Of course, we can always add an external monitor or use the plus key to increase the resolution. All she wants to use it for is some family email, inet browsing and the like. She is certainly not a power user by any stretch of the imagination. I have a wifi in the house so that she can sit in front of the TV and look up the cast of various episodes to see when they died off, etc <G>.

So, we are looking for something with a 15" screen or better, maybe a T60 or other?? I want a ThinkPad and the bottom line is a gb of RAM, 60gb HDD and $500 or less.

Suggestions??

thanks es 73
chas k5dam

[ssd_thinkpad]

The T40-T43 or T60 with the 15 inch and SXGA+ or UXGA resolution all are IPS displays (Lenovo / IBM calls them "Flexview") which are very good. Take one of these. They should be rather cheap. The easiest solution would be a T4x with 15 inch IPS display and then you can just take the hdd of the old thinkpad and put it in the new one.

If you need more speed, take the T60.

Whether buying T4x or T6x, avoid nvidia graphics (gpu) as it tends to make big problems. Intel is best, ATI second.

I have a T60 for years and despite its problems - rather heavy etc. I love it. It is completely silent with the ssd and I have even turned of the fan completely with the program tpfancontrol. If you add two large displays and use keyboard, mouse it is hard to beat

[RealBlackStuff]

For your wife's eyes sake, I think a T43 or R52 with Intel graphics and 15" XGA would be perfect.
You'll want to stick to the 4:3 aspect ratio of the LCD.
I happen to have such an R52 for sale.

Product: ThinkPad R52 1860-CAU
Original description: P M 750(1.8GHz), 512MB RAM, 40GB 5400rpm HD, 15in XGA 1024x768 LCD, Intel 900, CDRW/DVD, Intel 802.11abg wireless(MPCI), Modem(CDC), 1Gb Ethernet(LOM), UltraNav, Secure Chip, IEEE 1394 Firewire, 6 cell Li-Ion batt, WinXP Pro

Currently this machine is barebones: no RAM, no HD (but cover/caddy included), no media drive, no battery, no AC-adapter. It does have an Intel 2915ABG wifi card in it.
The BIOS has been updated with a NO-ERROR-2010 version.
Meaning you can throw any PATA hard disk in it, without that ominous Error 2010 Message.

PM me if interested to discuss price and the missing parts (if you don't have them yourself).
The R52 takes DDR2 PC2-4200 or PC2-5300 RAM up to 2GB.

[rleo25]

T60s 15" IPS are really a nice option, however if you are a Mac fan why don´t you get her a 15" macbook which comes with such estraordinary dsplay onboard?

[ThinkRob]

T60s 15" IPS are really a nice option, however if you are a Mac fan why don´t you get her a 15" macbook which comes with such estraordinary dsplay onboard?

The 15" MBP uses a TN display, not an IPS one.