Thinkpad survey!

[Oregonian Haruspex]

It looks like we have a few people who read this group, and I think it
could become great again if we simply post a bit. I’ll start off with a
survey!

1: Do you own Thinkpad from a purely pragmatic POV or do you collect them
too?
2: What is your favorite Thinkpad and why?

To answer my own questions, I enjoy collecting them on the cheap, and my
favorite Thinkpad is the X40, which is still powerful enough for day to day
work for me. I wish they still made 4:3 Thinkpads because they were so much
smaller.

[visiblink]

On Tue, 2 Oct 2018 06:13:32 -0000 (UTC)
Oregonian Haruspex <no_e...@invalid.invalid> wrote:

> 1: Do you own Thinkpad from a purely pragmatic POV or do you collect
> them too?

I guess a little of both.

> 2: What is your favorite Thinkpad and why?

My main home machine is an R500(my favourite) running Debian LXDE.
The 16:10 display is so nice owing to its vertical space. It's still
responsive and I'm happy with it. I also have an X120e (bought new,
runs Win7) and a 390X (also Debian LXDE). Neither gets a great deal of
use these days.

At work, my employer provided a Dell Latitude 5480. I couldn't
stand the keyboard (it misses keystrokes and I'm not happy with
the layout either) and replaced it with a ThinkPad Yoga 260, which I
like a lot better, despite the missing lower trackpad buttons. I find
the pen very useful for annotating PDFs with the device in tablet mode.

I would really love an update along the lines of the T500/R500. A new
16:10 15" machine with a great keyboard and a trackpad with lower
buttons would be great.

[News]

Favorites: X61s 4:3 with 4G WWAN, 510CS early sub-note

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[Computer Nerd Kev]

Oregonian Haruspex <no_e...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
> It looks like we have a few people who read this group, and I think it

> could become great again if we simply post a bit. I?ll start off with a

> survey!
>
> 1: Do you own Thinkpad from a purely pragmatic POV or do you collect them
> too?

I bought a 90s one as a collectable for either nothing or next
to it. Unfortunately I ended up pulling it apart in order to try
to get the screen backlight working, then got distracted and
haven't got it back together again (years later, I'm afraid). I
guess that's a failure at the collecting side of things.

> 2: What is your favorite Thinkpad and why?

I'm still sticking with my R31, though I've been thinking that if
I decided that browsing the web was getting too painful on it (even
with a lightweight Linux OS) I would move up to an X/R/T61 with a
4:3 screen.

Recently I noticed an R60 on Ebay as not working and without power
supply, but with a description which made me suspect that it could
be an easy fix. Got it for $5, and after buying a genuine Lenovo PSU
for $22.50 from a surplus store that happened to have a bunch of
them, I powered it up and found that the problem was just slight
corruption of the file system causing XP to hang while booting.
Simply mounting the partition using ntfs-3g in Linux from a Live
CD was enough to fix Windows. Stress tests showed that there don't
seem to be any other problems, and even the battery still seems to
work well!

It has the 15" 4:3 screen and Intel Core 2 CPU. With a lightweight
Linux distro it runs very fast, though Windows is a bit slow
(probably all the junk left on it from the last owner).

Looks like it will be next in line for daily duties, but for now
I still prefer some things about the design of the R31 (no
trackpad in the way, better sound, parallel port (still handy for
me), ...).

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#_ < |\| |< _#

[Archer]

On Tue, 2 Oct 2018 06:13:32 -0000 (UTC), Oregonian Haruspex
<no_e...@invalid.invalid> wrote:

>1: Do you own Thinkpad

I own a R50e (2015 or so) and it is still my preferred daily mahine. I
also have a Lenovo G50/Win10 but I use it only for occasional work
involving video etc.

The R50e is loaded with XPSp3. I tried to load Win7 once but it was
too much for the machine and I reverted back to XP
--
Sandy

[joecool]

I’ve had a X201 since they were selling them new. Runs win10 and gentoo
currently. To me its the last thinkpad made with ideal form factor (no
trackpad, classic keyboard). It’s still my daily but I carry a GPD pocket
more places since it fits everywhere.

I might repurchase a X220 one of these days, the X201 is fine for most
things but does show its age sometimes.

[Bill]

In message <LnMuD.154210$SN2....@fx38.iad>, joecool
<joe...@this.is.invalid> writes

>I might repurchase a X220 one of these days, the X201 is fine for most
>things but does show its age sometimes.

I run an X201 with Windows 10 and it's still good in spite of the OS. I
use it to have a machine with W10 as I "support" friends with their
problems.

I just replaced my workhorse T410 with an X220T, fitted it with an mSATA
ssd for the OS (W7 64bit) and a big data drive. I run XP in a VM on it
to run the old programs I need. I'm delighted with it. The capacitive
touch is brilliant for scrolling, zooming etc. when in laptop mode as
well as being good in tablet use.

Third main machine is an X200T on W7 64-bit that I use as something to
hook up to external things with. For example the ODB2 car diagnostics,
Firewire audio controllers etc. etc. The resistive touch screen is not
as good. Had it on W10 briefly, but Microsoft kept blowing away the
screen drivers and I never did get touch working for more than a few
days at a time.

Finally ditched the old X60T's and older TP's.
--
Bill

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[James McCoy]

I own, love and use a T500.

[5GyYap52yQ1UGMWD]

I know this has been a while but it looks like ibm.ibmpc.thinkpad is a
slow group. Well, anything in USENET aside from a few are mostly slow
nowadays anyway.

1. I started using Thinkpads in 2018 because I was looking for a cheap,
used laptop that I can buy with my meager salary. I was able to buy a
used X200T in decent shape then. I gradually started buying a few more
Thinkpads in the following years since them because I've liked how my
X200T works.

2. I'd say my favorite ones right now is the X200, not the T, since it's
the that I'm using right now. I find that it's just the right balance
between portability and usability. I'm also a bit fond of both the X60
and X61 since they have a slightly square display and slightly smaller
footprint.

In that regard, I've been thinking for a few months now whether I should
upgrade my laptop to a Thinkpad X220. The allure of a quad core CPU and
16GB of RAM in this day and age has been getting stronger.

Any suggestions? I've been trying to fish for the higher end i7 models
but I don't know how rare they are today.

--
Pointless meanderings in a bleak and lonely world.