Groups | Search | Server Info | Keyboard shortcuts | Login | Register [http] [https] [nntp] [nntps]

Groups > comp.sys.laptops.thinkpad > #596 > unrolled thread

Modern Market, Lenovo vs IBM design

Back to article view | Back to comp.sys.laptops.thinkpad

Contents

  Modern Market, Lenovo vs IBM design Caffeine Canidae <samuel.common@hotmail.com> - 2026-06-30 22:55 +0100
    Re: Modern Market, Lenovo vs IBM design not@telling.you.invalid (Computer Nerd Kev) - 2026-07-01 09:06 +1000
      Re: Modern Market, Lenovo vs IBM design Chris Green <cl@isbd.net> - 2026-07-01 11:02 +0100
        Re: Modern Market, Lenovo vs IBM design Caffeine Canidae <samuel.common@hotmail.com> - 2026-07-01 18:34 +0100
      Re: Modern Market, Lenovo vs IBM design Caffeine Canidae <samuel.common@hotmail.com> - 2026-07-01 18:31 +0100
    Re: Modern Market, Lenovo vs IBM design Jason McBrayer <jmcbray@carcosa.net> - 2026-07-06 12:34 -0400
      Re: Modern Market, Lenovo vs IBM design Caffeine Canidae <samuel.common@hotmail.com> - 2026-07-07 13:38 +0100

#596 — Modern Market, Lenovo vs IBM design

What do people think of the modern lines of ThinkPads that Lenovo are 
offering in the current day? Honestly, I think people can be a bit too 
quick to judge them - and pass them off as a lot of what modern tech 
companies are offering, but with the badge of the original IBM brand 
without the spirit of their long-term durable design.

Call me optimistic - or something else, but I believe that many machines 
can be for long-term support and repairable if people are willing to put 
the time and effort into the environment of them. Of course, with 
locked-down design and non-replaceable parts, there can be issues, but 
these are simply imposed design by manufacturers and aren't entirely 
indicative of what is possible with a machine.

I'm quite impressed by the modern hardware that Lenovo are putting out 
in some cases, despite the obvious inclusion of a lot of less favourable 
tech trends that we have been seeing over the decades, such as the 
infamous "AI-powered" CoPilot key and AMD Ryzen AI GPUs (if I remember 
correctly)

I think the P16 Gen 5 honestly - despite the trendy-tech (for the lack 
of a better word - bullshit) seems like a solid machine, and I wouldn't 
mind using it for a bit more powerful operations such as editing and 
graphics.

What do you all think of the modern lines, I'll always be at heart a fan 
of the retro lines, but do you think they still live up to the name?

-- 
- Mokka

So long, and thanks for all the fish!

[toc] | [next] | [standalone]

#597

Caffeine Canidae <samuel.common@hotmail.com> wrote:
> What do people think of the modern lines of ThinkPads that Lenovo are 
> offering in the current day? Honestly, I think people can be a bit too 
> quick to judge them - and pass them off as a lot of what modern tech 
> companies are offering, but with the badge of the original IBM brand 
> without the spirit of their long-term durable design.

I took it that the ThinkPad brand had lost any meaning when I saw it
on cheap under-powered notebook things (ThinkPad Edge). I haven't
been following the whole modern Thinkpad range, but from that
evidence I decided it was just a brand Lenovo stick on things when
the marketing department think it might help - no longer any promise
to follow the design aims of IBM era ThinkPads. So the
ThinkPad/Lenovo badge seems interchangable to me now.

But I'm not in the market for new laptops anyway.

-- 
__          __
#_ < |\| |< _#

[toc] | [prev] | [next] | [standalone]

#599

Computer Nerd Kev <not@telling.you.invalid> wrote:
> Caffeine Canidae <samuel.common@hotmail.com> wrote:
> > What do people think of the modern lines of ThinkPads that Lenovo are 
> > offering in the current day? Honestly, I think people can be a bit too 
> > quick to judge them - and pass them off as a lot of what modern tech 
> > companies are offering, but with the badge of the original IBM brand 
> > without the spirit of their long-term durable design.
> 
> I took it that the ThinkPad brand had lost any meaning when I saw it
> on cheap under-powered notebook things (ThinkPad Edge). I haven't
> been following the whole modern Thinkpad range, but from that
> evidence I decided it was just a brand Lenovo stick on things when
> the marketing department think it might help - no longer any promise
> to follow the design aims of IBM era ThinkPads. So the
> ThinkPad/Lenovo badge seems interchangable to me now.
> 
> But I'm not in the market for new laptops anyway.
> 
I'm just about to move from a T470 to a T16 Gen 2 as my default
laptop, the T470 has served me well (though it's a Lenovo one of
course) but it's beginning to feel its age now and my eyes want a
bigger screen.

The T16 is refurbished from eBay and will arrive tomorrow. The
documentation seems as good as that for the T470 with proper hardware
dismantling procedures etc.

I'll report further if anyone is interested.

-- 
Chris Green
·

[toc] | [prev] | [next] | [standalone]

#601

Chris Green wrote:
> I'm just about to move from a T470 to a T16 Gen 2 as my default
> laptop, the T470 has served me well (though it's a Lenovo one of
> course) but it's beginning to feel its age now and my eyes want a
> bigger screen.
> 
> The T16 is refurbished from eBay and will arrive tomorrow. The
> documentation seems as good as that for the T470 with proper hardware
> dismantling procedures etc.
> 
> I'll report further if anyone is interested.
> 

I'd like to hear about it! I've been hearing a bit about the recent 
T-range, my friend recently got a T15 from his workplace, Network Rail, 
as a work laptop and it seems quite good!

Not exactly what they used to be, but quite upgradable and decent build 
quality from what I've heard. I imagine the T16 will serve you quite 
well if the information is right about them. I've been wanting to get a 
more recent T-series. I have a T460 that works quite well (I certainly 
like the full-size SD card part for my photography) but it seems the 
port selection is still lacking for the most part compared to a lot of 
the more workstation-like P-series. Though I suppose in the name of 
portability and simplicity I can understand the division between the two 
lines.

I'd be quite interested to see what the T16 has to offer, I've not heard 
too much about it yet.

-- 
- Mokka

So long, and thanks for all the fish!

[toc] | [prev] | [next] | [standalone]

#600

Computer Nerd Kev wrote:
> I took it that the ThinkPad brand had lost any meaning when I saw it
> on cheap under-powered notebook things (ThinkPad Edge). I haven't
> been following the whole modern Thinkpad range, but from that
> evidence I decided it was just a brand Lenovo stick on things when
> the marketing department think it might help - no longer any promise
> to follow the design aims of IBM era ThinkPads. So the
> ThinkPad/Lenovo badge seems interchangable to me now.
> 
> But I'm not in the market for new laptops anyway.
> 

Ah I can definitely understand that - the "ThinkBook" range too, or 
whatever it's called being the cheap Lenovo laptop taking the name too 
certainly doesn't help the situation - they're no better than the 
Dynabook Satellite laptops! They don't even have the beloved UltraNav!

Did you ever see about the Ultrabooks that they released! I've got one, 
non-functional but to be honest I don't have all too much intention on 
fixing it unless I can get the screen working. They weren't massively 
cheap and the build quality was definitely sub-par with the keyboard. 
Awful low-spec netbook-esque things to tie in with Windows 8/10.

I've been hoping for a return to form, I think most people have but the 
hope for it has quite died past the 25th Anniversary.

-- 
- Mokka

So long, and thanks for all the fish!

[toc] | [prev] | [next] | [standalone]

#607

Caffeine Canidae <samuel.common@hotmail.com> writes:

> What do you all think of the modern lines, I'll always be at heart a
> fan of the retro lines, but do you think they still live up to the
> name?

I think it probably depends on the line? The newest T14 got a 100%
repairability score from iFixit, after several years of 80-90%. I have a
1st generation T14 and for some things it's more repairable than the
X230 I upgraded from. It lacks the external access to drive and memory
that the X230 had, but it's easier to get to the T14's drive than any of
the internals of the X230. My X230 needs the heatsink repasted, and
getting to it is a complete disassembly.

But I think some other things that are ThinkPad branded are just
glued-together slabs like everything else.

-- 
Jason McBrayer      | “Strange is the night where black stars rise,
jmcbray@carcosa.net | and strange moons circle through the skies,
                    | but stranger still is lost Carcosa.”
                    | ― Robert W. Chambers,The King in Yellow

[toc] | [prev] | [next] | [standalone]

#609

Jason McBrayer wrote:
> I think it probably depends on the line? The newest T14 got a 100%
> repairability score from iFixit, after several years of 80-90%. I have a
> 1st generation T14 and for some things it's more repairable than the
> X230 I upgraded from. It lacks the external access to drive and memory
> that the X230 had, but it's easier to get to the T14's drive than any of
> the internals of the X230. My X230 needs the heatsink repasted, and
> getting to it is a complete disassembly.
> 
> But I think some other things that are ThinkPad branded are just
> glued-together slabs like everything else.
> 

Honestly the X-series has always been quite difficult to get to anything 
on them, I have a couple X41 that I got in a joblot to repair for amount 
maybe 25GPB (there was 3 of them in variable condition) and I've got 2/3 
of them working but it is truly a pain to get to anything in them 
(especially with some of the screws being stripped)

I think definitely the T-series has been one of the more lasting ones 
with repairability, it's gone down a bit I'd say with the batteries and 
some of the easy-access but overall it's just "modernised" in a sense 
for better or for worse. I'm glad they've generally been quite good.

As for most of the other lines I don't generally really hold too much 
hope for alot of them. The X-series I think has sacrificed quite a bit. 
I would agree most are just soldered and glued slabs with minimal 
respect for repairability or long-term use past the warranty.

-- 
- Mokka

So long, and thanks for all the fish!

[toc] | [prev] | [standalone]

Back to top | Article view | comp.sys.laptops.thinkpad

csiph-web