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"Great laptop and best customer support!" on by David-Rodgers
Pros: See summary
Cons: See summary
Summary: I rarely ever write reviews but i needed to for this one. I bought this laptop directly from Lenovo and recieved it about 3 weeks ago. I am constantly traveling and was tired of lugging my 18.5" hp wherever I went. This laptop is very light. One of the best features in this laptop is its keyboard. The keyboard is the best that i have used to date, it has no flex when typing, the keys are backlit, and they have just the right amount of resistence when pressed (also the keyboard is spillproof). The ThinkVantage suite is very nice as well, usually i would not use any software that is preinstalled by the manufacturer but it is very intuitive. Also no bloatware so when you finish setting up your computer it is actually ready to go and you do not need to remove a lot of crap applications. This computer is very fast including great startup and sleep times as well. Some people may complain about the battery not being user replaceable but you really dont need it with the new technology they put into the laptop it usually lasts me 4 to 5 hours depending on what im doing and if i need to i can get the 80% charge in 30 minutes which actually rings true to the claims. The security of this computer is very good. The fingerprint scan works even when the computer is off, you just scan your finger and it will skip the log on screen. Another noteable security feature is the camera if it does not detect human presence for you set amount of time it will automaticly lock the computer. Also worth mentioning is the screen is very very bright and makes things alot easier to see.
Update Link
My only complaint is that the ctrl and FN keys are in the opposite places that they usually are its not a big deal but you do have to get used to it if you use lots of shortcuts like myself.
The best part about this laptop by far is the support. I found 2 dead pixels near the edge of the screen so i called lenovo and within 3 button clicks i actually had a real person and there was no wait time at all.(thinkpads have seperate support from the other lines of laptops) The support is in atlanta so you can actually understand what they say and in less than 10 minutes everything was done. they are sending me a prepayed box and they also let me defer my shipment by 2 weeks because of work. This is the best support i have ever had from any company by far. Very kind and polite operators. lenovo ThinkPad will recieve all of my future laptop purchases (i am comparing the products and services to that of Dell, HP, and Sony with which i have expierience with).
I highly recommend this laptop. You won't be dissapointed with this or the ThinkPad support.
Lastly, If you will buy this Laptop I suggest you have to compare prices before you decide at: www.amazon.com/exec/******/****/B00535BU38/cnet-offer-20
Updated on Oct 26, 2011
www.amazon .com/exec/******/****/B00535BU38/cnet-offer-20 -
"Ridiculous- great machines" on by J. Blow
Pros: no heat, the best key board- period, long battery life, no preinstalled craplets, etc
Cons: a little expensive
Summary: other reviewers are full of it. I'm on my 3rd machine, two x61s and an x301 and I'd never use another laptop. Seriously.
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"Awesome machine in a need of a higher resolution screen" on by bigbadwoolfe
Pros: Keyboard, no junk pre-installed, light, USB3, good selection for CPUs, HDDs.
Cons: Low screen resolution, electrical buzzing when some power settings are changed, rubbery finish collects fingerprint smudges like crazy, headphone jack hidden behind a cover that's a pain to remove every time I want to use headphones.
Summary: This laptop came with a 160GB SSD, 8 GB memory and an i7 CPU, so it's quite the powerhouse. It is super fast (boots in 20 seconds from dead, wakes up from sleep in 1 second, starts any program in under 2...), light, and the keyboard is the best laptop keyboard I've typed on so far. One can turn on and off the backlight, and the keys make this soft clicking sound that's just ... perfect. Charging the battery is pretty amazing too - it really goes from 0% to ~80% in half hour, and takes another half hour to get to 100%. At full brightness and CPU utilization (doing tasks like installing software/updates, compiling code, Angry Birds of course) however, the battery goes for about 3.5 hrs (so not bad, but not the advertised 7 hrs). The trackpad is good, but I find that the 2 built in buttons at the bottom are sometimes tricky to use - they don't register if I am touching the trackpad, but I guess it's something I need to get used to. The red nubby joystick thingy is very useful tho, and works great combined with the 2 hard mouse buttons. Speakers are loud and clear, webcam is satisfactory (i'd say average) and the mic works surprisingly well.
Now my biggest hangup about this laptop - the screen. It looks very pretty with it's edge to edge Corning glass... until you turn it on. The default settings are not great and the picture looks too pale, almost washed up, so it needs to be calibrated for brightness, alpha, color... and this is well hidden in "windows settings". And this will bring it to a point where it's quite usable... I don't love that changing the viewing angle changes how colors appear on screen - but this is something I can live with - I usually look at it straight on anyway. Finally, something that I find exceptionally weak with this laptop - the graphics card and screen resolution of 1366x768. I'm not a gamer, but the resolution is really, really low, and on bright images I can see individual pixels. Maybe I'm too picky because I haven't had a resolution this low in years, but if I could change something on this laptop, this would be it. Probably not the end of the world for Word and email and casual web browsing, but I use things like Photoshop and Visual Studio on a regular basis and there's just not enough pixels to show everything I need on one screen. Even Gmail looks better on my old Sony(1440x900).
Overall I'm happy with the purchase so far. If the screen resolution was higher, it would be a no brainer 5 star rating. I I don't think you get more bang for your buck going any other route regardless. A Sony with the same specs costs 50% more, and let me tell you, they are gentle. This things looks like it can survive a nuclear blast... at least a 3 foot drop, and they say it's spill proof, tho I hope I won't be checking that feature soon. -
"Great product!" on by MarcWua
Pros: Thin, Light, Powerful, Great Keyboard, Amazing build quality, very good support, Great selection of ports including USB 3.0, very good webcam, beautiful design (obviously subjective)
Cons: The screen, while very bright, could have a better contrast ratio, especially for this price
Summary: I've had this product for a month now and I am glad I bought it. This product has the great build quality we've come to expect from Thinkpads, has a beautiful design and the technical support is very good. The keyboard is amazing, and beautiful with the backlit keys. The battery life is in fact better than I had expected from reviews I had read. I can use the computer unplugged for 5-6 hours easily even with Wi-Fi on. The screen's brightness easily makes up for the fact that it is glossy however blacks tend to be a little grey and colours don't pop as much as one would expect from such a premium product. Apart from the screen's contrast ratio this computer is truly amaing and very powerful. I would easily recommend it to anyone looking for a powerful, yet portable product.
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"ThinkPad Buyers Beware of defective Thinkpad touchpad" on by americanism
Pros: It was great for 15min until cursor went crazy. ThinkPad Support sent a postage-paid return box right away and I returned the defective ThinkPad to them for repair. ThinkPad Support speaks English well.
Cons: My new factory sealed ThinkPad was defective. ThinkPad Repair does not stock the parts required to make any repairs to defective ThinkPads. Board of Directors does not care about customer down-time. If you buy one you must spend time warning others
Summary: I purchased a new factory sealed ThinkPad on Tuesday. After fifteen minutes of use the touchpad would not control the cursor. On Wednesday I called ThinkPad Support. They remotely controlled my defective ThinkPad but could not effect a repair. ThinkPad Support sent a next-day postage paid return box for my defective ThinkPad. I shipped the defective ThinkPad to them on Friday. They received the defective ThinkPad on Monday. It is now Wednesday and after not hearing from them regarding the defective ThinkPad, I called ThinkPad Support. I was informed that the replacement keyboard/pad needed to effect the repair might not arrive from their vendor for another week. And that I should expect to receive my then previously defective ThinkPad a week after that.
To say that I am extremely dissatisfied is an understatement. I would love to yell at and curse their board of directors for being unconcerned about the down-time customers suffer because ThinkPad Repair does not keep sufficient parts on hand to effect repairs of defective ThinkPads. The support staff does speak English well. That is good news for anyone who buys a defective ThinkPad. They are not, however, in a hurry to satisfy ThinkPad customers. ThinkPad buyer beware.
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