Which Thinkpad to buy?

If I remember correctly there was another thread on this topic but I couldn't find it anymore. Anyways, I need a new laptop for programming/university and all the old stuff like the T420 is becoming a little bit too slow for me. I have the choice between a Thinkpad X1 Carbon 8th gen and a Thinkpad X13, both at the price of 600 dollars. Here are the specs: X13: Intel Core i5-10310U 16GB DDR4 13" screen X1: Intel Core i5-8665U 8GB DDR4 14" screen The X13 doesn't have a backlit keyboard and the screen is smaller but that extra RAM compensates for it. I'm really unsure whether 8GB will fit my needs since I have a lot of tabs open all the time. What do you think lainon?

>>48614 Using Windows? 16GB, no question. If you want to run VMs, complex build systems, IDEs, etc. more RAM is a blessing. If you're using Linux 8GB should be enough (swap/zram, etc) but it'll probably be tight. If you would prefer the X1, make sure you have swap/zram and try to offload stuff to a build system like a VPS.

>>48614 The X13 is imo better, if you aren't married to having a tiny laptop the T series are better value though

I recommend the T41 for street cred

Theoretically you could swap the non-backlit-keyboard for the backlit FRU.

X200 w/troonboot Thank me later

Since the Thinkpad General is gone I'm just gonna post this here. I need help Compiling and flashing coreboot on my Thinkpad T60. I don't want to use Libreboot because I want SeaBIOS as my payload with my own bootsplash image. I managed to compile it but I'm scared soykafless of flashing it and fuarrrking it up, I don't have a pomona clip or a raspberry pi to fix it in case something goes wrong. So please, if you're willing to help me contact me on tox: E846A2A8829CBCF831F943A59513C88A433836CBA050754841E000C838FB997E0992E2FEF065

>>48655 Tox more like cox

>>48632 I recommend the T420 because it gets stoner chicks wet when they find out your "super hacker terminal" is running on Terminator Weed.

>>48614 X13. That extra 1” isn’t that much.

For security reasons, you should only use a secured core Windows 10 PC, a macbook, or a chromebook, but desktops have a terrible security model, so it is advised to only use mobile devices, in which case iOS is recommended.

>>48675 oh boy, thinkpad threads are just meme threads now

What websites do you guys use to buy thinkpads online? I'm looking at ebay and following a couple of auctions but I hate the bidding format, when I buy something I just want to buy that thing for a flat price, not have to worry about auction times and being outbid, however I'll stick with it if this is the cheapest and easiest way to get one

>>48708 i use gumtree in my country to find them and just go and pick up in cash. if you are american then i guess craigslist? otherwise just set ebay to buy it now

>>48655 You really should get a clip and a CH341A. I assume you have a second computer to use? Doesn't have to be a pi, just has to run Linux and Flashrom. They're $10 or something. Save off your current BIOS and you'll have an escape hatch in case something goes wrong.

>>48708 I usually just set eBay to buy it now and sort by recent listings. Sometimes you find deals sometimes you don’t.

>>48708 Ebay, gumtree, reseller sites like ITzoo We're still in the silicon famine right now so used prices are high but there's still good deals to be had if you're patient

>>48614 I use a T420s, which in hindsight wasn't my proudest purchase but never the less I love it, it suffers from poor thermals, so if I were you, I would probably get a T440p but the X13 and X1 are good choices but I'm not well versed in the ease-of-repair of these two

The state of modern thinkpads is fuarrrking infuriating, My T450s is really long in the tooth now and I can't get a replacement keyboard that actually has a working trackpoint for some reason but there's nothing worth replacing it with in their range, they're all trending in the wrong direction and the T480 and T495, the last good ones, are all way overpriced at the minute. I think I'm done with thinkpads, might buy a slimbook or a framework laptop instead, at least they have all user upgradeable parts but no trackpoint and buying a new laptop is crazy expensive

>>48614 don't get a chinkpad they're all garbage. thinkpads have all sucked ass since 2009 or so

>>49578 Why? What do you recommend? Bear Computer?

I just got myself the X1 carbon, 4th gen. Paid $400 for it. Not sure if that was a good purchase or not. Suddenly worried about the quality of the keyboard.

>>49581 i don't really use laptops anymore but if you want a business laptop i'd look into HP and Dell I guess. Never had a dell one but i had a really good HP business laptop over 10 years ago. and if they suck then you might as well just get a regular consumer grade laptop, they're much cheaper and if they're all crap nowadays anyways then why pay the premium

>>49584 Dell ones are decent, but make sure to buy them refurbished or used, because their MSRP pricing is nonsensical. The main issue I had was that some of them run pretty hot, but that is probably due to the reburbishing company not bothering to repaste.

One problem I've run into with a relatively-recent thinkpad under Linux is a sound volume issue. No matter what I do, the maximum volume on my X1 1st-gen 2-in-1 tablet is way too quiet. Pipewire or pulseaudio, Fedora derivatives, Debian derivatives, Arch, older kernels, recent kernels, firmware updates, it doesn't matter. I spent roughly 20 hours last week trying to get volume on my X1 tablet to be anywhere close to the same as under windows. Even with the usual "amplify above 100%" in the mixer tricks I never could get it working. I could barely hear anything with either the built-in speakers or the headphone jack. In the end I simply gave up and am making plans to sell and replace the machine with something I know to be compatible out of the box, rather than try to continue getting Linux working on it.

>>49594 Did you check the levels in alsamixer? The 'Master' slider controls hardware volume whilst Pulse IIRC uses software volume control.

>>49595 One of the first things I did. Trust me, I'm no newbie at troubleshooting on Linux. I cut my teeth on Slackware 3.4. I have solved a whole lotta weird issues on a whole lotta weird hardware in over 2 decades of using various distros as my desktop daily driver. I went about 10-20 pages deep on duckduckgo, google, etc. with various search terms. Nothing at all has helped. So I'm writing off this hardware as a lost cause. Reinstalled windows and set it aside for sale to fund a replacement.

>>49596 That's a shame you couldn't get it to work. Sounds like you should try filing a bug for the audio chipset so future owners don't have to deal with the issue.

>>49599 >That's a shame you couldn't get it to work. Sounds like you should try filing a bug for the audio chipset so future owners don't have to deal with the issue. The bug report for the same issue was filed years ago, in many many places. It's continually marked as fixed in most of them despite not actually being fixed. The bug can be found by searching for "intel sunrise point linux low volume" and similar phrases. This isn't my first rodeo with bug reports.

>>49457 >framework https://frame.work/ It does look like an awesome laptop. It's also quite a bit cheaper if you "configure" it yourself.

Just bought a Yoga. Wanna install a Linux distro on it but still keep access to the pen to do art on Krita or whatever. I heard Gnome was good for touchpads. Any other recommendations? I'd also like to do some light RPG maker games and Love engine games.

>>49688 honestly i don't think you'll run into issues and should just use whatever distro/DE you want. wacom support is really good. my x60 tablet pen works without configuration on my recent arch linux/i3wm install. a more recent laptop should have no problem with the pen being supported.

>>49688 >Gnome I would install KDE or Mate instead because Gnome is like kicking dead whales down the beach.

I have a Libreboot X200 which works great, but I am unsure of which distro to run on it. I am currently running Debian GNOME but GNOME runs a bit sluggish on it. Any recommendations?

Are the tablet models actually any good? Specifically X200t. Wouldn't the hinge break more easily?

>>49742 Window Maker would probably be a good fit for the tablet, otherwise leaner DEs like Xfce or Mate should run better than Gnome (especially super light window managers like IceWM). Debian is great because it's very customizable and stable, with new releases aprox. every 2 years you won't have unexpected software changes so your environment will remain 100% consistent until you upgrade.

(repost also on other thread!) My co worker has something like T460 or T430 it's smaller than mine I have a P1 Gen1 his is actually smallest thinkpad I have ever seen irl. What model is it and is it good bros? I want a smaller PC to throw at my backpack and use it for ZOOM (soykaf uni job) and Linux and writing LaTeX.

Can anyone tell me the difference between the 41W1450 and 41W1360 mobos for the t60? I'm planning on librebooting so I know I need the intel graphics and obviously don't want a mobile baseband.

How usable are the librebootable thinkpads? Surely you don't need more than 16GB of ram to just browse the net and program, maybe do a little light gaming?

>>51254 >16gb ram bad news anon

>>51258 Nonsense, I get along just fine with that.

>>51254 >How usable are the librebootable thinkpads? I own a T60 and it's hot garbage. You can listen to music, read PDFs, visit websites and watch video but nothing more. Anything 3D will lag, Minetest renders only 3 chunks with 20fps, maybe some 2D games could work. Compiling the linux kernel takes 6 hours, compiling web browsers will likely fail. >16GB of ram ... Librebootable thinkpads don't support more than 8GB if not only 4GB. My trashpad has 3GB.

>>51254 What the hell do you people do that you need so much ram? I've literally have just 8 both and my pc and laptop and never ever was I close to running out of it.

>>51338 Try running a few VMs, or using Qubes. It's feasible, but it's definitely less painful without having to swap constantly.

>>51333 I think he meant that Librebootable laptops don't support 16GB of RAM.

>>51254 The problem with questions like this is... It depends entirely on use case. They are usable for me... Although, I can run a 1GB raspberry pi to do nearly everything I need. >email >IRC >music >write/compile *TeX >writing programs >read PDFs The only thing that does suck is compiling, but zram helps prevent crashing and, at worst, I can juts use my nice home server for that. I don't play video games at all. If I did, I'd opt in to having a separate machine for such things.

>>51335 >Librebootable thinkpads don't support more than 8GB if not only 4GB. My trashpad has 3GB. Doesn't it? I think 3GB blackslist is the case with windows operating systems and you should use linux to avoid it. Maybe upgrade to core 2 quad but I think x200/t500 model should be way faster and support 8gb but I've heard the libreboot pushes this to 16gb or something (might be unstable?). The good thing about t60/t500 is the screens. >>48614 16gb is enough for everything however isn't it kinda expensive considering you could get the same specs at the same price? >>48708 Just look at every market place, something like carousell or whatever is available on your place in europe there's tons of them too but I don't remember the names. Use android apps.

>>51338 Working on large software projects eats up ram like crazy nowadays. I'm working on a large Android project atm and between the IDE and Gradle it was using ~20Gb locally. We ended up switching to a remote build system because of this.

>>51347 >Doesn't it? I think 3GB blackslist is the case with windows operating systems and you should use linux to avoid it. The chipset supports only 32-bit adresses which effectively gives 3-something GB even if 4GB are installed.

>>51354 Here's the from the official T60 page: >Supports up to 4GB maximum memory >Note: Only 64-bit operating systems support more than 3GB of system memory (RAM). Intel Chipsets 945GM and 945PM do not support more than 3GB system memory (RAM), even when a 64-bit operating system is installed Well that's news to me. >The chipset supports only 32-bit adresses which effectively gives 3-something GB even if 4GB are installed. Here's from Intel: >The Mobile Intel 945GM/GME/PM and Intel 945GT Express Chipsets support up to 4 GB of addressable memory space and 64 KB+3 of addressable I/O space. Sounds like IBM set a hardware limitation when chipset really support 4GB? I suppose coreboot or libreboot might remove this limitation. I've heard upgrading to libreboot lets you use different blacklisted CPUs like certain core quad processors. I had something like a G45 chipset (toshiba) which only sees 3GB with any windows version but could use 4GB on linux so might be worth a try.

>>51414 Forgot to tell, that toshiba BIOS has option to set whether the OS used is "Windows" or "other OS" and obviously other works and can even dualboot to windows. Not sure and I might be remembering incorrectly but I think when I booted from grub (os prober took windows boot) with "other OS" setting in the bios the windows could see the entire 4GB memory.

bump >watch the lainbots start a new discussion about their LARPpads KEK

>>48614 I've always had great success with X220-x240's t420+ usually do the job

I have a T420, T430, X230 and I nearly exclusively use the X230. Performance is good enough for my needs of surfing the web, watching video, and writing documents. I found my T420 to overheat easily while even watching 720p video. The T4/X230 are not very good gaming machines for modern games if that's what you're looking for. I like the trackpad much more than the *40 series thinkpads. I recommend a T430 or X230. X230 is nice and small which makes it easy to carry to school in a bag. T430 can get a beautiful 1080p IPS screen put into it with relative ease and it really does look great. https://coolio.one/blog/1080p-ips-upgrade-for-my-thinkpad-t430.html Sorry for the self promo but this is a relevant blogpost containing the kit and panel I used. The kit link seems to be dead, but attached is the image associated with it. Be careful when buying one as many are outdated kits that have issues like flickering, but those are becoming more and more uncommon. You can also put an IPS panel in an X230, but that is only 1366x768 AFAIK unless you want to solder.

>>48708 Try searching for "refurbished thinkpads" and some local websites will show up

>>48614 anyone know what upgrades are possible for a IBM T43? I just wanna do stuff like put in an i5 core, an SSD, & 16 GB memory. Pretty standard stuff for a newer model Lenovo, but something tells me it won't be as easy to upgrade something as old as a T43.

What are your experiences with the newer ThinkPads? Am considering buying a T14 Gen 3 whenever it comes out. Has build quality dropped? Are components still upgradable?

>>56561 The T series (talking specifically about the T14 here) has been slimmed down a lot and has lost two ram slots and comes with one slot soldered and one upgradeable. Aside from build quality and a little larger battery you should check out the L series which has both ram slots and 400 nit LP displays in some regions. I would rec checking out the specific psrefs before choosing

>>56339 >put i5 core into 2005 laptop ZOMG WUT? are you an expat from /g/ or what?

>>51353 LULZ I been working on several millions of lines of code on a very limited PC. My IDE was vim plus few console tools.