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Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

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Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#41

Post by JoshTriplett »

cornedor wrote: post #7

This week at CES the T470 will be announced. So if you're thinking about buying one you might want to wait for that

Having purchased a ThinkPad immediately after its CES announcement before, I'd strongly recommend against it, for several reasons.

If something goes wrong, you'll have a long wait for service, due to unavailability of parts or replacement systems. I had to wait literally months for "next business day" service. (Under normal circumstances, they really do show up on the next business day.)

Wait a few months, let any teething issues shake themselves out, and then get one. If you can't wait that long and need a new laptop now, grab an established model.

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#42

Post by JoshTriplett »

innocentoldguy wrote: post #20
herbst wrote: post #3

Ive went with a T420 recently, mostly because of the keyboard. But also because $400 for laptop + battery + Samsung SSD + 16GB hyperX Ram sounded so cheap i could not resist. And honestly even after a 2015 MBP it feels perfect for all my needs. In fact due to the superior RAM and SSD it feels often way faster than the MBP for 5 times that price felt. Plus it has way better battery life. Seriously Thinkpads are the be…

Have their trackpads improved at all during the last five years?

The current X1 Carbon has an excellent trackpad, to the point that I actually consider the trackpad a usable alternative to the stick.

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#43

Post by chx »

2bluesc wrote: post #12

I've owned Thinkpads in the past and almost bought the T460 last month, then I discovered the Dell XPS / Precision line and fell in love. I picked up a manufacturer refurbished XPS 15 on eBay and wound up swapping in a Dell Precision E3-1505M motherboard I stumbled across. The line has Intel quad core CPUs, minimal bezel (my 15" is almost the same size as the 14" System 76 Galago Ultra Pro it's replacing), reasonably…

How's the keyboard and the TrackPoint?

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#44

Post by karussell »

aiur3la wrote: post #35

> ... I find the boot time compelling enough (~23sec until login, plus 2sec to open the browser) that I do not need this. I think something is slowing down your boot, I get faster boot on a 2008 thinkpad running the same OS. OT: systemd was supposed to improve boot performance but it has actually become much worse. Upstart on a weak chromebook boots in under 2 sec, why shouldn't your current generation thinkpad with…

Would be nice to have a faster one, yes :) ... some recommendations?

Just fyi: I measure boot time from the time I press the power button. The BIOS logo appears a staggering 8sec or something although the BIOS fast boot is enabled. (Maybe the sync with NSA or something ;))

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#45

Post by mateuszf »

aiur3la wrote: post #35

> ... I find the boot time compelling enough (~23sec until login, plus 2sec to open the browser) that I do not need this. I think something is slowing down your boot, I get faster boot on a 2008 thinkpad running the same OS. OT: systemd was supposed to improve boot performance but it has actually become much worse. Upstart on a weak chromebook boots in under 2 sec, why shouldn't your current generation thinkpad with…

I don't think this is a problem with systemd. On Archilinux using it - it's quite simple to get < 5s boot times.

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#47

Post by 2bluesc »

karussell wrote: post #15
2bluesc wrote: post #12

I've owned Thinkpads in the past and almost bought the T460 last month, then I discovered the Dell XPS / Precision line and fell in love. I picked up a manufacturer refurbished XPS 15 on eBay and wound up swapping in a Dell Precision E3-1505M motherboard I stumbled across. The line has Intel quad core CPUs, minimal bezel (my 15" is almost the same size as the 14" System 76 Galago Ultra Pro it's replacing), reasonably…

With discovered you mean you bought one? What about the noise and battery time under normal and high work load?

> With discovered you mean you bought one?

Yes, ordered a manufacturer refurbished XPS 15 from eBay, apparently that's a popular thing to do. A day or two later I stumbled on a deal on the Precision 15 E3-1505M motherboard and took a gamble on swapping it. Worked out without any issues other then likely warranty complications if I ever go down that road.

I can easily get 6+ hours on it doing vim + chromium + GCC builds. If I baby it, it can do 10 hours I assume, but it's to the point it doesn't matter unless you need to go a weekend without charging.

My old System 76 ultra pro was lucky to get 2.5 hours doing the same things.

Most of my components are selected for power. I've heard the 4k display with touch is brutal for battery life and selected 1080p instead. I have 8GB of RAM, started to swap in 32GB but the baseline power at idle went from 5.25W to around 7W. The bigger 84Wh battery is an obvious choice and I use the Intel GPU 99% of the time (sometimes the Quadro M1000M for the rare times I play games via bumblebee).

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#48

Post by yuhong »

endgame wrote: post #37

Lenovo are on my personal shitlist after superfish and abusing the windows platform binary table. When my current laptop dies (a thinkpad T440p that I'm reasonably happy with), I may have to suck up the performance hit and go to minifree for a machine I can actually trust.

Ah, "consumer" vs "business" computers. I wonder whether this distinction even makes sense. I think the biggest reason it still exists at this point is Best Buy and similar retail outlets, right?

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#49

Post by sz4kerto »

endgame wrote: post #37

Lenovo are on my personal shitlist after superfish and abusing the windows platform binary table. When my current laptop dies (a thinkpad T440p that I'm reasonably happy with), I may have to suck up the performance hit and go to minifree for a machine I can actually trust.

They seem to have signed up for the MS Signature program, so you might now get pure Win10 without bloat.

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#50

Post by sandGorgon »

2bluesc wrote: post #12

I've owned Thinkpads in the past and almost bought the T460 last month, then I discovered the Dell XPS / Precision line and fell in love. I picked up a manufacturer refurbished XPS 15 on eBay and wound up swapping in a Dell Precision E3-1505M motherboard I stumbled across. The line has Intel quad core CPUs, minimal bezel (my 15" is almost the same size as the 14" System 76 Galago Ultra Pro it's replacing), reasonably…

+1 on this. And for people planning to buy an XPS, just wait for a month. new models of XPS are being announced at CES. https://mspoweruser.com/dells-new-convertible-xps-13-leaks-a...

The convertible, bezel-less XPS convertible = macbook pro + ipad pro

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