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The X220 ThinkPad is the best laptop

bt.ht

101–110 of 148 posts

Re: The X220 ThinkPad is the best laptop

#101

I sit here, using X61s, compiling stuff, listening to music, writing code and articles, no care in the world, comfy as a kitten. I think being comfortable with less is my superpower.

Similar experience with a librebooted T400. Core2 Duo and 8 gigs of RAM is still plenty for a lot of use cases.

Re: The X220 ThinkPad is the best laptop

#102
I'd argue the X230 (basically an X220 refresh) is slightly better.

* One generation newer CPU (3rd gen, Ivy Bridge, die shrink)

* Additional USB 3.0 port

* Optional backlit keyboard

Both are solid laptops. I bought my X230 in 2016 for about $400USD and with how much I've used it, it has paid for itself. Nearly 8 years of solid service. I "upgraded" mine slightly:

* USB-C pigtail adapter with tiny 65W GaN charger

* USB 3.0 ExpressCard for total of 4 USB 3.0 ports

* Passive microSD adapter that lives in the SD slot

* mSATA SSD for simple dual booting

One can also Coreboot the machine to support newer Intel AC wireless adapters, but I don't do anything that would benefit from it.

Re: The X220 ThinkPad is the best laptop

#103
post #77

I assumed this was satire (especially the VGA port), making fun of the number of “X laptop is the best” posts which then use incredibly cherry picked and specific criteria. But it really reads like it’s genuine. Maybe a solid article that’s just 10 years (at minimum) too late.

No. It's the fact that it is a great 12 year old machine that makes it notable. I would not be surprised if it was usable as a 20 year old machine. These things are comfortable and they last.

Re: The X220 ThinkPad is the best laptop

#104
post #47

All very nice, but not with such dated CPU and memory. I also have a thinkpad with archlinux, but a 10 year newer model (T14). The CPU is fine. But it also has 16GB of RAM, and I wish there was more, it doesn't even take that many firefox+chrome tabs to fill it all up.

Aren't you exaggerating a little? My main PC has 16 GB and the only way I ever run into the upper bound is when I run a heavyweight Minecraft modpack.

Must be his browser settings, his may not be putting tabs to sleep. I am under 3 GB on a Linux machine with just browsing.

Re: The X220 ThinkPad is the best laptop

#105
post #48

Like the author, I've found the perfect old ThinkPad for me and it works brilliantly. I have a nice efficient GNU/Linux install, all my local software runs smoothly and I've used it for my day job for 9 years. But the damn worldwide web keeps marching on their mission to make the most bloated software in the universe. I should be able to keep using the machine forever with unchanged software, but the web demands more…

I blame JavaScript and the deficient culture of insanity around it. The only things that are slow on any of my computers are honking great stacks of shit built on top of browsers with JavaScript. Sometimes I have three different fucking browser engines running these stacks of shit.

I blame the native world for not finding easy ways to build better alternatives. If, for example, C++ people demonstrated that they could write the same software with more ease and speed, then it would've been a no-brainer for all businesses and open source projects in the world.

Re: The X220 ThinkPad is the best laptop

#107

I'd argue the X230 (basically an X220 refresh) is slightly better. * One generation newer CPU (3rd gen, Ivy Bridge, die shrink) * Additional USB 3.0 port * Optional backlit keyboard Both are solid laptops. I bought my X230 in 2016 for about $400USD and with how much I've used it, it has paid for itself. Nearly 8 years of solid service. I "upgraded" mine slightly: * USB-C pigtail adapter with tiny 65W GaN charger * US…

x230 is decent only if you do the x220 keyboard upgrade

Re: The X220 ThinkPad is the best laptop

#108
post #100

What I really want is a modern laptop with the old style Thinkpad aesthetics and pragmatisms. i.e ports, replaceable components, magnesium alloy chassis with plastic and rubber armor (i.e tanky AF), good keyboard with real travel, hot swap batteries, 3.5mm jack, card readers, OOTB Linux support, hw kill switches for radios, webcams and mic. Then for modernisation: 4k OLED, USB-C charging + docking, actually decent we…

I’ve managed to upgrade an i7 T480 with a new display, glass trackpad, WiFi 6e, 2xNVME SSD and 64GB ram. It has 2 USB-C ports, on of which is thunderbolt. I also have an actual dock for it and batteries for hot-swap.

If they made anything close to the expandability of these, I’d be buying that as well.

Re: The X220 ThinkPad is the best laptop

#109
post #100

What I really want is a modern laptop with the old style Thinkpad aesthetics and pragmatisms. i.e ports, replaceable components, magnesium alloy chassis with plastic and rubber armor (i.e tanky AF), good keyboard with real travel, hot swap batteries, 3.5mm jack, card readers, OOTB Linux support, hw kill switches for radios, webcams and mic. Then for modernisation: 4k OLED, USB-C charging + docking, actually decent we…

Oh, I dunno. I've been using think pads for a many years. I've had a few work issued dell xps's along the way too.

I'm currently running a P14s, and while I have a few minor gripes around the fan and thermals overall I'm pretty pleased.

  * 2xTB4, HDMI, 2xusb3, 3.5mm jack,  I could have opted for a card reader if I still used PIV/CAC for Kerberos but I carry a yubikey these days
  * I prefer the newer Thinkpad keyboards, they have less play (as in wiggle) in the keys
  * Linux support out of box is great
  * Display and scaling work well with Wayland (sway)
  * Linux power consumption is great, 
I couldn't switch to an M2, well because Linux is a hard requirement for me.
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