Old Dog's Blog

I think it was Ben Franklin who once wrote “Keep your words soft and sweet, for someday you may have to eat them.” Back in April, I certainly had some “hard” things to say about My IBM Stinkpad. Now I'm going to have to eat them. Or part of them anyway. The case of the T23 is still just as weak and prone to break as ever, BUT...

There's nothing like shopping for a new laptop to help you appreciate the feature set IBM manages to design into the Thinkpads. That was my situation last month. I was anticipating the arrival of the Whidbey beta, and the need to stop “fiddling” with it and get down to some serious using of the product. As I looked at what I had available in the way of hardware, what I saw wasn't encouraging. An almost three year old desktop, and the afore-mentioned Stinkpad T23. Time for something new.

I decided up front that I was willing to spend some reasonably serious money, not just pick up the current loss-leader or such. For a whille I vacillated between a desktop and a laptop. For the price range I was willing to spend, I found I could get a reasonably high-end desktop and toss in a 20 or 21 inch LCD monitor (or a pair of smaller ones for a dual-monitor setup). But OTOH, I have become rather fond of being able to get up and move around the house, sitting in whatever place appeals to me for the moment, and still keep on working. That implies a laptop, not a desktop. So I started looking at higher-end laptops.

My requirements, for a laptop, were (in order): “enough” power and memory to run Whidbey-class apps in a VirtualPC session and get reasonable performance; SXGA screen; Centrino technology for both the battery life and the wireless, reasonable weight; a good keyboard. Along the way I looked at the usual suspects most might comtemplate -- Dell's Inspiron 8600 and 600 being the leading candidates. I liked the 8600 for some of the higher end configurations it offered, and the 600 for it's size and weight, but I just didn't like the extra weight or size of the 8600. For the 600 there was an SXGA screen but only in 14.1”, which was too small, and at the time, they didn't have a 7200rpm hard drive option for the 600. I looked briefly at Alienware's Sentia, but it suffered from the same screen problems as the Dell 600, and Alienware hadn't yet done anything with the newly shipping “Dothian” mobile processor.

Enter IBM's new Thinkpad T42, the latest in their “T” series.
** Power? It was available with the latest mobile processor, and had a 60gb/7200 rpm hard drive option.
** Memory? A factory config with 512mb and an open slot that I could (and did) populate with an additional 1gb stick, for 1.5gb total.
** Screen? a 15” SXGA. Just right. 
** Full Centrino support, wireless antenna in the lid for good reception, and a claimed battery life on the “normal” battery of up to 4 hours (I have gotten over 4, with wireless on). There is also a heavy-duty battery that can giveyou up to 6 hours on a charge, and a drive-bay add-in battery that can add another 2+, so with the heavy-duty main battery and the drivebay addin you can come darn near to a work-all-day-on-batteries setup.
** Weight? Under 6 pounds with “basic” battery. 
** Price: less than Alienware, more than Dell

I've had it about a month now and couldn't be more pleased. I'm running the Whidbey beta bits on a VirtualPC image and it's faster than it was on my old T23 on the main OS. The screen is crisp and clear, and that extra inch of size helps the text to be a comfortable reading size (when my glasses are clean). The battery life is superb, routinely going 4 hours and more on the standard battery. I bought a spare “heavy duty“ battery for it, but have not yet used it long enough without charging to find out just how long it will go. Wireless reception is super. Keyboard has that touch that seems to be the hallmark of IBM--why can't other manufacturers do it that well? It can't be that hard to do.

Oh, and the case? Those thin rails that break so easily are now over a quarter-inch wide.

But it's still fun to call it a Stinkpad.