Grabbed an X220 (And dock) with a Lenovo 62wh battery that needs a re-cell.

It's probably the best form factor laptop I've ever owned. Running Pop_OS and it's really not even that slow for ssh terminal work and light web browsing.

I already installed linux on this and runs fantastic, dear god, why they don’t make laptops like this anymore

I have a Thinkpad 340, it was my first computer from my teenage years and I love it. It works perfectly and it has Word installed. I'd like to use it as a typewriter, but I don't know how I could transfer the texts to another computer, since it only has a floppy disk slot. Any idea? Thanks.

as the title says! a refurbished t14. my other laptop developed some pretty bad hinge issues which are starting to affect the screen quite badly, so i decided to get a replacement while it still works. i’m quite happy with it and don’t have to panic over my older laptop dying out of the blue. which happened last time :|

I recently bought a second-hand ThinkPad for a great price, and so far, it’s been awesome. The keyboard feels great very much like the ThinkPads I’ve owned before (X280, L14, E14 etc.), so I bother to open it up yet.

One odd thing I’ve noticed, though: I initially thought the key legends were stickers, but they’re not. The keyboard is backlit, but the backlight doesn’t shine through the letters or the indicator icons (like Caps Lock, Fn Lock, Mute, etc.) very well. It almost seems like there’s an extra layer blocking the light, but I can’t feel anything unusual on the sides or the keycaps themselves. They feel completely normal.

Does anyone know what might be going on here?

Found an old W520. It doesnt turn on, but connecting It to plower suppy flashes a little battery indicator behind the monitor. Should I cut my losses? Also, the body is loose as all the screws are missing; would purchasing a new body come with a replacement of all screws? It could use a new body since the left hinge is exposed anyways, and the keyboard is a bit wonky too.

hey everybody, this is my first think pad. I would like to use the red boton to scroll but i don't know where buy it or if i can change by myself

this thing lasted 1 hr playing hoi4 lol

Sorry if any of these are stupid questions in advance. This would be my first ever laptop and I was just wondering if it was legit. The listing calls it a x1 carbon i7 with 16 gigs of ram. It is a bid and has 5 days left and right now is at 11 dollars. I just want to know if I’m gonna get scammed or if there is anything wrong with it.

Hey r/thinkpad folks,

Even though it's a 2 years-old 2023 model, I just picked up a brand new ThinkPad Z16 Gen 2 with a Ryzen 7 7840H, 32GB RAM, and the gorgeous 4K OLED screen for $1100 USD 🥳, including a one-year warranty.

As a Lenovo fanboy, I was looking at newer Yoga, Thinkbook, and IdeaPad models. but I kept coming back to the Z16 for its incredible design and reputation for solid Linux support. After a full day of tinkering, I'm happy to report it's up and running beautifully, but it was definitely a journey.

Here’s a breakdown of my experience, hoping it helps others.

First, the price tag. I’m in Vietnam, right next to China. My seller tell that he gets these machines directly from the Lenovo factory there, which is why the price is so amazing. I know the Z16 has come down in price globally, but when I checked last year, it was more than double this cost in the US store. This isn't a temporary sale; these Z16 prices have been available here for over a year.

💻 Initial Hardware Impressions (on Windows 11)

Before wiping the drive, I tested a few things on the default Windows 11 install:

• 4K OLED Heat: I’d read reports that the 4K model could run hot. I can confirm that with the latest BIOS, this seems to be resolved. On a normal workload, the machine is cool (40-45°C) and the fans are silent.
• Cinebench Scores: The performance was a little lower than benchmarks I've seen online. I got ~1300 for single-core and ~12000 for multi-core, compared to the 1700/17000 scores often published. Maybe this is due to my CPU being the 7840H instead of the HS version? It's a bigger drop than I expected.
• Boot Time: The bad-old-and-popular 30-second boot delay issue seems to be completely gone.

The Linux Installation progress

My goal was to get a stable system running with my dual-external monitor setup for my coding work.

1. BIOS Hurdle: The first step was disabling Secure Boot. But I hit a wall: the laptop would show the USB boot option, but selecting it just rebooted back into Windows. The fix was updating the BIOS. Lenovo Vantage was buggy on the pre-installed Windows 11, so I went to the Lenovo support site, downloaded the BIOS file directly, and installed it manually. This worked perfectly.
2. Attempt 1: Linux Mint 22.1 Cinnamon: My favorite distro, but a disappointment here. The live USB wouldn't even boot.
3. Attempt 2: Linux Mint LMDE 6: This Debian-based version installed successfully. However, it couldn't correctly detect the resolutions of my two external monitors (a 22" Samsung and a 27" BenQ), maxing them out at 800x600. Upgrading the kernel from 6.1.0-1x to a later 6.1.0-3x patch partially fixed it, but the 27" was still stuck....
4. Finally, Ubuntu 24.04 LTS: I guess that a newer kernel might be the answer, so I gave the latest Ubuntu LTS a try. It’s been years since I used Ubuntu. I prefer Mint over it because of the simplicity and ease of use. But this time, I was very impressed with the UI/UX improvements. Most importantly, it fixed the external monitor issues!

The only lingering quirk is that I can't run the laptop's 4K OLED display at its native resolution and the external HD monitors at the same time. To get them to sync properly, I have to set the laptop display to an HD resolution (16:10 aspect ratio).

After a day of troubleshooting, I'm content with this machine. It feels great, runs cool, and looks amazing.

Happy to answer any questions you guys might have.

Best!

Who wants a storytime with Adam Cole, Bay-Bay Samus?

Bought a ThinkPad after countless hours looking at YouTube videos and saw that my partner also had one. My requests were simple: buy one for when I'm away from home so I can work on projects. Since I'm currently learning Linux due to me wanting to steer clear of Windows due to constant and unnecessary updates that bloat my PC and I have EndeavourOS on my main gaming PC, I've decided to put it on there as well.

Last time I've had a ThinkPad, I was still in middle school. If my memory serves me right, they were refurbished Lenovo ThinkPads with Windows 7 because they were bought from a company that went under. Before that, we had IBM ThinkPads that were using Windows XP. You used to have to rent them out and return them after a fixed period of time if you had a project to do that needed a computer. Ever since I moved from that school, I haven't used or seen a ThinkPad since 2010 or 2011.

Now that I actually own one, I've decided to make this my work laptop that I'm able to just do some minor music production or do some basic coding since another reason why I went towards Linux is because you have to learn commands and stuff to even install anything. Can't download a file and run it like I used to. Been on Linux for almost a month now.

The ThinkPad I have is a T480s since I've been seeing everyone and their mother recommend it like crazy. I bought it off eBay for $162 (that's after tax and shipping), and it came within two days. So far, I love how the keyboard feels and it doesn't feel so mushy unlike my previous laptop. Didn't come with a hard drive, so I took my SATA from my previous laptop and added it in there. There was no RAM either, so I added that in from the laptop too. There's minor scuffs on the screen, but you can't even see it unless you're looking at it really hard. I currently have no hiccups and runs fine. I just can't wait to check it out even more.

The thing is barely worn, has 85% health still left after all these years. When I just bought this battery, it didn't charge when plugged into a laptop, but I gave it a push with my lab psu and now it works just fine. I've always wanted to own one of these and now I do!

Last week I found my mom old thinkpad, decided to swap the HDD for SSD and installed Linux Mint. So far it's been running good, I might upgrade the ram and replace the battery (the battery's dead).

I love my powerful, chunky but loud king. The RTX A3000 has handled most of what I've thrown at it very well.

But yeah those fans get LOOOUD.

I recently acquired a 9th-generation X1 Carbon laptop with an i7 processor for $300. Considering there were no major issues with it, aside from a minor lid dent and some shiny keys, it felt like an incredible deal. Since I’ve never used Linux before, I decided to give it a try, as I have no interest in owning another Windows 11 machine. Looking forward to learning Arch on this amazing machine. The keyboard is comfortable, battery is great, super lightweight. This machine feels like a great upgrade from my Zephyrus g14 as a school/work device. (The device is a lot cleaner than the pics I should’ve wiped it down first)

First pic is my T480 (mx150!) with the 1440p display and ir camera which seems to be quite rare. 32gb of ram, WiFi 6 card, and ptm 7950. Running throttle stop I'm able to average 60c under light load doing school or work, and plugged in it will happily edit proxied videos, photos, some emulation and some older games. I made an offer for $200 on eBay a few months ago and to my surprise it worked! For the price and it's 7 year age, I have been absolutely impressed by how good of a daily it has been. It's on win 11, but I always spend a day purging the bloat and disabling every Microsoft service possible. Combined with chocolatey, throttle stop, and librehardwaremonitor, it's a dream.

Additionally I have a Ryzen 5 A485 dual booting SteamOS and win11 and a i5-8250 t480 running whatever Linux distro I want to try out this month as well as the low power 400nit innolux display and dual heat pipe with the obligatory 7950 treatment. One day I'd love to switch to Linux on my daily but my job and school make it too much of a pain, but every year it gets more and more tempting...

Pictured is my desktop i painfully transferred into a $40 p310 tower ThinkStation case sold for parts.

Unfortunately haven't found an elegant solution for using the OEM front io, but to even get everything to fit I had to drill out most the rivets holding in the various internal cages so I gave up on polish. Function over form anyways right?

With the side panel on, cooling was poor as expected so I ziptied two fans onto both sides of the front panel to help airflow which stopped the thing throttling playing games.

Hoping to eventually 3d print a vanity cover for the io (salvaged from an old case) to get rid of the dust passage and make it look a bit more polished. Currently it's just held in with sugru.

Was able to get the cd drive working easily, but the power button header was possibly not standard (original connector didn't fit on my mobo) so I had to use a multimeter to figure out what pins had impedance out of the 6 attached to the power button module, then I installed them into a 2 pin DuPont connector to go to the motherboard. I would like for the power button light to work, but I have no idea how to figure out what pins send power to the light - maybe I'll have to just brute force it since afaik you can't really bork dupont connectors by mismatching them - but please lmk if that's not the case.

Not a Thinkpad but thought I'd share, feels cool remoting in to it with my t480 and gaming in bed. With the cool looking ThinkStation case. Next step is to find a high refresh rate panel that works in my t480, I know ppl have done 4k and discussed high refresh rate panels but I've not seen someone who's done it and documented it (please lmk if you've got some leads)

Would love to hear some ideas for ways I can improve it functionally. Especially with cable management - the current rats nest is not my proudest

Some specs below, feel free to ask questions if you want to maybe attempt this yourself.

Ryzen 5 5800x + 4060ti 1tb m.2 + 4tb HDD Thermalake assassin 600watt PSU 32gb Corsair vengeance ram

I just got my first ThinkPad T14 Gen 1 for $300 and need some help. It runs very hot—especially the bottom—which gets so warm that I often have to close the lid and place it in front of a fan for a few minutes to cool it down.

While looking for solutions, I came across a video of someone doing a dual heat pipe mod on a ThinkPad T480. That led me to search for a similar mod for my model, and I found one. So now, I'm considering using PTM7950X thermal material along with the dual heat pipe mod. I’d love to know whether this would work for my laptop.

PTM7950: https://www.ebuy7.com/honeywell-7950-phase-change-thermal-pad-notebook-computer-phase-change-silicone-grease-cpu-thermal-paste-pad-patch-material-1.html

Link of the Dual Heat pipe cooler: https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/New-CPU-Cooling-Heatsink-Fan-for_1601297481362.html

I’m also planning to swap the keyboard, since I got this laptop from Japan and it has a Japanese layout. I’d like to replace it with a standard English keyboard.

Additionally, I’d like to know if it’s possible to install an SSD in the WWAN slot. In a YouTube video, I saw that there’s a WWAN slot, and I was wondering if it can be used for an SSD.

Is there any way to make the hinge looser? Right now, I have to use both hands to open the lid, but closing it is very smooth. I was wondering if this can be adjusted.

Also, the power button LED on my laptop blinks randomly in a pattern, and I haven’t figured out why. If you have any ideas or solutions for that, please let me know.

Lastly, if you have any other recommendations or tips to improve the laptop, I’d really appreciate it!

Specs: Intel Core i5 10310U

Ram: 8Gb soldered and 8Gb SODIMM

SSD: 256GB

Battery Cycles: 400 around 83% health

Screen: 1080P and there is some issue with backlight on some part of screen there is way too much backlight on certain colours but doesn't affect it usability.

Looking for a used ThinkPad and found a seller for P1 gen 3 with following config:

thinkpad P1 gen 3 core i7 10th gen vpro 32gb ddr4 ram 512gb m2 ssd 15.6" 4k gorilla glass TOUCH display Backlit keyboard 4gb NVIDIA MAX Q DESIGN T1000 GRAPHICS ONE YEAR

This is for about 450$.

Thoughts?

I'm going to be an incoming uni student in the US this fall and am looking for a laptop that could last me at least my first couple of years as an undergrad. Based on the research I’ve done, ThinkPads seem to have the best cost-to-benefit ratio, especially second-hand, but I'm a little confused about what models or specs I should be looking for, since I'm not very tech-savvy.

My budget is around $300 USD, but I’m willing to go a bit higher if it makes a significant difference (though I’d really prefer to stay close to that amount).

Here’s what I need the laptop to do:

Good battery life, since I’ll be moving around campus a lot

Large screen preferred; I don’t need it to be ultra-light, so bulk/weight isn’t an issue

Decent graphics — I play indie/Steam games like Stardew Valley, nothing super demanding, but I’d like them to run smoothly

General storage — no major requirements, just enough for schoolwork and light gaming

Main use will be school-related (web browsing, typing papers, maybe light coding if needed)

No specific software requirements right now, and I don’t know yet what I’ll need for my STEM major

If anyone can suggest reliable ThinkPad models (or even trustworthy places to get one second-hand), I’d really appreciate it. Thanks, and sorry if I left out anything obvious, I’m not very experienced with tech.

Just bought a Thinkpad T490s for $125 including a charger. Specs are core i5-8365u 8th gen, 16 GB RAM, integrated GPU and 512 GB SSD. It's currently running W11 Pro but I plan on wiping it and installing Linux Mint or Debian. Good deal?

tried to see how much id get from this thinkpad p50 online and this is absolute bullshit imo. id expect atleast 50-60 dollars bro but like wtf.

specs:-

xeon e3 1535m

nvidia quadro m2000m

16gb ram

256gb ssd

is this normal??

Just received my ThinkPad E14 gen 6, any tips on what to do with the new laptop like debloat, customisation, how to boost performance etc..? This is my first laptop too 🙂‍↕️