1 reason never to buy a Thinkpad

[kvk1009]

U buy a Thinkpad ( W520 :biggrin:), u'll get addicted to the Trackpoint. Now u'll look for a keyboard with trackpoint, you'll stumble upon an Unicomp Endurarpo (for home). Now you just got addicted to mechanical keyboards and you won't be happy typing on a rubber dome keyboard in your office. Now you want another mechanical keyboard that's less noisy (thanks officemates!!) and you end up buying a Das Ultimate silent. And then you will be poor.

Poor but happy!!!!

[sth]

There are many roads that lead to keyboard addiction. Thinkpads are the only  non-Apple laptops I'd ever buy, the trackpoint being one of many reasons I like them.
 
Welcome to Geek Hack:thumb:

[lorem3k]

Everybody loves the clitmouse.

[Quarzac]

I've used a ton of these at school, and I don't really like the trackpoint. I much prefer a mouse, but it's about tied with a trackpad.

[lorem3k]

Except our gay brothers.

They can think about it as the "just-the-tipmouse"

[kaiserreich]

I, too, bought a W520. Awesome rig Though, I did require a system board swap in my first couple weeks...

The keyboard is...OMG. Best notebook keyboard on the market, I have no doubts.

Seconded

[isp]

+ nice keyboards
+ professional look

- the lcd panels mostly suck, low res TN with overly aggressive antiglare coatings


I would have purchased an x220 had it not been given a netbook res :/

[grizzlyclambert]

Bought my wife a Y-series IdeaPad. They have that same keyboard. Very nice.

[emptythecache]

I'm on a thinkpad W520 right now. It is my work machine.

[slueth]

Wish they had a laptop with mechanical switches...   Lenovo is probably the only company that would do it... Should come with a suitcase!!
http://geekhack.org/showthread.php?11792-Would-you-buy-a-laptop-with-a-truly-mechanical-keyboard/page3

[gorky]

I have joined geekhack because I was googling for something like 'is there a better keyboard than the one in Thinkpads?'. Of course never heard of mechanical keyboards earlier.

TP just pwns, that is true.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

I'm not one with using the keyboard for the Web – and Web 2.0 has destroyed what little hope there was, with fake controls instead of HTML controls (though you've always had images for navigation that even Firefox's find-as-you-type can't jump to).

That was the nice thing about the Miniguru – for anyone who can use a trackpoint, you could even have that on the home row. You just don't get that with the Poker, HHKB or any other home-row-orientated keyboard.

What did surprise me the other day – the Dell Latitude E5420 has legends without the decal look – I don't know what they've done, but I was seriously impressed with the look. White and vivid colours on black, smoother than FILCO. Smooth like dye sub, but more like paint sub.

But yes, things I know I'd have to accept in a laptop, are spongy keys, decal look keys, LEDs placed where you can't see them, port legends on the side where you can't see them, horrible top-to-bottom backlight unevenness (we won't get rid of this until OLED when the diffusion panel becomes defunct), stupid rubber port covers that get bent and won't stay in … All the sorts of things that the 21st century should have eradicated.

First priority for me is DPI – keep the size down, but get the resolution up. 1400×1050 minimum for me, or, ugh gag puke, the widescreen equivalent. The best you get there in a compact 14" machine is 1600×900, kiss goodbye 150 rows of space.

We need like a FILCO/Topre of the laptop world, a company devoted to productivity machines, no widescreen, useful keyboard layouts (ctrl before fn, always!), top quality keyboards. Top of the range Gold Edition luggables would come with Cherry ML switches at a cost of portability ;-) laptop keyboards are unbelievably thin and bendy, and you won't pull that off with a grid of microswitches!)

[sth]

But yes, things I know I'd have to accept in a laptop, are spongy keys, decal look keys, LEDs placed where you can't see them, port legends on the side where you can't see them, horrible top-to-bottom backlight unevenness (we won't get rid of this until OLED when the diffusion panel becomes defunct), stupid rubber port covers that get bent and won't stay in … All the sorts of things that the 21st century should have eradicated.

First priority for me is DPI – keep the size down, but get the resolution up. 1400×1050 minimum for me, or, ugh gag puke, the widescreen equivalent. The best you get there in a compact 14" machine is 1600×900, kiss goodbye 150 rows of space.

Laptops with nearly all of these features exist. You just have to be willing to pay for Apple hardware. They cost more mostly because Apple can charge that, but also because there's a LOT of thought put into their design.

Also, your keyboard-only approach to web browsing reminds me of surf. Are you familiar with suckless?

[Daniel Beardsmore]

Ironically, Apple are pretty bad at keyboards. I don't think they've made one single decent keyboard since the AEK (not the II – dampening keys is sacrilege).

Island keys are so hopelessly limp – Sony manage to eke a bit of tactility into them, but they're still poor. Apple also thought it was really funny to remove the side of ISO enter that I hit.

They also require 15.4" to get merely 1440×900, while a Samsung 600B4B manages 1600×900 in 14". While I'm still young and I have eyeballs to burn out, may as well get more space and lower footprint ;-)

What it comes down to, is that there's no specifications clearinghouse that lists every model of (keyboard, laptop, display, etc), and lets you pull out what you're after through filtering accurate specs. Reseller websites either omit half the brands out there, or have hopelessly inaccurate specs and poor filtering.

No idea about the web … I have wondered honestly about the EnduraPro and using the trackpoint, but then I'm tied to ultra-loud buckling springs. I love them, but I can't have the EnduraPro design, but with Cherry MX, Topre, ALPS … I can have Cherry ML, but Cherry's ML keyboards all have stupid layouts. They do have integrated trackballs, something I miss in laptops. Trackball is the way to go with laptops. If you have room for one of those, then there's room for ML switches as well =)

[sth]

Ah, I can't speak for ISO users. Also I keep forgetting how badly apple ****ed up the unibody Pros... the keyboard on the MBP just before the unibody is pretty decent for a laptop keyboard (more solid but less enjoyable than some Thinkpads).

The 15.4 has, or did have, a higher resolution display available at additional cost.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

I'm only going by the wired aluminium I bought, granted it's possible that the laptop version is better, but I do appreciate tactile switches, not limp island keys. I need to get me a Cherry ML board one day.

As for the screen, I see it in the store now; Apple just keep quiet about it for some reason, as it's not in the spec. WTF?

[sth]

It's  CTO/BTO option. They don't usually advertise those (not that they usually advertise any other technical aspect of their products in concrete terms... you have to hunt that info down).

[Daniel Beardsmore]

I guess their marketing strategy isn't geared to attracting Windows users who despise Mac OS X ;-) If you want an approved machine for running Mac OS X, you don't really have any choice as to what machine you want. I guess it says something that even in Apple's price range, decent screens aren't considered marketable.

Oh well. I started out with a BBC Micro – 160×256 to 640×256. I expect I'll still be alive in a few decades' time when we have decent DPI. The "new iPad" of course gives you a good idea about the practicalities – whole generation of machine devoted entirely to a DPI increase.

See, here's the thing we can do now – a tablet in laptop form factor. The reduced-size components will leave room for a Cherry ML keyboard. Eat that, Thinkpad keyboard!!

[Daniel Beardsmore]

One other thing ... if you do buy Mac, you don't get the trackpoint! Which defeats the whole objective ;-P

(Another win for the Samsung 600B4B …)

[sth]

Doesn't look like samsung advertises the higher-res option for that model on their website...  Those series-9 machines look really fancy though.

[Gawkbasher]

Tbh, y'all should just be pushing for larger format tablets and connect whatever the hell keyboard and mouse solution you want to them.

something like a 15" portable iPad w/ Stand and an HHKB or Poker & Magic Trackpad sounds great to me for portability.  Somebody could even make a "lap stand" for it.

[davkol]

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[Daniel Beardsmore]

Hm, you're right, they don't. I only found that model by checking on Ingram Micro (workplace supplier) what options I would have for a decent laptop, and the 600B4B comes up as 14" 1600×900. (I ruled out HP after the claim that they were leaving the market, but they're still here … and they probably also have a comparable model; Dell do the E5420 with the same spec display.)

I can live with my Latitude D600 a bit longer – runs Windows 7 perfectly, original battery still adequate, backlight uniformity is decent for a laptop, I just find 1024×768 a bit annoying. My personal laptop does do 1400×1050, which is perfect, but I barely use it (though it does have a decent keyboard).

It's all wishful thinking though … dreaming … Glad I forced myself to spend the money on a Realforce though.

[sordna]

Samsung makes nice laptops, usually with very nice keyboards. Only problem is they don't play well with Linux in my experience, for example the volume and brightness controls may not cooperate, or the wifi may need ndiswrapper to work. The 600B4B could be a different story though, anyone tried it?