Lenovo ThinkPad T500 15.4" Laptop Review

Lenovo is the company that acquired IBM's PC/Notebook business. I think most people are aware of this now. Thinkpads are sold now with Lenovo's badge/logo on them.

Set among laptop computer design icons that consist of Dell’s Adamo or Apple’s Macbook expert 13, the Lenovo T500 appears strikingly away from place. Indeed, like a time-traveller through the 1980s shot unceremoniously into 2009, the T500’s dowdy, textured dark physique could practically be considered a museum exhibit of how laptops the instant accustomed to look.

A laptop such as the Lenovo ThinkPad can greatly increase your productivity. It is of optimum weight and will easily tag along with you wherever you go. The Lenovo ThinkPad Laptop runs on a reliable and efficient operating system. A fast processor and system memory provide you with the speed you're looking for. There is ample hard disk space to store all your data and applications. The Lenovo ThinkPad T500 battery life is also considerably good allowing you greater freedom during your outings.

The ThinkPad T500 Notebook is designed to enhance productivity and change the way you work. To begin with, it features widescreen display that helps to lower power consumption and offers brighter colors.

The stability of the case barely leaves room for critique, this being supported from a magnesium roll cage in its interior. The base unit shows itself as very buckling resistant and as long as you don't pick the notebook up in the area of the drive, you can handle the notebook without further ado. The display stability also turns out very impressive. The display lid gives in slightly at pressure but it's barely possible to provoke distortions on the activated display. Therefore the Lenovo ThinkPad T500 AC adapter can be picked up at a corner of the display without further thought. Therefore picking up the notebook at a display edge without a hesitation also remains possible on the T500. The display frame differs here, giving away considerably under pressure whereas distortions on the activated display also become obvious.

The T500 cements its credentials using a range of business-friendly features. A fingerprint reader arrives paired using a TPM 1.2 chip, and there's no shortage of connectivity either. ExpressCard/54 rubs shoulders using the more mature PC card regular – some thing which is bound to please a range of IT departments loath to throw apart more mature hardware. There's a 4-in-1 card reader, three USB ports, mini-Firewire, as well as D-SUB and DisplayPort outputs.

Specifications:
Screen: 15.4" 1680 x 1050 WSXGA+ LCD (Matte finish)
Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo T9600 (2.80GHz, 1066MHz FSB, 6MB Cache)
Memory: 2GB DDR3 RAM
Storage: 160GB HDD (7200rpm)
Optical Drive: DVD+/-RW
Wireless: 802.11a/b/g/n, Bluetooth 2.0
Graphics: ATI Mobility Radeon 3650 w/ 256MB (hybrid switching)
Built-in web camera
Battery: 9-cell (84Wh)
Dimensions: 14.1" x 10/10.9" x 1.8"
Weight: 6lbs 7.2oz (w/ 9 cell battery)

The keyboard and UltraNav (touchpad and TrackPoint [little red nub in the center of the keyboard]) are what draw many prospective laptop buyers to the Thinkpad family. I can confidently say that the keyboard is the best I’ve used on a laptop, with very good key pitch and great feel, with nearly no flex**. By pressing quite hard on the keyboard with one of my fingers, the only place I could get to flex slightly was the first column of keys from the Esc key down to the Tab key. I wasn’t too bothered by that, seeing as in normal typing, my fingers would not press with so much force. The spacebar, however, seemed quite a bit louder than the other keys, and a bit flimsier—I wished it were quieter. Liquid drains are present to drain the keyboard after a spill. Missing, however, is the grey color of the two rows of function keys at the top, also present in the T-series prior to the Lenovo ThinkPad SL500 battery. Overall, the keyboard feel was great, much better than my old Averatec’s—no small accomplishment on a 15” laptop, which tends to have more “empty space” in the case.

Lenovo's latest, the T500, might not be able to compete with the ultraportables when it comes to stamina and portability, but one thing it certainly isn't lacking in is power. And while it can't quite boast supermodel looks, with its business-like straight lines, sharp, pointy corners, bevelled edges and all-black cloak, its sheer practicality races to the forefront.

The red TrackPoint in the middle of the keyboard on the other hand, is still the best of its kind. One has to admit, that no other producer has ever managed to build a comparably ergonomically designed and user-friendly mouse replacement. This holds true for the TrackPoint itself, its responsiveness, and for its three buttons. Everything fits perfectly together.

Lenovo's ThinkPad T500 laptop is an update of their 15.4-inch ThinkPad T laptops. It retains the wide screen, 1680x1050 15.4-inch panel that gives it one of the highest resolution panels in its price range. It also has one of the most durable case designs on the market.

A pricier version of Lenovo’s T500 has been our second-choice A-list business laptop for some time now, and this model follows in those footsteps. It isn't stylish, but if you want a practical, comfortable business laptop that’s built to last, you won't be disappointed by the Lenovo T500.

Over a century after Hollerith submitted his series of patents for the punch card technology, IBM released the first ThinkPad computer in 1992. The ThinkPad spawned a line of products which would become one of IBMs most successful ventures in recent times.

The Lenovo Thinkpad also offers a hardware configuration which doesn’t use the switching function. If you only use office programs like Word, Excel, mail and internet, then the model with integrated Intel 4500M HD graphics would be a possibility. In this case the notebook doesn’t have a dedicated graphics card at all. The alternative would be the combination of ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3650 graphics card and the integrated Intel GMA 4500M HD graphics chip.

The port selection on the T500 rates slightly above average, but still shows room for improvement. The DisplayPort is nice, but with current TV's and monitors finally starting to show HDMI, it would have been a better choice as the Lenovo Thinkpad T500 adapter cant output any resolution higher than the DVI spec. Three USB ports is cutting it close for a highend 15.4" notebook, and with them grouped together, if you have any large devices you will overlap. Moving past those complaints the rest of the port selection is fine. Some may argue that the headphone and microphone located on the front will cause problems, but there was no space what-so-ever left on the sides even if Lenovo wanted to mount them there.

And, hidden beneath the black exterior, there’s another similarity. The T500 is equipped with dual-switchable graphics: an ATI Radeon Mobility HD 3650 for when it’s connected to the mains, and Intel’s lower-powered GMA X4500MHD for when you’re out and about. The former is quick too: its 61fps in our low settings 3D benchmark is good and promises improved performance in graphically intensive applications that support DirectX 10 – Photoshop CS4, for instance.

Also the recorded surface temperatures hint on that the W500 is indeed a powerful workstation. The top side of the base unit has a maximum temperature of about 32.4°C and, so, it feels only slightly warmer. Only the bottom side of the Thinkpad W500 gets with up to 42.9°C a little bit warmer. Considering that the W500 will be probably operated on hard surfaces anyway, this value can be neglected.

Many reviewers have noted that Lenovo has switched to cheaper plastic for the case. I can confirm that this is true. If you search on Youtube for reviews of the T500 you will find a video where the reviewer pushes his finger deep into the plastic of the T500, as if it were made of Jello. That video is entirely fake. The plastic bends, but not much.

Drives (SSDs), an integrated camera, DDR3 memory modules, new DisplayPort technology and a wider Touchpad for improved ergonomics. ThinkVantage® Client Security Solution with Integrated Fingerprint Reader and SmartCard support are other innovative features that give these notebooks extra protection by securing data against potential intruders.

Lenovo's T500 is a smart business laptop, and the first we've seen to have a built-in GPS receiver. The bundled software will give you a precise fix in latitude and longitude. However, its integration with Google Maps is limited to showing you a map of the area, with no precise indication of where you are.

Lenovo's ThinkPad T series of laptops has been extremely popular with corporations but they also work well for consumers. The New Lenovo Thinkpad T500 battery is an updated platform that uses the same durable case and design as previous models. Performance is superb for this platform although it is a bit more expensive. Some users will be really happy of the Windows XP downgrade included because of its corporate focus that still primarily uses the OS.

Well the display is every bit as bad as expected. It's plenty bright, and it looks great if you look at it from just the right angle, but I can't get through more than an hour of work without having to spend a few minutes fidgeting and adjusting the screen so as to make it tolerable. It's clear that Lenovo is simply going for the cheapest possible screens with the requisite specs. I can easily source better panels than the one shipped on this system -- there are a number of common TN panels that can outperform the rather crummy ones used on the T410, and given their presence in systems by other manufacturers, I can only assume that price is the limiting factor.

Set among notebook computer design icons which consists of Dell's Adamo or Apple's Macbook professional 13, the Lenovo T500 appears strikingly away from place. Indeed, like a time-traveller away from your 1980s shot unceremoniously into 2009, the T500's dowdy, textured dark physique could practically be considered a museum exhibit of how laptops when utilized to look.

An interesting feature of T500 and It's smaller cousin T400 is that they come with switchable grahic. What this means is that you can switch from dedicated ATI HD 3650 to the integrated intel graphics to extend your Lenovo Thinkpad SL500 battery life. This is no doubt a great feature but it is only useable on Vista. In XP or Linux, you have to manually set the graphic card in BIOS or the OS will just use whichever is detected first on the bus.

Conclusively you can say that the Lenovo T500 office notebook can be recommended for professional or private users, who put value on an extensive mobility but don't want to or can't completely sacrifice certain performance reserves.