[ltp] Buying a T41p

[Sebastian Riedel]

Cameron McCormack wrote:

>Hi everyone.
>
>  
>
Hi,

>I'm contemplating buying a notebook and at the top of my list is the
>Thinkpad T41p.  From following this list for a short while it seems
>like the Linux support for this model is quite reasonable.  I've got a
>couple of questions before I commit myself, though.  (Sorry if some of
>these aren't Linux specific.)
>
>  
>
I replaced my Apple Powerbook G4 with a T41p last week.
The only thing i miss is that titanium case, since i don't
like the feeling of the plastic so much. :)

>  1. How would the 1.7GHz Pentium M compare to, say, my desktop 2.4 GHz
>     Pentium 4 machine?  At the moment I'm doing a lot of Java 2D
>     graphics development work, and I don't want it to be much slower
>     than my desktop.  I have read articles saying that the performance
>     of Centrino machines with a given processor speed are comparable to
>     P4s with a higher speed.  Is this correct?
>
>  
>
Speed is awesome! I would say it equals to a P4 2.6 GHz.

>  2. What is the VGA out and S-Video out quality like?  The notebook
>     that was previously at the top of my list when I was investigating
>     these things a few months ago was an Acer Travelmate 803, and there
>     were reports of it having blurry VGA output.  I will probably be
>     using the Thinkpad with an external monitor when at home, so I'd
>     like to make sure that the image quality is good.
>  
>
Only used VGA out once, but it worked fine, nothing blurry.

>  3. Does anyone know (approximately) when the next model in this T
>     series will be released?  I don't want to buy it and find out a few
>     weeks later that the next model is available at the same price as
>     the current top of the range model.
>
>  
>
Here in europe I heared it will be available during the third quarter,
but just rumors.

Additionally it took about 4 weeks until mine was delivered, so don't
expect to get one before the end of the year. ;)

>  4. For those of you running Linux on this model Thinkpad, could you
>     give me a brief list of the things that don't work properly (if
>     any)?
>
>  
>
Running 2.6.4, ACPI does not work without screwing up some things like 
usb. :(
APM works fine.

Wifi works fine with the Madwifi drivers but seems not to use full bandwith,
maybe just a bug. (The wifi led never worked)

If you want 3d accelerated X11, you have to use ATI's closed source drivers,
which don't support power management!!! (Suspend is really unuseable!) :(

Hope ATI will take their linux driver development more serious in the 
future,
today it seems nvidia has the pole position here.

The performance is good and enough to play Unreal Tournament 2004 with
full details at 1280x1024. :)

The T41p is a very fine machine, it is quite new, and i'm very confident 
most
of the problems will be fixed soon.

>  5. Do IBM actually have any stores where I can have a play around with
>     one of these notebooks before I actually buy it?  I haven't seen
>     any Thinkpads in any stores that sell other notebooks.  (I'm in
>     Melbourne, Australia.)If ATI ever gets to fix this the T41p will be a killer of a machine. :)
>
>  
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Here in europe i never saw a T41p in a shop.

>Thanks a lot,
>
>Cameron
>
>  
>
Cheers,
Sebastian