Deciding Between T420 vs T420s: advice appreciated

Hi, I am deciding between a T420 or 420s for int'l business travel and grad school.

Basically am wondering if added $$ for 420s is actually worth it as I'm not sure if I would use the USB 3.0 and bigger speakers much at all.
On the plus side, <4 lb wt is attractive vs. the 420 at 4.8lbs.

Spec-wise I would not need the nVidia graphics, would upgrade memory later if needed, and do the higher res 1600x900 display on the 420.

Current machine is a Latitude D630 that looks like it's been through a war, before that a ThinkPad T23.

Thanks for you insight!

 

That's kind of a personal preference. I wouldn't pay it myself, but I'm kind of cheap as you can see from my X220i with the i3. I'd say if you need a lot of mobility and would like a lighter machine, then perhaps so.

 

Another important consideration is that the T420 can get significantly better battery life than the T420s with the 9-cell on the former. But yes, as ZaZ mentioned, it depends entirely on personal preference and your specific usage.

 

I've used both, and honestly the T420s doesn't seem worth it (500 more than a standard T420). T420s is handcuffed at a 44 WHr battery while the T420 can get a 9 cell battery. If you want a slim/ultraportable laptop you can look at an x220 with the IPS screen, and with that you can get 9 cell + slice = 23 hours battery life.

 

I'm having troubles to decide too. X220 has crappy resolution that kills it for me.
With the t420s you can get 1 or more ultrabay batteries and hence have long battery life too. But that further increases cost (as does 9-cell for T420).

T420s has USB3 while T420 as eSata but no USB3.

 

True, but the X220 screen is higher quality. I'd take quality over quantity.

 

eSATA is better for hard drives, USB3 has a high overhead. You can search around for some benchmarks on google which show the exact numbers.

I do love my T420s, but part of me wishes I had gone with the X220 w/IPS.

 

Thanks folks. Looked at the X220 but I have a thing for matte screens and some of the classic T series features.

Is excessive fan noise / heat an issue with the 420s given the same platform in a smaller package? Also, trying to determine how significant the 1lb or so in wt difference would actually be...

 

The T420s can get about 7 hours of run time with the main + bay batteries. Note that the previous generation of bay batteries work fine in the T420s. They have slightly lower capacity but are much more affordable.

Display options are the same as on the T420 with the 1600 x 900 display being the preferred option. However, it's a lottery whether you get the LG (probably the best of the bad bunch), Samsung or AUO (probably the worst).

Regarding heat and fan noise, under light usage there's no problem. However, pile on sustained CPU load and the temperature will climb and the fan gets noisier. CPU throttling starts at 95C and sustained operation with two CPU-intensive threads can reach that temperature. However, the throttling involves temporarily slowing down the CPU speed by one or two steps. You need to run a monitoring program to see it happen. Fan noise is also noticeable under sustained CPU load but it's not unacceptably obtrusive unless you are ina very quiet room. There is a bug or two in the fan control fules which can leave the fan running fast when the temperature has dropped substantially. This might have been fixed in the latest BIOS (but isn't mentioned in the change log). However TPFanControl can be used to ensure complete silence under light CPU load (temperature less than 60C).

John

 

Not pushing you towards X220, but I do want to clarify - they are matte screens. The X1 is not.

Holding a T420s and T420 in each hand, to me at least, I can feel a big difference in weight. When I pile it into my 60lb backpack, any bit I can save is big to me though.

 

Let me start with saying I don't think there is a wrong choice, I personally have a T420s and usually use it with a bay battery inserted in place of the optical drive. Overall I like the smaller size and lighter weight compared with the T420, however if I needed to run for longer periods on battery power my preferance might swing towards the T420. As to the price difference when configured in similar ways with the typical sales Lenovo has been running the price is not all that much more for the T420s (they have been offering bigger discounts on the T420s). So to sum it up, play more for a lighter T420s, if you need more run time, buy a supply of bay batteries and carry them when needed, or pay less for the longer running heavier T420.

Ike

 

Hm.. You have both T420 and T420s?

Could you please take a photo or two of the laptops, put one next to each other, closed, or stacked one above the other?
Can't find such pictures anywhere to realistically compare the height difference! It would be awesome if you could do that.

I have to make a choice between the two also, and every one hour I change my mind :/

A T420 with removed optical drive and 6 cell battery and an ssd, I suppose would have pretty much the same weight and battery life with a T420s with a bay battery added.
Is that right? So the only difference really would be the volume/height and the ...noise (?)

The various tft panel models that were mentioned for the T420s - does the same apply for the T420? Or it's not that much of a bet for that model?

In the UK and Germany I can find the laptops with minimum price difference, like 100euros more for the T420s, so that's not an issue at all.

 

I would personally go with a T420 instead of a T420s as it has a much longer battery life (the 9 cell is only a $20 upgrade before e-coupons, with them it is more like a $15 upgrade). I need the battery life as my university does not offer power outlets in lecture halls. Also, I like keeping an ODD on board at all times for one reason or another, although I rarely use it (just paranoia in case I do, and I don't want to be caught without one, I guess). I don't really mind the weight of a laptop as long as I can pick it up, put it in a backpack, and carry it. I don't really like ultrathin laptops either, so it really is just a personal preference on this point.

 

Sorry to push this off topic, but how do you check which panel you have?

Anyways, back OT, I would go for the T420 mainly because of the longer battery life. Yes, the T420s is lighter by a little bit. However, the price difference is HUGE. I only went for the T420s because I got mine at a great deal from Craigslist. Also, the T420s has a fan problem where the fan would not shut off even after the computer idles or cools off.

 

You can do the parts look up. There's a link in the sticky.

 

In general 16:9 is crappy especially for web browsing but also for office work.
1366x768 is unusable for real work. While I would prefer light and small, it is not offered by anyone except by Sony but they are worse than Apple in terms of pricing.

 

When you've got the market to yourself, you can charge as you please.

The market for people who want a notebook with above WXGA resolution is very small. You've got to remember most of Lenovo's customers are bus, gov, and edu. They don't give a hoot about resolution, but cost and compatibility.

 

Leaning towards the 420s since weight is an issue (travelling a lot). Only thing is the fan noise issue...seems it isn't all 420s users? Is it more with ones with the Optimus graphics? Has the new BIOS improved it?

 

Also, does the 420 have any of the "griddiness" or "screen door" effect on the display?

 

My 2 cents in this...

The T420 is plenty portable, and that is not an understatement. Honestly, it's pretty lightweight given it's durable design, and I heard that the keyboard is a tad bit different in feeling in the T420S. It's not worth it in my perspective to pay the extra premium for an unnecessary smaller frame.

The 3.0 USB ports might be a nice addition, but it's not worth it given the substantially lower battery life you find in a T420s.

Save the money, buy the T420 for an identical machine, and with the money saved, get some nice accessories! (mouse, extra battery, carrying cases)

 

Just my $.02, at least with my T420s (with Optimus graphics) running a recent if not latest bios I have no fan noise issues, the fan is there, and can be heard in a very quiet room, but is not obtrusive, and the pitch of the sound is much more pleasant than my previous Samsung X460. As to the screen there is a slight screen door effect (I tend to only notice it when looking for it), more of a concern may be screen brightness if you tend to work in brightly lit areas, again compared to my last notebook the X460, the screen is much less bright (full brightness on the T420s would be about equal to 2/3 brightness on the X460 which had one of the brightest screens I have ever seen on a notebook computer), having said that the T420s has better color reproduction, contrast range and angle of view so it is a trade off.

Ike

 

If I get it right the only difference between models is that 420 do not have 3.0 USB and can handle 9 cell battery?

 

the T420s is thinner and lighter too.

 

Do you have part numbers for the previous generation batteries? There's a ton of ultrabay bay batteries on fleabay, but I don't know which ones are compatible (except the ones that explicitly say t420s, which I assume is the current generation).

 

There listed under several different numbers, but here is an example of one Lenovo Thinkpad Ultrabay III Battery 51J0507 | eBay be ware of ones marked with the IBM logo as those were from before the Lenovo Thinkpad buyout in 2006. All of the cheaper ones I see listed on ebay at the moment are either older IBM labelled batteries or 3rd party brand names.

Ike
ps look for the ones with the angled corner at the top

 

I am interested too
maybe a list of model wich the bay battery are compatible with t420s would be great

i saw many compatible with T40 ecc for cheap..are this compatible with t420s?
how i can know if they are?

 

Any batteries described as UltraBay III or UltraBay II should definitely work. I don't know about anything older. For anyone in UK, this one works fine.

John

 

Not to threadcrap, as I never do. But this is one of the most bizarre things I have ever read. I guess the 1366x768 I've been using forever is bad.... I never knew!

I guess the 9 zillion people who use this resolution on the 9 zillion laptops that have been sold with it are totally non productive and can't see the web.

Sometimes, things on the internet are too strange for words

 

Well, if we were all the same the world would be a boring place. You do bring up a good point. I need to go look at the demographic data for our web site.

Nanohead, your view is certainly interesting. Is it safe to assume you've been using notebook/netbook LCD screens below 14" in size?

I'm on the other end of the scale. I've been using 15.4 and 15.6" notebook panels for so long that 12 or 13" with 1366x768 seems like a radical departure. I have actually tried it on the X1 and some other recent machines. It's a big change from the high resolutions I am used to running.

 

We forum participants are a minority, even an eccentric one at that. Our technical knowledge refines our preferences and choices, but most users are happy and productive with 15.6" 1366 x 768 (WXGA) TFT displays -- and glossy. This is the "state of the art" of most mainstream, affordable, above-average laptops.

I would never dismiss such displays as unusable.

Offices, factories, schools and homes are not based on quad-core CPUs, SSDs and IPS FHD displays!

(I've been using all sorts of displays with laptop and desktop computers. But it's me. My needs and wants do not reflect the mainstream. My preferences are not the measures of goodness and suitability.)

 

Actually ended up configuring a 420 and getting an additional education discount and waranty discount for calling in to talk to the rep. Have recent 16x9 420 models been shipping with the LG display or the worse one? (blv Samsung)

 

What? How? Is the discount significant?

I spoke with a rep...asked if there are additional discounts...and he said "no" T_T

 

Don't have the figures in front of me but it was roughly an addtl 8-10% for a university specific discount. Anyone have insight on the display question?