First Impressions of the T460s from a Longtime Legacy ThinkPad User

Well, after waiting too many years and holding on to 16:10 for as long as I could, my T410 and T400 (I have many other older ThinkPads that are mostly retired too) notebooks are showing their age and need to be replaced. So, I jumped in with both feet on the T460s (20GB RAM and 512GB NVMe) once Lenovo finally shipped a T Series that could do better than FHD (why do only Apple users tend to get the “Retina” fun?). Without further ado, my first impressions after using the machine for 30 minutes:

1. The notebook is light weight. Really light weight. Coming from a T410 as my daily driver with the 9-cell battery, the T460s is a feather.
2. Build quality is nice. Not Surface Book nice, but nice (I spent an hour with the Surface Book at the local Microsoft store before buying this).
3. 16:9 still sucks. There’s a reason I kept my 16:10 for as long as I have. Why does Apple have the market on 16:10 and why is everyone else bent on producing notebook screens that are optimized for watching videos?!? I need to get actual work done.
4. The materials are solid and FAR nicer than the creaky cheap plastic on my T4*0.
5. The top does not have the soft rubberized feel that all my other ThinkPads have. Oh well.
6. The screen is nice. Not Surface Book nice, but nice.
7. This thing is fast. Really fast. Yay SSD, but I assume most people with SSDs already know this.
8. The keyboard is not as good as the one on the ThinkPad’s of yore—there is VERY little travel—but we all already know this too.
9. Coming from notebooks that have a constant low hum from the HDD spinning, this thing is silent. Really silent.
10. All the little green LED lights that I’ve gotten used to over the years are gone. Gone. No wireless, Bluetooth, Caps Lock, drive access, battery, plugged in and etcetera. They’re all gone. While not a requirement, I got used to this little HUD over the years and I’m sad to see it go. A cost cutting measure I guess.
11. Lenovo used to have all the required drivers and related in C:\Drivers—not anymore. While not a big deal, now when you do a clean install you have to re-download everything you need.

That’s all for now—perhaps I’ll update the thread later.

 

I just took delivery of a custom-build T460s (i7/20GB/512GB). Previously I had a work T450 (cheapo model) and before that an X230.

I directly came from my personal MacBook Pro (2011), and agree with a ton of what you've said (just about everything).

My one concern right now is the battery life (especially the i7). It's not looking good, and there is no ability to upgrade to a larger battery...

Also the early versions (like ours) don't have WiGig.

 

I'm not a fan of the new keyboard layout, but I do find it to be better than the old keyboards in terms of tactile feel and a lot less flex. I have a T440s but I'm not sure if the new T460s has the same keyboard?

 

T460s keyboard is very similar, but not the same. Its an enhanced version of the T440s keyboard.

 

What do you mean by enhanced version?

 

There are some changes, a CapsLock LED indicator in the CapsLock key has been added, the FNLock LED has been moved to the Esc key. The printing of the F-keys is slightly larger for improved readability. Possibly there are also some changes to the texture of the keys themselfs, and the T460s keyboards are made by Chicony and Darfon, not Chicony and LiteOn like the T450s keyboards. T460s keyboards are not compatible with T440s/T450s keyboards.

 

For the drivers just download this : http://support.lenovo.com/us/en/pro...ies-laptops/thinkpad-t460s/downloads/DS112090.

The sccm package and you can install all your drivers from the device manager.

 

@BinkNR - Can you comment on the battery life? The first complaint about mediocre battery life has surfaced on the Lenovo forums.

 

I cannot say at this time. I have not installed all my programs and related on the notebook yet, so it's not my daily driver and I can't compare it to my usual usage. While I'll comment on battery life when I feel more comfortable to do so, I also find battery life very subjective and based on one's specific usage, so I wouldn't take anyone's generic comments on this too seriously.

 

things that jumped out at me:
-only 4gb onboard ram stick size
-no hot-swappable or expandable battery
-no hard drive slot
-2560×1440 ...why?
-no UHS-II support on SD reader (i believe)

positives:
-NVMe
-930m

the t460p specs left a much more favorable impression on me

 

There will be a 8 GB Onbard RAM option, its not yet available for non-business customers it seems.

 

I seem to be getting 6-7 hours with my usual usage.

 

What are the key differences between the T460s and the X1 Carbon 4th gen? Until the OLED screen starts shipping on the X1, seems like the T460s is the smart choice. The size differences aren't that great now.

 

Differences X1 Carbon Gen 4 - T460s:

• Traditional Mechanical Bottom Docking (T460s) vs. Onlink+ Docking port (X1 Carbon)

• Full-Size SD Card (T460s) vs. microSD Card (X1 Carbon)

• Full-size Ethernet (T460s) vs. No Ethernet (X1 Carbon)

• Geforce 930M (T460s, North America only) vs. Intel 520 only (X1 Carbon)

• X1 Carbon is thinner & lighter

• X1 Carbon has higher quality FHD IPS displays compared with the T460s FHD IPS displays

• T460s has a user-replaceable keyboard, and one RAM slot (vs. all soldered on the X1 Carbon)

 

Thanks. How big a difference in the 1080p IPS displays?

 

Supposedly the X1 Carbon FHD Display is brighter and covers a larger color gamut (>90 % sRGB vs. ~65 % sRGB).

 

Except the T460p is still vaporware. Does anyone have any idea when it'll be available?!

 

Its available here in Germany, but only with FHD and i5 Quad-Core until now. More configs are said to be released in "late March", including the GeForce models and i7 CPUs.

I guess lenovo.com might wait for the GeForce models to be available.

 

So T460s still has replaceable battery?

 

I believe the bottom of the T460s comes off and gives you access to the battery, so I presume one could replace it, though in the traditional sense.

 

There are still some indicators... like FN Lock, Power, Caps, etc. There is a small LED next to where you plug in the AC adapter as well to indicate charging/full. But yes you are right in that most of what we have seen in the past are gone. I miss the 10+ cryptic LED symbols on the bottom corner of my LCD bezel on my T60 that I had to memorize which meant what...