Introducing Woody

Well, I think I finally got my X200 up and running to where I like it. Vista is installed and I have my LCD bezel screw caps in place. It should serve well as my ultraportable for the next three to four years, maybe longer as I don't need need a ton of performance. Thankfully, the little fan noise problem seems to have taken care of itself. I don't know why it was so noisy before. With the SSD, which I'm not super impressed with performance wise, other than the quietness, it's a near silent machine. My install with apps and Mp3s is about 17GB. It should leave me with enough room for a few movies and what not. I may bump it up to 3GB if I can good deal.

My main purpose with this thread is show my new laptop skin. As you may or may not know some ThinkPads like the X200 use a rubberized coating on the lid. While I'd agree it has a nice feel to it and makes the machine more grippy, I don't care for it much myself as it's a fingerprint magnet and makes it look dirty. I like the ABS plastic on my R60 better, but you can't please everyone I guess.

I decided to get a laptop skin. A google search led me to SGPStore.com.com. They have skins specifically tailored to the the X200, along with a lot of other notebooks. There are cut outs for the logos, indicator lights, hinges, etc. It makes it a lot easier to apply the skin if you don't have to do the cut outs yourself. I choose the darker Walnut Skin, which I think blends well with the black of ThinkPads. It took a few times to get the holes lined up, but it's remarkably effortless to apply. It also comes off easily with a fingernail, but also feels like it's not going anywhere either. Time will tell on that point.

Overall, I'm pretty pleased with it as it looks pretty good I think and it solves the lid problem. Plus down the road if I sell it, I can peel off the skin to reveal a like new lid I hope, which is always a good selling point. I ordered over the weekend and got it today, $23 shipped. I was thinking about picking one up for my R60, but I'd like something with some more color, which SPGStore doesn't seem to have. I guess I'll have to keep looking.

 

Hi woody. It's nice to meeet you!
Renee

 

For some odd reason, it reminds me of that "special, limited edition" X seris laptop several years back that was all outlined in brown leather.
It does look neat though ! And, for $23, I might see what they have for my T61.

 

NICE work, ... wonder if I can convince the wife to snag me a nice mohogany veneer to put on a machine.

 

Reminds me of Han Bao Quan's wooden Elitebook skin. Pretty cool

 

Can x201 wear this skin?

 

Look way better on the vendor's sites, your photo does not do the skin justice.

 

How does it feel? Is it some shiny plastic thing? I hate to say it, but I feel a wood-like exterior for a ThinkPad is a bit of an anathema. Also, FWIW, dump Vista and put 7 on it.

 

Yeah, Han's is way better than mine. He did the whole thing himself as I recall, which is a much more impressive feat than mine.

My guess would be yes, but since I'm not selling it, you may wish to ask them.

Am I a professional photographer? I think not.

But I don't like Windows 7, which is a problem. As for the feel, it kind of feels like shelf paper.

 

Zaz, you must be the type of person whom likes plastic wood trim in their car interior...

Also do you like Morgan race cars?

 

Not a lick of wood anywhere near my car.

I only buy American cars, though the Morgans do have a cool old school look to them.

 

It definitely gives it that 70's retro look. I can't decide if I like it or not (not that my opinion matters ). On one hand the wood looks cool, but on the other I prefer the black thinkpad look. I'd probably get a clear skin if I ever bought one.

 

i think fake carbon fiber would look better.... maybe not since that is sort of look reserved for HP DV series.

 

ha... that's either a ThinkPlank or a WoodPad.

either way, i kinda dig it.

 

There will be no pounding of the notebook.

Woodpad, that's not bad. I kind of figured if didn't work out I could always remove it, but I think it looks pretty good. I hope it hold up.

 

:laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

Seriously though, thats one awesome skin mod!

 

iWood or iPlank

 

Is this the Apple forum? I think not.

 

yeah, that's a big iFail.

haha

 

Pledge, hehe.

 

Personally, I think ThinkPlank sounds cooler, but seeing as you've already worked it into your sig pic, nevermind

 

Hey very nice skin! I was thinking of browsing their site to see what other stuff they might have, but that site, but when I go to SPGStore.com, I get a "this web site coming soon" page. Are you sure that's the site you used?

Thanks!

 

I think you're right, it's SGPStore.com. There's a link in the original post, but I'll fix it.

 

@Zaz what software and fonts do you use to type the word WoodPad in your signature?

 

Heh, WoodPad. I like.

You've got me curious though, and now I kind of want a black leather, cube, or carbon skin for my T410, but the site only has skins for T400 series. Do you know if it'll still fit properly?

EDIT: wait nevermind, just realized that the screen ratio and hinge sizes are different between T400 and T410.

 

The font used is AlphaWood and it was made using the Gimp.

 

This is off-topic, but... can you talk about why you are not that impressed with the performance of your SSD upgrade? You bought an OCZ Vertex, right?

 

That looks very nicely done Zaz. Certainly, it gives the notebook a feeling of "higher value"

Now speaking of the lid, my T61's rubberized coating has worn off a lot. Zaz just made me rethink the idea of turning my Thinkpad into wood

 

No, I got the Agility. I'm happy with my purchase of my Agility. When I first got my X200, I threw my 500GB Seagate in it. The Seagate, which had always been a solid quiet performer in my R60, was noisy in the X200. This certainly is due to the thinness of the X200. I've been happy with my Agility, primarily because it runs cool and is whisper quiet.

As for the SSD performance, it's a bit more snappy, but I wouldn't say I've been blown away either. These things have been so relentlessly hyped since they were released, it's almost taken for granted they're the best upgrade since the silicon chip was released. There are some applications where the SSD does seem to help speed things up, like Photoshop or iTunes, but they're slow starters by nature. Operations that put a heavy load on the SATA controller are definitely faster. Copy/pasting files would be an example of this. SSDs also have other benefits like they're quiet, they run cool, some offer better battery life and with no moving parts, they're much susceptible to damage. From a performance perspective, if FF opens in 1 sec on a SSD or 1.5 seconds on a conventional platter based drive, does that make a huge difference? Not to me. Now if you're doing some things where heavy throughput is required, then perhaps a SSD is warranted. I would have been perfectly happy with my Seagate had it been more quiet.

 

hmm interesting post man..

I've been considering an SSD for a while now, mainly for:
1) Better boot-up time
2) Being able to use it in the car/train without TP Active Protection going crazy on me
3) Better performance

The noise doesn't really matter to me to be honest. But that's an interesting analysis you got there. I think one of the reasons why you may have a good point is because of Superfetch in Windows Vista/7. With 4GB of RAM, all the commonly used stuff is cached in RAM anyway, so load-up times for programs will probably not see a very significant improvement. So maybe the performance aspect isn't really a "big deal" for everyone?

PS. Sorry for the thread hi-jack

 

Someone lent me their 80GB Intel, which is supposed to be the best SSD. Perhaps it was a bit more speedy here and there, but seemed fairly close to the Agility. Yeah, SSDs are a little quicker, but I just expected with unending praise SSDs have received, it would be a bit more noticeable. I ran the benchmarks. My drive seemed to be performing normally.

I think it's somewhat akin to CPUs. Everyone likes to debate the merits of the i5 vs the i7, but if you're just going on the Internet or listing to music, a Core i CPU won't offer much of an advantage over a Penitum M. It's the same for hard drives. Typical notebook usage like Office, Media and Internet, just don't need a lot of throughput. A faster drive won't make much of a difference.

I know a lot of people swear by them, I just don't see it on the performance side. Everyone is different. Perhaps I'm just not that demanding. They do offer benefits outside of performance and for that reason I'm happy with mine.


Uh, clear or black? Kinda of boring don't you think?

 

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I love the black thinkpad look myself.

 

It doesn't cover the corners? this is where the rubber finish takes all its damage...