Questions before buying a laptop

[Fis]

I am looking to purchase a laptop and realizing that they are by nature an exercise in tradeoffs. One must find a compromise between function, performance, battery life, weight, and durability. I would willingly pay through the nose if I could maximize all of them, but alas, physics stands in the way.

With that in mind, I am leaning toward the Lenovo Thinkpad X61 or T61, and have some questions for which I cannot find easy answers:

1) What is the cost/benefit in terms of performance and battery life if I choose a faster processor? If I go from the Core 2 Duo T7100 to the T7300 or T7500, am I gaining much in performance, and am I giving up much in battery life to get it?

2) Same question regarding graphics (I'm not one to play first person shooter games, but I will edit some video). My assumption is that going from the integrated 128mb X3100 to the 256mb NVidia Quadro will suck battery life considerably.

3) If I choose a higher resolution screen (such as SXGA instead of WXGA), does that have any impact on battery life?

4) Are there any good 3rd party sites/sources you can recommend that tell me what the true battery life is between different models? Am I overly obsessed with battery life?

5) If I want a very lightweight and durable laptop and am willing to pay for it, is there any reason to consider any brand other than Lenovo?

Thanks in advance as always to the awesome anandtech community

 

[nomagic]

Before I got my new laptop, I did a little research. Here is my opinion:

1) If you can afford it, go for T7500. At rest, modern processors automatically step down in voltage and frequency. Therefore, all three processor you mentioned would use about the same amount of power when not in use. On the other hand, when under-load, T7500 will require more power, but it also gets tasks done faster and steps down earlier. As a result, the there probably isn't a noticeable difference in battery life.

2) In almost all cases, IGPs are more battery friendly than dedicated graphics solutions. In addition, GMA X3100 is very capable of 2D graphics and low stress 3D graphics. If you don't play games or use any 3D intensive apps, you will be fine with X3100.

3) Higher resolution screens don't have much impact on battery life. If you worry too much about the screen eating away battery life, turn the backlight down. And if you are indeed so overly obsessed with battery life, the extended battery pack will be a must buy.

4) / 5) You will get biased brand/site from me. ("I wouldn't trade my T61 for any other laptops of the same specs.")

**Hugging his ThinkPad T61**

 

[Fis]

As always, a quick and reasoned response from the Anandtech community .

Follow up questions (now bringing cost into the equation):

For fairly lightweight use (schoolwork mostly), how noticeable is the performance difference from T7100 to T7300 to T7500 to T7700?

Is my money better spent on RAM?

Is there a performance curve "sweet spot" for processor and RAM, after which the gains are smaller?

 

[Ruptga]

Originally posted by: Fis
As always, a quick and reasoned response from the Anandtech community .

Follow up questions (now bringing cost into the equation):

For fairly lightweight use (schoolwork mostly), how noticeable is the performance difference from T7100 to T7300 to T7500 to T7700?

Is my money better spent on RAM?

Is there a performance curve "sweet spot" for processor and RAM, after which the gains are smaller?

No difference (unless your schoolwork involves CAD or some such)

2GB is ideal for Vista and...

There's a point of diminishing returns for everything. Laptop memory's point is 2GB right now, you can get that for fifty bucks on sale, but good luck getting 4GB for less than $250. For processors, it depends a lot on what you're using the thing for, my T2300 holds up well for occasional music and video editing, but a professional would be apalled. A 10% difference in processing time/frame rates/et all is the minimum discernable to almost everybody, so any processor speed increase of less than 10% is probably going to be a waste of money.

 

[gobucks]

I just bought lenovo t61 the other day (they are priced really nice right now with the 10% off coupon from *****). I went with the T7300 because I wanted the 4MB cache, but i figured the T7500 and T7700 simply weren't worth the money (the performance gains are only 10 or 20 %, respectively). Besides, a 2.0GHz Core 2 will be rocket fast for anything I will do on a notebook, and considering how overclockable Core 2s are, it's pretty likely you'll be able to undervolt a T7300 pretty substantially for better battery life.

As for video, I've heard that the Quadro FX 570M is a pretty big drain on battery life, but that's only available on the t61p anyway, and all the widescreen t61ps are not even being sold right now. Since the t61's dedicated video, the Quadro NVS 140M, is basically just an 8400GS, I doubt it would eat up too much power. If it does, you could probably underclock the graphics core during general use using coolbits.

As for memory, don't buy it from lenovo - just go with the minimum (1GB, 1 DIMM) and buy your memory elsewhere. I just bought 2 of these:
*****/product-_-productdetails.cv_-_item--20-208-323
with coupon *****/product-_-productdetails.cv_-_item--20-208-323 it is under $200 shipped!
If you get 4 or more GB of memory, though, be aware that you will have to reformat your laptop and install 64-bit vista (you can still use your OEM product ID)

 

[cheesehead]

I'm a BIG fan of thinkpads. The X61s is a terrific laptop.

 

[alimoalem]

i'll just back up some other responses so you can be more certain of what you're being told.

1. you are only gaining performance if you use the last 10-20% of the 7300 and 7500's potential. battery life really shouldn't be affected.
2. this is different than the CPU answer. even if all you're doing is staring at your screen, the dedicated gpu's will drain more battery than integrated.
3. i'm not sure about this but i've never heard anything about it. if it actually did have an impact, i'm sure i would've heard about it by now.
4/5. you can go to notebookreview.com and see what people are saying. i can't think of any other sites off the top of my head. if battery life and reliability is your thing, stick with what you're looking at.

Follow up questions
1. no difference.
2. depends on how much you're already considering. going from 1gb to 2gb...yes. going from 2gb to 4gb...no. if you absolutely must spend the money and already are going for the 2GBs, what about a bigger hard drive? webcam? fingerprint reader? a mouse?
3. personally, i think after 2GHz w/4mb cache for the CPU and 2gb of ram for 99% is the most they should need.

thinkpads are amazing laptops in basically every department...except maybe the appearance department . though subtle their changes have been, they do look better than previous gen models but they could still use some help...otherwise everything is perfect, imo