Thinkpad x1 carbon gen 9

I7 11gen 16gb ram

Running cachyos with niri as the WM

My first laptop was an IBM… hard to believe it’s been 20 years already.

Back then, I had five or six ThinkPads, from the T41 to various X-series models. Then I got married, and now I have three kids. These days, my wife uses a MacBook, while the kids and I use Samsung and Dell laptops.

But while cleaning today, I found this old friend. I’d kept it around for spare parts and completely forgotten about it. I guess it might finally be time to send it off for recycling…

After joining Reddit and browsing around, I came across this ThinkPad community. It brought back so many memories that I just had to join. I’d love to stop by now and then and see what everyone’s sharing.

Hope you all have a great day! :)

My little cousin absolutely destroyed the screen on my T480s a few days ago. LCD cracked, vertical lines everywhere, completely cooked.

I was just going to buy another stock FHD panel, but finding an actual decent replacement here was way more annoying than I expected. A lot of sellers list a specific panel and then say they’ll send “an equivalent compatible model”, which I really didn’t want.

After way too much searching I found a used Innolux N140HCE-EN2 Rev.C4 for 1800 TRY. The original panel in my T480s was an N140HCA-EAB Rev.C1.

The EN2 is still 1080p, but it’s 300 nit and has much better colors than the stock panel. The old one looked fine to me before, but after turning this one on I realized how washed out it actually was lol.

The only annoying part was that the EN2 doesn’t have the same mounting tabs, so I had to use thin double-sided LCD tape and line it up manually. I was convinced I was going to screw up the fitment, but somehow it went in perfectly and the bezel closes fine.

Honestly pretty happy with how it turned out. Little cousin broke the screen, accidentally gave me an excuse to upgrade it.

X31 is one of the lesser known ibm-era thinkpads. Its build quality is really good. With really nicely-molded keys and a tight hinge. The device is surprisingly powerful, it has a Pentium M and Mobility Radeon but somehow is able to run HALO and GTA3. Albeit at 20-30fps. The cooling is robust. The worst thing about this is the inverter on the bottom of the display assembly for the florescent tube backlight . It makes the thing stupidly hot to the point I worry about the plastics so usually I turn the brightness down. The display panel though is almost as good as the t430, its disappointing how Lenovo didn't update its ppi in all those years (I think the viewing angle is actually better on the x31), though the e-series did have really nice displays. To answer the "why windows", I think XP is better for this era of devices than Linux honestly, especially for old software like autocad 2002 :)

It was so hard to find parts for this. I had 3d-printed a replacment HDD slot cover and I hand-soldered the old 18650 cells out of the battery and replaced new Sanyo cells. You can find a 3D-model for the slot cover in my previous posts.

Hey everyone,

I’ve accumulated a small collection of ThinkPads, but I’m torn between finding fun projects/distros for them and putting some (or all) of them up for sale.

• X220 (i5 2nd gen compact 12.5" with classic 7-row keyboard)
• T420 (i5 2nd gen classic 14" workhorse)
• E520 (I3 2nd gen 15" with dedicated numpad)
• L470 (I5 7th gen Intel Core – not pictured)

After looking for some time on a good vintage thinkpad i was settled on a x200-x220, but to my surprise a x61 appeared, and being so much different than my t480 and other thinkpads that i fixed really got me on it, low and behold i bought it, unfortunately the last owner wasn't so careful with it, its full of scratches, missing screws, but it is the T7500 version, one of the fastest ones available, after replacing the internal fan (the one beside the wwan card) i got it to boot, already did the bios upgrade, i will put Gentoo later when i get more time with it, but until then i will be looking for the missing components, talking about it the two things its missing that i really wanted but seem to be either more rare or expensive than the laptop itself, are the batteries (both the removable and the internal one), and the external antenna for the 3g card (i know, i know, but think about all the aura it carries), and the thinklight isn't working, if anyone know of a international seller that could have these components would be of much help, and please, any tips are more than welcome, even tho this is IMHO the best looking thinkpad, there is very little to it, specially compared to its younger brothers (x200-x220), ill update my progress later (hopefully still in this year lol)

I purchased an E14 7th Generation.

TMI: I’m minoring in network security, and I’m preparing to apply to a CPS graduate program or a network security graduate program.

Dropped it one time and the bottom doesn't secure in place anymore, y'know what they say; the cucumber always tastes better pickled

As most of y'all would know, P16s Gen 5 AMD this year has finally unified the design with P16s Gen 5 Intel, introducing Blackwell dGPU options to P16s Gen 5 AMD.

While doing a bit of research into these models, I happened to come across the spare parts listings for these models, and it seems that the P16s Gen 5 and P14s Gen 7 share the same motherboard in terms of footprint, design and screw holes. What changed is that the P16s Gen 5 has RTX 2000 options (vs 1000 on the P14s, but 5060 options are available for the T14p, so I expect 2000 series to hit P14s Intel in a generation or two).

Interestingly, because of the fact P16s Gen 5 AMD uses Nvidia chipsets, and the fact it occupies the same board footprint as P14s Gen 7 Intel, you might actually be able to build yourself a custom "P14s Gen 7 AMD" with an Nvidia GPU and a 14.5 inch screen, in the chassis of the Intel model.

As for parts compatibility, I am not exactly sure, but you can probably give it a shot, I suppose.

----

Now obviously, with this RAM and GPU crisis, I'd be very tempted to ask, "but why?", especially with a device this new. But if anyone really wants to go for it, I suppose you can...

At the same time, this makes me heavily question why Lenovo thought it'd be a good idea to gimp the P14s Gen 7 AMD by reusing the design from the T14 rather than giving it a 14.5in model since the boards are shared...

With a new one (T15g Gen 1)

After nearly two years of using this computer the thing that has always bugged me the most was whenever plugging or unplugging the computer the screen would go black and the power light would blink. I got this computer refurbished before the ram crisis at a good price and I didn’t expect much from it so I didn’t really care at first but the longer I used it the more it bugged the hell out of me. How I use this laptop is short stints of sitting at a desk or table and then moving around so I’m constantly plugging in and unplugging the computer and every time it would blink and freak out. Sometimes for upwards of like ten to fifteen seconds. I checked windows settings I checked bios setting nothing ever changed until I looked at a piece of software that I never installed. Seriously what is this garbage and why would I ever want to change the refresh rate of my screen on a 60hzs max panel?! Consequently now that I’ve finally figure out how to turn this stupid garbage off my battery life has improved by over an hour. I am beyond pissed and hope that this rant can maybe help someone else out

took it out for cleaning under, like i always do, and it snapped while cleaning. this time i put some pressure on it. permanent marker worked like charm to hide that crack!

Is there anyway to fix this. The thinkpad has no issues before,. The last thing windows related thing i did was updating it.I still need it to finish pre uni (Dont hate me for using win 11)

On my E16 Gen 1 I notice that the K key is much brighter than compared to the other keys with the backlit keyboard regardless of the level. Anyone else experience? Pic might not illustrate it properly.

Hello everyone! I’m thinking about buying a ThinkPad to use as a secondary computer for my cybersecurity studies (I already have a gaming PC that I use for gaming and daily tasks). I’m trying to decide between the ThinkPad T Series (T14 G2) and the L Series (L14 G2). Could you explain the differences between them—in terms of build quality, specifications, etc.? I’m planning to go with an Intel-based model (though I’d ​​choose AMD if I can find one here in Brazil), ideally with 16GB or 32GB of RAM.

My budget is around R$ 2,000 BRL (approximately US$ 396), and I currently have R$ 800 saved. I'm buying in Brazil, so prices and availability are different from those in the US.

I'll mainly use the laptop for:

• Fedora KDE Linux as my daily OS
• Programming in C and Python
• Cybersecurity labs and virtual machines
• College coursework and documentation
• Possibly dual-booting Windows and Linux

I know the T14 is generally considered a higher-end model, but the L14 might offer better value for money, especially if I can get a better configuration for the same price.

My questions are:

1. How do the T14 Gen 2 and L14 Gen 2 compare in build quality, keyboard, cooling, and Linux compatibility?
2. Is the T14 worth paying more for, or is the L14 the smarter choice on a tight budget?
3. Which model would you recommend for my use case?
4. Are there any specific configurations or issues I should watch out for when buying refurbished?

I'd appreciate any advice. Thanks!

My 10 y/o netbook has a Celeron N3060, eMMC and 4GB RAM DDR3L 1366x768 TN.

I bought this ThinkPad online for $238 and in Argentina it is really hard to find good prices, even getting a ThinkPad outside the capital city is a luxury. In this subreddit a lot of people talk trash of this notebook compared to T series and newer generations so I want to know if is it really that bad for the price I paid?

A month ago I was playing Fallout 4 on my ThinkPad (a game that (it demands a lot) and there came a point where the game froze and I couldn't do anything, I couldn't even return to Windows, so I pressed the power button for a few seconds to restart but When I did that, the ThinkPad wouldn't turn on again and just stays like you see in the video; the fan only turns on for a while and then it shuts off. If anyone knows a solution, please let me know, I already tried removing the external and internal batteries and only connecting it to the charger, and the problem persists.

Had a t470 I abused for years I bought it around 2020 for $140 but the final nail in the coffin was I jammed it in my backpack full of stuff and the screen got crushed, lucked out and found a t490 with 16gb ram 500gb m2 ssd a week later for also $140 on marketplace last night. I need recommendations for a crush proof case that’s not too bulky so I don’t ruin this one, any budget around $20-$50

What are you thoughts on T16 gen4 intel 255H processer laptop with 52wt battery. I am getting it for a reasonable price . Which is very good offer. Compared to other thinkpad T and P series. Even L series basic prices are around this T 16 gen 4 I am geeting.

My main concern is

temperature control and less fan noise use moderate use.

I know the battery will last less but the price is very good and I have to work on my desk only so that's ok.

My father got this Lenovo Thinkpad E560 in 2018, he's a uni professor. He used for work and to play splitscreen games with me during the lockdown in 2020. He passed it to me in 2023 after switching to an HP Pavilion laptop with an Nvidia GTX 1650 because he needed more power for his softwares. I used this laptop to study and to run softwares liks SolidWorks and other apps that can use GPU for acceleration. The GPU had an overheating issue despite lowering the power options to save energy and doing regular maintenance ( changed thermal paste and cleaned it ) and also I started seeing pixel stripes on the right side of the screen and they increased by time. The display cable that links the screen to the motherboard is directly on top of the heatsink as i remember and that area gets hot fast. Today I was doing some heavy work when suddenly i saw some errors popup on the screen about some dll files located in system32, the error pointed to a corruption then Windows crashed, I tried fixing it by removing the old driver using DDU and reinstalling the driver but it kept freezing whenever I try to install the driver, i tried different ones, AMD official driver, Windows update driver and even Lenovo official gpu driver for the E560 but it kept freezing so I reached the conclusion that something is fried on my motherboard and after some search online, the freezing is a symptom of failing vram that got permanent damage due to chronic heat. So now i'm running on the intel I-GPU unfortuanalely. RIP R7 M370... (I'm still not 100% sure that my GPU is fried, please if you got any other ideas to help tell me in the comments)

I threw my t14 gen 2 at the wall out of anger. It broke the wall, the thinkpad is a bit dusty.

Genuine. Love.

I saw that body coating problem in X1 Nano Gen 1 is very very bad. I have touch the device by myself and it's disgusting.

How about the Gen 2? Anyone with X1 Nano Gen 2, can you share your experience? I want to know whether Gen 2 or even Gen 3 has the same problem like Gen 1.

Thank you!

So i have a W510 and I want to see what the out of box experience was like.

I looked for a recovery image online and found out that all the 10 series thinkpads use the same media but when i try to use the win 7 64bit sp1 English image off my usb which I made eith rufus it just gets to this screen and freezes. I left it all night and not a pixel changed on the screen.

I tried looking for other disk images too but none worked that ive tried.