Originally posted by: ceo2b
Just had a few questions for you:
--1. Does the plastic casing feel cheap or easy to damage or mark badly?
The plastic casing feels very sturdy for the most part. While most of the laptops I have come across have that "smooth looking" plastic (i.e. Dell, HP), almost all the Thinkpads have that porous looking type of black plastic. Its not very easy to damage (but I do not conduct "drop tests" of my own on them!) from the looks of how they are constructed. Fingerprints may stay on the casing, but they are easily wiped away with a soft cloth. The LCD is connected to the bottom half of the laptop with Steel braces (not 100% sure its steel. Maybe aluminum). This method of construction is sooooo much better than the Dells and HP's I've had my hands on (come on.....plastic hinges? A Laptop is supposed to be sturdy!).
2. At UXGA are you comfortable docking two browser windows without the need to scroll?
Yes. At first, it took a little time to get used to the resolution being so high, but after that I was fine with it.
3. How is the harddrive performance: fast? quiet or noisy?
Performance is well. Granted I work in a not so quiet area most of the time, I can't really be too suggestive on the acoustics (quiet or noisy). I can say that I was away from my area with this Thinkpad doing some work and it is no more or less louder than any other newer laptop hard drive I have come across. This particular model also has similar technology to the T41 systems, with regard to protecting your hard drive if you drop your laptop or it gets juggled around while powered on (Essentially, it uses airbag-like technology to park the hard drive heads when it senses it is falling or getting juggled about while powered on). Very cool technology that no one else on the market has (IBM Active Protection System. Check out the 3d tour of the T40 series on IBM's website for more information on this).
4. Overall performance from daily tasks to running multiple apps simultaneously?
Everything runs just as well on this system when it comes to multitasking as it would on a desktop system. I've had numerous applications open at the same time (Word, Outlook, Mozilla, IE, Lotus Notes, etc.) with no issues whatsoever. Now, if you do hop around to various review sites on the web, you may come across benchmarks that show other manufacturers with laptops that have better performance. IBM tunes their machines (specifically BIOS, preloads, etc.) for stability more than anything. Sure, I could have a laptop that blows away other laptops in the same price range, but is it stable? Does it crash a lot? Maybe. The tradeoff here seems to be performance for stability, which I would take anyday.....
5. How is working with UltraNav?
Generally good. Sometimes I use the touchpad, other times I use the trackpoint. Somebody else pointed out in another thread that you can replace the T40/41/41p touchpad with a blank plate from IBM, but unfortunately you can't (as far as I know) with the R series, as the top is all one piece. But I have no problems having a touchpad.
6. If you had to spend the 3800 on it, would you?
If I had a salary that was 2x what I make now, I wouldn't hesitate!
7. Anything you dislike about the system or find another system in the market surpasses the R50p?
I do find the weight of it a little annoying. But for what you get in the system at that price, I could live with the weight. The only other laptop I would consider would be the T41p, just because it is somewhat lighter (5 - 5.4 lbs vs. 6.6-7.1 lbs for the R50p). I've played with a recent HP laptop and it just doesn't feel good at all. Keyboard sucked, touchpad was not very sensitive at all and overall, the system just felt slow (boot times were not good, nor were the application load times). Granted, maybe I am biased towards Thinkpads because I have almost 100% exposure to them, but comparing other manufacturers laptops to them almost seems silly, because there is no comparison. I am a firm believer in "You get what you pay for", as I've had bad experiences with cheap crap all to often in the past. Good thing I learn from mistakes.
Buying a Thinkpad, you're not just paying for the IBM name.........
Thanks