The Retro ThinkPad is coming... finally officially confirmed

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Just a tidbit about it a short time ago, first news in quite some time actually:

http://blog.lenovo.com/en/blog/retro-thinkpad-its-alive

Now as for what it'll actually be made up of and how it'll look is basically a guessing game filled with speculation at this point, for me personally I'd want:

- the best Intel processors available given the limitations of the form factor, so Core i5-i7 obviously, potentially quad core support (they run hotter than their dual core counterparts so heat would be a concern and maybe they can't do that)

- 32GB max RAM support, should be easy to do considering there are 16GB SODIMMs available, crazy expensive fuckers but they exist

- 14.1" diagonal or potentially a 15" diagonal 16:10 display, don't care about the actual resolution as long as it's higher than 1680x1050 which it obviously will be, probably a 2560x1600 panel maybe, or something even higher but still maintaining the 16:10 aspect ratio, I just don't like 16:9 and only use it when I don't have the option regardless of the resolution

- the 7 row classic style keyboard and hopefully the original style with actual KEYS and not chiclet shit, not a fan of that either but I figure they're going to do chiclet whether people like it or not

- the usual bevy of ThinkPad related aspects, ThinkLight (at least one, potentially two for one in each corner would be even better), the classic TrackPoint and TrackPad controllers (both at the same time), actual buttons and not just a pressure pad, etc

- a somewhat reasonable price considering the legacy of the ThinkPad brand and also with the latest hardware spec available just don't go batshit insane on us - the blog post linked above makes light of the joke that some people online have guessed such a ThinkPad (because of the limited quantities) could approach $5K in pricing and the blog poster says no, not even on that so it remains to be seen

- and please, Lenovo, for the love of all that's holy and worth, make it BLACK like it should be and not your hideous puke vomit idea of a smokey dark grey whatever you're calling it - if it's not flat matte black top to bottom then dammit it's not a ThinkPad proper

Anyway, the Retro ThinkPad is coming, there's no details on when but considering 2017 is the 25th anniversary year of the original ThinkPad's release let's hope it's coming soon and that it doesn't disappoint when it does arrive.
 
Nothing matters except the keyboard. Give me recent hardware, give me the old keyboard and I won't ask how much it costs. I can't believe I am making enough to be in Canada's 1% -- even if barely -- but I can't buy the laptop I want!

If it doesn't come with the seven row old keyboard I will hack the old keyboard into an iGPU i7 T430s because it has Thunderbolt, hack a full HD screen in as well, I have the latter in my T420s already and then mourn the days when laptops were usable. I have been doing that for some five years now with the last two years having some hope with the Retro announcement and then the T420s full HD hack, hoping the T420 will work out but it didn't then the community hacking the T430s keyboard firmware. I do have a T430s full HD kit incoming because I do not fully trust Lenovo at this point. I hope.. I hope dearly! but I do not trust them to deliver.

All these requests, screens, shit, I don't care. Just give me a good keyboard and Thunderbolt 3. I will live with the rest, whatever the rest is.

It's such an emotional year with the Moto Z keyboard mod supposedly shipping in July. I want to believe but do I dare? Does really the five year old keyboard winter thaw out this year? I know it will freeze back but I will stock up and hope the next five years another thaw happens. I am familiar with stocking up, the moment I saw the T430 keyboard I bought a second T420 and stashed it. I have two Droid 4s, a Nokia 900 and this and that. The N900 is still on duty some days. It's more than seven years old now and still there are some tasks where it is unbeaten. Is a good keyboard too much to ask? Apparently.

But, yes, I am hoping and bought a Droid Z Play when banggood had it down at $250. But the hope is barely alive by now and the factory screen film is still on it and I only switched it on to see it works because if there won't be a keyboard then I will need to sell it -- and I barely hope it'll happen. Who would be so crazy to have strong hope? After five years? And now I am checking the indiegogo page daily for updates. Please. Please. Make the dream come alive in laptop and mobile. It's been so long.

And no, this is not insanity. What you could call insanity happened in 2014 when I bought a 55Y9003 and stashed it in case I need to hack together a 2-in-1 laptop from a current-hardware tablet and a usable keyboard. That was the lowest point and then the Retro announcement happened before I became that desperate.

In the best case, this time the freeze won't be total: TB3 would keep the laptop from becoming obsolete too fast -- although it's not like I can't work on the T420s still. And Motorola promised mod compatibility for several years so there's that. Maybe. Five months and we will know ... some.
 
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My money is on that they are going to use U mobile chips, not H chips, most likely the 7600U for the i7 model, not the 7560U surface pro is touting.

Possibly with an option of dedicated GPU of no higher than 965M (that's an extremely optimistic scenario), but more likely something along the lines of 940MX.
 
Rumors are that it's going to be built on the T470 with the old keyboard perhaps they will change the screen from 16:9 to 16:10 and -- that's it. So yeah, U CPU and ancient crap of a dGPU. The XPS 15 got the 1050... I doubt we will.

But. The old keyboard is we? at least I! need.
 
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So a notebookcheck writer who claims to be familiar with the details of the Retro confirmed the seven row keyboard:


 
The assumption with that last comment there is that the picture that's been widely circulated (with the original rainbow ThinkPad branding) is actually the Retro model or just a render or early design concept so, until we see a real actual full on layout of it I'm not gonna get my hopes up towards anything. They could do just about anything with this model, that's my biggest fear actually because I really would like to get one IF...

(yes that's a big if there on purpose) they don't completely fuck it up, of course. :D
 
It's not an assumption, read more of the thread, it says this prior to the exchange I quoted: "Thats the point, it won´t fit and it will never fit, because the palmrest needs a larger cut-out for the keyboard. Also todays ThinkPads in general often have keyboards that are special for one model." and also he says "Of course. I know all the details about Retro. But its still not announced completely, so I will keep my mouth shut." and it's quite credible knowing who he is. it's really fsckd that this forum inline reddit comments instead of allowing me to link to an entire conversation.
 
And now it's available, $1899 for the base model so it's not as expensive as I was expecting (was thinking $2200+ for some reason), and of course Lenovo is adding some goodies for pre-orders today only (Oct 5th) but I would imagine the pre-orders are brisk so far, no idea if we'll ever find out. And as expected it is available in limited quantities so, I don't suspect they're going to sell millions of 'em but even so I wouldn't mind having one.

https://www3.lenovo.com/us/en/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpad-t-series/ThinkPad-25/p/22TP2TTTP25
 
Didn't realize Lenovo was sending out review units but apparently they did so, here's an unboxing - and the box itself is fucking cool:

 
Damn, why not an 8th Gen with MX150. Looks pretty nice but to under powered for that price for my tastes.
 
I've owned 60 Thinkpads (or thereabouts) over the past 15 years. I wanted to want this one...but not at that cost with those specs. At this point, I'm holding out for an 8th gen quad core with OLED. The NotebookCheck review's gamut tests just turns me off on this system.
 
Daleon said:
Damn, why not an 8th Gen with MX150. Looks pretty nice but to under powered for that price for my tastes.
Click to expand...

Because there are no Coffee Lake mobile components available yet, that's months away and since it's the 25th anniversary right now (give or take a few days) they had to build it out with what was available, it's not like Kaby Lake is a poor performing architecture or anything. As for the choice of GPU, again, probably a decision based on everything involved including the chipset, the CPU, battery life, thermal considerations, and so on. I mean really, it's not a gaming machine so I don't get why people want so much GPU power in a business class laptop. It's not using a Quadro either which would have been nice for an option (I use Quadros myself) but I suppose again they only have so many potentials for configuration with such a small mainboard.

I'd love to have one, and I strongly considered putting up the purchase price but I don't think this machine is worth $1899 for the base model (not that there's really much they'll configure on it and doing that is obviously cheaper if you do it yourself). I'd put it around $1300 in the base configuration, especially considering the 1920x1080 panel in it, even the matte finish touch aspect (a somewhat rare thing) wouldn't increase the price all that much. I don't really care all that much about super duper high resolution displays to be honest, so a 1920x1080 (1080p is a video format, not a damned resolution, seriously) display is just fine with me at this point in time.

I like the form factor, I love the older proper travel actual keyboard they put back in it, not all that happy with the ports, not happy with the extremely small and rather low capacity battery (they'll probably have higher capacity ones available since it's all based on the T470 model), but other than those drawbacks IMO I'm OK with it I suppose.

Just not happy with that price based on the actual hardware it's built from. :(
 
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But the ThinkPad 25th anniversary model has been in development for the last 2+ years, and since it's based on the T470 it's limited to 6th or 7th gen Intel mobile CPUs so, that's that.

How much freakin' power does a person need in a business class laptop? :D
 
More than that! If I could have an 8th gen quad in a 14" package that I could get running with 32GB of RAM, I could convince work to upgrade me from my Yoga 260.
 
Looks like the Retro ThinkPad is now out of stock worldwide, remains to be seen if Lenovo considers that a good thing and decides to produce more or if that's it entirely and they're done.
 
They had me until the $1900 price tag and 940MX. Damn shame, because I like ThinkPad keyboards and TrackPoints.

At that price, though? GTX 1070 (maybe 1060) or get out! I'd rather see a quasi-retro ThinkPad derived from the W700/W701(ds), but with IPS panels and modern CPU/GPU hardware under the hood.
 
I have a Thinkpad 770ED in new-like condition, with video capture, all accessories, even a floppy drive -- maybe it is now a collector's item?
 
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