Help me find a laptop (want to run Linux, used is ok)

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MrCrispy

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May 14, 2007
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Need - 15" screen (14 is too small), >5hr battery life, decent cpu, Linux compatibility, decent cpu, ssd, not bulky
budget - <$400. Used/ebay is perfectly fine

It will be used for programming, movies etc. I have looked at Thinkpads and did get a T440s but had to return it due to issues, and realized 14" is a little small. Any other options?
 
There are 15" ThinkPads, as I mentioned in that other thread, the W series so worth considering. There are 15" Dell Latitudes and 15" HP Elitebooks as well. If you're looking at something older then the W520/W530 ThinkPads are out there but expect to pay for the privilege, you can probably find a W530 in good/great condition with no issues for about the $350-400 price point depending on how it's configured. For Latitudes I'd say something in perhaps the E65x0 series might be worthy but it also depends on the configuration. The E64x0 and E74x0 series are the more popular ones in terms of overall sales with the E65x0 models being considered "budget" business class if that makes any sense at all.

Can't speak for 15" HP Elitebooks but they're out there of course, never really got into those all that much and I've personally only owned one of the more modern Elitebooks, was a 14.1" model a few years ago, was rock solid however as it should have been and I had no issues with it. Found it at a pawn shop for a great price, cleaned it up and made it all shiny and pretty again (previous owner was a pig apparently) and sold it on craigslist for a nice profit a few weeks later.

If you're into programming you'll want screen real estate so make sure the device you decide upon has at least a 1600x900 panel in it, preferably maybe a 1920x1080 depending on your eyesight. Because of your price ceiling don't expect to find anything with some massive quad HD display in it but you might get lucky if someone is dumping something newer with one of those such panels in it for a good price, you just never know. :)

As always, put in some time for research on the various models, make a list of the components you want (at least this particular CPU with at least this many cores, at least this much RAM, resolution, storage capability - business class machines can sometimes handle more than one storage device like putting an SSD in the traditional hard drive slot plus using the optical bay (assuming the device has one) for another SSD or HD using an adapter, etc - whether it has a dedicated GPU or something that's part of the chipset (Intel stuff mainly but AMD does have that line of APU things, personally I avoid AMD hardware myself and prefer Intel CPUs and chipsets and only Nvidia Quadro GPUs which are in business class laptops, Geforce hardware is strictly consumer class).

Happy hunting...
 
It is interesting you mention resolution as I agree. My current laptop is a very old Thinkpad T61p which I think I paid ~$100 for. Its slow, heavy, clunky, lasts for 1.5hrs but has a wonderful screen res of 1680x1050 which I've never seen anywhere else and its just perfect.

FHD on anything less than 15.6 is intolerable. Upon researching I found out Linux doesn't do HiDpi very well and many complaints about the quad-hd screens in newer laptops with unreadable tiny text due to scaling.

I'd prefer business class because of reliability as well. How is this - http://www.ebay.com/itm/Lenovo-Thin...D-Windows-8-/162530265473?hash=item25d78f0981
 
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Ack, didn't see that post till now, sorry. Personally my first impression is to say void the "p" or "s" models of ThinkPads, they're considered to be the "low end" of a given series, like a T420 is considered the standard model and the T420p or T420s would be slightly degraded in some respects, etc. I can't particularly saw how but there's a significant price difference between the standard models and the p and s submodels, that much I do know for sure.

As for that particular ThinkPad in that link, I'd say it's too much for it from a cost perspective, not even a true quad CPU in it (just the dual core 4 thread model of an i7 mobile CPU), and for $400 or more I wouldn't buy a laptop without a true quad CPU in it these days, even an older model like that one. I'm personally not a fan of full size keyboards, that's also another aspect of the p/s submodels for ThinkPads most of the time as well, the standard models almost never have the extended of full size ones with the full numeric keypad as well. Can't stand full size keyboards on a laptop, the "off-center" quality just irks the hell outta me I suppose. :D

Now, having said that about the p/s submodels and realizing you have a T61p there could be an issue there but the T60/61 class models were totally different beasts, they were originally designed by IBM which created the ThinkPad but they came out just about the time the hand-over from IBM to Lenovo was happening so many ThinkPad purists (myself included) consider the T60/T61 models to be "the last best true ThinkPads" for many reasons, and the p/s submodels were almost the same as the standard ones so those models get a pass on that aspect. :)

The T420 is considered by many purists to be the last best Lenovo designed and sold ThinkPad and I tend to agree with that as well. Once the "3" series rolled out (X230/T430/W530/etc) there were rather drastic changes to what - again - purists consider to be the best aspect of ThinkPads in general: the keyboard. The "3" series models shifted a lot of things around and also went from the original travel keyboards with full keys as expected to using the island/chiclet shit which I personally can't tolerate and avoid at all costs. One thing that makes the T430 still something to be considered is that someone created a minor hack that lets you install the T420 keyboard on the model with some minor issues but it works so, a modded T430 is actually a somewhat decent machine with a nice boost in power because of the newer chipset/CPU support over the T420 models.

Anyway, I'm a big fan of ThinkPads, I owned the first one when it came out 25 years ago, I hope (if things work out) to own the Retro ThinkPad expected later this year as long as Lenovo doesn't fuck it up entirely but it remains to be seen what they're going to do. My favorite laptops are still Dell Latitudes, for the past decade or so that's all I've personally put my own money into and I have yet to be disappointed. I just ordered an entirely new "base" (case/motherboard/etc sold as one part) for my E6420 because the one I've owned for a while is still a stock Intel machine with Intel integrated GPU (the Sandy Bridge Intel HD 3000) and I've wanted to get the Nvidia Quadro 4200m version for a while now. I found one on eBay the other day for just $20 so I snagged it, should be here in a few days then I'll swap all the components over from this base assembly to the new one and get some gaming on I suppose. :D

I guess the best advice or suggestion I can offer (aside from the main idea of don't buy consumer class pretty shiny shitty plastic laptops) is find one that meets your requirements as much as possible at a price you consider to be acceptable, and that's about it (after yet another wordy post of mine). :p
 
Regarding p/s series Tiberian (for Thinkpads, at least). p-series (ex T470p) are performance models, usually with dedicated GPUs, they're not budget in any real way. S models (T470s, as an example) are slimmer/more portable.
As for the OP's needs, I second a T530. I'm using one to type this right now, and I have nothing but good things to say about it--especially with the 95% sRGB 1080p display.
 
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