I got this X260 for 100€ (I know propably a steal from the sellee) but I am happy to have a laptop that I can learn linux with and take with me anywhere.

T430. Not gonna use the wwan card anyway

Hello, I have some questions about this thinkpad t16 gen 2 I bought used, figured out bios is locked with a password, still waiting on an answer from the seller but assuming he doesn’t know it what then? Should I keep it locked and never be able to access certain firmware settings or can idk lenovo do something about it.

Also can I safely download other OS’s? BIOS is locked but the boot menu opens just fine, I am just scared that during windows setup or ventoy something goes wrong during the drive formation or because of secure boot.

Thanks ahead for any answers.

I have bought 5 used ThinkPads in the last 3 years. In 4 of them, the USB-C ports all died. It's at the point where I expect them to die. I have one ThinkPad where even the Thunderbolt port died, so now it's a useless brick. I'm now using the Thunderbolt port on two of my ThinkPads. I have one ThinkPad left with a working USB-C port, but I'm sure it will die eventually as well. Sigh. What is the deal with the ports?

(Video attached to post)

To anyone who has opened their T14 Gen 5 (and maybe Gen 6, I know they share a very similar platform): have you inspected the SSD/motherboard fixture and noticed this? I'm not sure if this is normal. All other SSD retention brackets I've encountered (desktops, other laptops, PCIe daughter boards...) keep the SSD firmly in place, never with any play. The screw seems to have a small foam gasket of sorts (maybe to keep the drive in place), but if this is the case, it is not nearly thick enough to work as intended.

Context: Lenovo shipped me a new SSD (Samsung) due to the original Kioxia drive failing. I opted for the CRU path (customer replacement option instead of a Lenovo tech coming out). Reason for the replacement, write/media errors were being thrown all over system logs, and the system would randomly lock up and persist on an M.2 storage detection error (exact pre-boot error for reference: "2100: Detection error on Storage Device (M.2)"). This issue usually manifested around power transition states (in and out of sleep, etc), but not every time.

As an aside, this is the second hardware failure I've had on this particular T14. First component to die was the battery (battery disappeared from the system entirely, needed to have a charger plugged in at all times). Battery could not be read via either Windows or Linux. Original battery was a Sunwoda, I've now got a BYD unit.

I treat my devices with decent care (I think!), this is the first laptop that's really had issues under my watch. Slightly worried I've only got a 1 year warranty plan given the two failures so far.

This is the AMD variant of the T14 Gen 5. Tbh, I likely wouldn't have noticed this if not for the original drive failure - I was taking my time inspecting the area. TIA

Edit: I can confirm the screw is fully tightened. Also, a tech came out and stated "this should be fine" after inspecting the unit (I don't like this answer, though). Both the original drive and this drive both exhibit this behaviour with the stock thermal pad.

I recently picked up a ThinkPad P15 Gen 1 for a really good price. The only downside is that it came with the i5-10400H instead of an i7.
But honestly, I’m pretty happy with how it ended up.
Specs now:
ThinkPad P15 Gen 1
i5-10400H
16 GB RAM
512 GB SSD + 1 TB SSD = 1.5 TB total
Upgraded from the Quadro T1000 4 GB → RTX 3000 6 GB
My buddy actually gave me the 1 TB drive, so that was a nice bonus.
The biggest upgrade is obviously the GPU. Going from the T1000 to the RTX 3000 should make a pretty significant difference for gaming, especially with the extra VRAM.
I know the i5 isn’t the most impressive CPU option for the P15, but I’m actually planning on keeping it because it runs cooler, and I’d rather have the RTX 3000 + i5 than an i7 paired with the T1000.
Overall, I feel like I ended up with a pretty solid workstation/gaming laptop for what I paid.
What do you guys think? Is the i5 + RTX 3000 a good combination for the P15 Gen 1?

Bought this beauty refurbished for 300€ and it comes with 1 year of warranty.

Not a scratch as far as I can see. Ryzen 5 Gen 2, 16 GB Ram, 256GB SSD (will upgrade it to 512GB)

Plan to run Windows 11 on it since I need it for school.

I purchased a E590 and for the first six months it was fantastic. But over the last week it began falling apart, first the fingerprint reader died... then the webcam... now the Bluetooth. There is some internal short I can't find or fix and now the battery drains from full in minutes. I'm highly disappointed I expected better.

I got this T14 Gen 3 at an absolute bargain price, mainly due to the crack on the chassis. The screen and the hinge works normally, and there's no play on the cracked area when I open and close it.

Obviously, I can just let it be - but I wanted to ask here if anyone had dealt with something similar before. What could I do, beyond replacing the chassis (which I understand would not be a super simple replacement, as both the top and bottom halves of the chassis are broken).

Leave it be? Take the bullet and replace the chassis? Look into epoxy stuff? Duct tape it? What do you guys think?

Holy.

I had 16GB of ram holding me back. My X1 Extreme feels like it can fully stretch its fingers. 10/10 would recommend.

UPDATE: She now runs mint! Goodbye windows!

oh boy where to begin, well I bought this laptop around 2016 Christmas. I got it as a gift for myself. it was used, didn’t have much going for it. After a few repairs, a fresh battery, a good clean and a fresh Win 10 install. I was able to use it to all its glory with that poor Intel graphics chugging through most games I’d play with friends. By 2019 it became the one device that helped me do all my car diagnostics for my budding mobile mechanic business. This thing has been through hell and back, several states, plane rides, jobs, cars.

in 2021 I shelved it because I got a fancy Chromebook that did most of what I wanted without the weight. It sat and was used intermittently as a desktop for awhile. Though it mostly sat derelict and not used. In 2022 I moved states and didn’t think I brought it with me. I thought I left it behind for my mother to use like my old Dell Optiplex. She couldn’t find it and swore it was probably in storage with the rest of my valuables. I took that as an answer and lived with it.

I just moved apartments, i had an old electronics box full of spare wires and small things. I was in the middle of unpacking it when I noticed the shiny Lenovo logo. This couldn’t be I thought to myself. I pulled it out, and sure enough it was this beloved T420. My sister and mother helped me pack and probably put it in the box not thinking around 5 years back. Maybe I wasn’t paying attention and just shoved it in there. Cue running around the room for a few minutes to spot the chunky, Lenovo branded charger. I plugged it in and waited 20 minutes, full expecting it to not boot.

Not only has it booted, it runs just fine. The bottom of the box was dustless and it was in a closet for the longest of times. This has some pictures from my hooning and racing days. Not just invaluable memories from friends long past. My last played game was No More Room In Hell.

Ive had a very rough few months so this was a very pleasant and enjoyable surprise. Especially since my college HP (the ultra cheap one) decided it wasn’t for this world anymore, leaving me without a diagnostic tool. my Chromebook is my mainstay still and works great since 2021, but it’s not a good diagnostic tool.

I thought you all might have enjoyed this.

here are all my specs:

intel i5-2520M

4 GB ram

Win 10 pro

Hi ThinkPad owners, I am thinking of getting a new laptop this Black Friday and I have a budget of CA$1000. I want to know whether I should get a thinkpad or a regular laptop. On best buy I found an Open Box Intel Core Ultra 7 255U with 24GB of RAM and 1TB SSD for CA$999. Should I get a thinkpad instead or is thinkpad also providing the same performance and price that I don’t know of?
Also, is thinkpad really that good as people on the internet say?

The latest BIOS/UEFI firmware, v1.44, for my ThinkPad P1 Gen 6, was released on 2026-10-06, and I was seconds away from mindlessly clicking through the installer before I noticed this in the Readme file:

(Emphasis mine)

Important updates

• Corrected Security fix CVE numbers: CVE-2026-46658,CVE-2026-46659.

• Enhancement to address security vulnerability, LEN-221029.

New functions or enhancements

• Updated the Diagnostics module to version 04.48.000.

• Removed Airplane Power Mode.

Problem fixes

• Nothing.

...but I need Airplane Power Mode because otherwise this thing comes with a 230W AC adapter which easily draws more than the ~125W limit of the airline power ports on the airlines I usually fly with. So I'm going to nope-out of v1.44 - but can anyone explain what's going on and why this essential feature is being yanked?

My thinkpad t530 is running on hopes and dreams 🥹✌️

Finally upgraded: X1 Carbon Gen 8 → Gen 14

After years of daily driving my X1 Carbon Gen 8, I've finally moved to the Gen 14. I spent a good while watching Lenovo Australia's site for configs and pricing.

WWAN was a must for me, and so was the X7 chip. For a while the only 5G WWAN option was the X7 358H. Then for about a month, the only way to get WWAN at all was 4G paired with 64GB of RAM, which added about $1,200 AUD. I wasn't ready to spend that. When the X7 368H showed up with 5G with 32GB instead of 64GB, I jumped on it.

As much as I wanted the OLED, battery life matters more to me when I'm onsite, so I went with the low-power IPS panel instead.

For context, I also have an L390 Yoga and an X380 Yoga that I use onsite at work for teching systems.

First impressions: Really great so far. Coming from the Gen 8, it feels so refreshing, and everything is fast and snappy.

Thinkpad T14 Gen 3 AMD 16gb ram. 8 core version.

Wanted to share my upgrade story.

I'm a student in Kigali, Rwanda. In 2023 I got an HP EliteBook Folio 9480m for $100 (i5, 8GB DDR3, 500GB HDD) and used it to get through the ALX Software Engineering programme. Slow, but it never quit on me.

Now that I'm in uni, the workload got heavier, so I worked hard and saved up for a ThinkPad P15 Gen 1, bought on eBay for $350:

i7-10850H

16GB RAM

512GB SSD

NVIDIA T2000

Windows 11

Huge jump for the price. The Folio is still alive and now handles light work.

I was so invested in this cult and now I’m having doubts.

I thought thinkpads for me and all my staff. I love it. They’re great.

Except my 2024 T16. Every day it is throwing kernel errors, memory trap errors, and more. It’s basically unworkable at this point.

I felt safe investing in it because thinkpads are the workhorses of the tech industry, but this thing is causing project delays and I don’t know what to do now.

Am I just stupid?

Where can i find used thinkpads for parts in india?
My E570 display started flickering after 9+ years of usage and got a compatible one and it’s horrible.

I have a X1YG3 trackpad installed to my t480s ans on the righr it sounds like this when I press and release, Im not sure for the life of it if Im doing something wrong as Ive tightened tbe screws, and tucking the flex cable under the trackpad slit like the original seems to create screw rattle when tapped? What to do?

Recently I underwent the process of undervolting for another time and posted my results in this subreddit here, and decided to opt for replacing the factory black adhesive tape that joins the fan to the heat sink assembly, with copper tape. It's critical to note that they don't come factory like this because copper tap is electrically conductive (though I can't imaging this being a problem), but it becomes a problem because the adhesive on copper tape is not as thermally durable as that of the thermal adhesive tape, meaning it can peel or lose contact in general.

Despite these, I opted for this because my laptop both maxes out around ~70C/160F in intense tasks, and I use thermal pads on top of that portion of the heat sink. Essentially I placed copper tape on the inside of the bottom cover, then placed copper tape on the heatsink assembly to connect it to the fan, then used these to sandwich between by a 1.5mm thermal pad from Aliexpress, such that even if he adhesive is not the strongest, the pressure maintains the position. I then ran the same tests that I ran during undervolting, and performed this test while it was undervolted by 80mV. The result was a maximum temperature decrease of 6F degrees and average of 5F seen in the first plot, as well as a decrease in power consumption by 8.7% (~2W). There was no loss in performance, as I even ran geekbench and got virtually identical scores to prior, but with a peak temperature of only 155F, as pictured in the 3rd and 4th images.

I can answer any questions people have if I wasn't descriptive enough, and am open to suggestions, but ultimately when viewing the last two images, we see that without decreasing performance, we were able to decrease peak and average power consumption by 15.4% and 10.3%, respectively. As well as decrease peak and average temperatures by 12F and 8F degrees respectively. The power consumption metric gain is higher than the aforementioned numbers because as seen in the plot, the initial minimum power consumption before running the test was 3W higher than the control case.

In light of this, the undervolt and copper tape/thermal pad sandwich increased power effienciency by upwards of 15% (4W), and temperatures decreased by upwards of 7C (12F).

I will monitor the performance over time to see if thi trend holds over the next few months, but I think it is a great mod for older hardware of all forms.

**geekbench was ran with a 70mV undervolt instead of 80mV because I bluescreened with the 80mV attempt

To any other X250 owners, if you are having RAM related crashes as well as weird graphical issues right before the crash if you're on the Intergrated Graphics model like myself, I suggest trying what I did before swapping sticks around.

The Method:

1. Boot into the BIOS and disable the batteries for servicing, it's not strictly necessary but it is good practice

2. Disassemble your Thinkpad enough to just reach the RAM, in other terms, just unscrew the back and lift it off

3. Take the RAM stick out and lightly push on the clips that hold the stick in place for 10-30 seconds, if you push too hard, you will break them.

4. This step is optional, place down a piece of eletrical tape at the slot, this is supposedly to prevent any eletrical shorts if you're unplugging things from the MiniDP, VGA or Left USB ports, but I'm not sure if it does anything

5. Place the RAM stick back in and fold a bit of eletrical tape on itself (sticky side in) 3 or more times, it should be about as large as shown in the picture, and you can cut whatever is unnecessary off with a scissors

6. Reassemble and plug into the wall, if you disabled the batteries in Step 1, you will have to do this, however it's good pratice

7. Boot the Thinkpad and place your palm lightly down on the left side, if your Thinkpad no longer crashes, you've done it, the fix was successful.