Excellent laptop for students - only minor glitches
Written: May 05 '01
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Pros: Almost regular IBM laptop quality at a fraction of the cost. Absolutely excellent ergonomics.
Cons: IBM remains a large organisation, which is difficult to approach.
The Bottom Line: You get excellent ergonomics at a modest price, but be prepared for some minor disappointments such as: Lack of serial port and floppy drive. Expect wear and tear to show.
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| knilaus's Full Review: Lenovo ThinkPad i Series 1300 1171 (06P9216) PC No... |
I went to Great Britain about 8 months ago to study for an advanced degree in information systems. I had planned to purchase a laptop over there, as my programme involved quite a lot of essay writing and independent research surfing the net.
Criteria
1) Inexpensive -- price around USD 1500.
2) Reputable brand -- no no-name laptops, thank you!
3) Suitable for word processing, e-mail and internet surfing.
4) Good ergonomics, i.e.
* perfectly clear screen,
* no-hassles keyboard and pointing device, and
* perfectly accommodating handrest.
5) Also usable after the conclusion of my 12-month study programme -- i. e. "expandable" and "durable".
Reputable brand
All the major vendors today offer low-end laptops aimed at students and small business owners, but to my knowledge only the IBM iSeries provide products that include high-end ergonomics features as part of the low-end range.
High-end ergonomics
As I intended to use my laptop in a stand-alone fashion without any input peripherals connected (i. e. no external keyboard or mouse), it was very important to me that the laptop came with the best combination of keyboard and pointing device.
Exposure to laptops provided by my previous employers has taught me that I generally prefer a Trackpoint-style pointing device. I also do not like the new Windows-keys to take up too much space on the keyboard. Finally, I want the keyboard to resemble a standard keyboard with no "exotic" placement of keys such as Toshiba's strange placement of a vertical column of numeric keys to the right of the Enter-key.
As mentioned in the above, I only managed to find the required level of ergonomics on the IBM ThinkPad iSeries.
IBM Thinkpads have a strong track record of leadership in ergonomics features. They actually have a research centre (IBM Research Almaden), which devotes considerable resources to constantly improving the ergonomic experience of their laptops and other computers. My experience with other laptop vendors sometimes makes me think that their ergonomics are the coincidental result of a collection of random ideas thought out by various "inspired" design engineers that did not consider performing user-testing of their ideas before implementing them in a marketable product.
The 1300 range
The IBM iSeries 1300 is equipped with a built-in 10/100 Mbit Ethernet adapter, which is compatible with the LAN that is installed on campus and in my hall of residence. It also comes with Microsoft Windows 2000 and the Office 2000 Small Business Edition (i. e. Word, Excel, Outlook). This was to me a decisive advantage over the 1200 range, which only offers Windows ME and Lotus SmartSuite and includes no Ethernet adapter.
I chose not to buy one of the models that sport the so-called "Dual Scan" (DS) screen technology, as it comes nowhere near the quality of a TFT screen. For example, it can sometimes be difficult to locate the mouse pointer on a DS screen, if you move it quickly. Your eyes will also tire from looking at a DS screen. In comparison, TFT technology is comparable to regular monitors, if not sharper. The 1300 range offers two models with TFT screens: One is 12.1 inches and reaches 800x600 resolutions, whereas the more expensive one offers a 14 inch screen and resolutions of up to 1024x768. I should have preferred the latter, but unfortunately it would cost around 250 USD more than the former, and I had already strained my budget..
Ordering
I intended to purchase my computer directly from IBM, as I could only find business-to-business re-sellers in the London area, who actually stocked the ThinkPad. Unfortunately, it took more than three attempts at placing my order before it could actually be effectuated. This was because I used a Danish credit card, which had an upper limit for transactions abroad of around USD 500. Unfortunately, this was a fact that IBM did not bother to tell me about, although they were the ones, who received the error code from the transaction. They only told me that the transaction could not be authorised.
It was not until I was able to talk to a fellow Dane, who was on secondment in their call centre that I actually got the information from them that enabled me to find out what was wrong. The Danish IBM employee suggested that I made my bank transfer the funds using the SWIFT network instead. Normally, this is a procedure, which they apply to business-to-business sales, but in my case they made an exception. The payment problems had the unfortunate effect of delaying the delivery by several weeks compared to my expectations, which was somewhat of a pain. I find it difficult to understand that it should take IBM employees so long to give me the required information to take corrective action, and I actually got the impression that they did not put much care or attention into serving individual orders. The order volume is probably so high that they would rather just proceed to processing the next order and leave any problems for the customer himself to figure out. I had to make somewhat of a nuisance of myself before they finally suggested that I could talk to their Danish colleague, who was far more helpful and professional than his British counterparts.
Installing
When the ThinkPad finally arrived, it came in a nice box that protected the delicate parts inside. The ThinkPad had system software pre-installed and backup copies were included on CD-ROMs. Furthermore, some user manuals and a spare cover for the TrackPoint device were included.
Setting up the computer was a matter of connecting it to power and to the Ethernet socket in my wall (Ethernet-cable not included). It worked immediately! I had no reason to contact customer support for anything regarding installation. Registration and installation of the Office Suite was automatically initiated upon first startup.
The ThinkPad in use
Having used the ThinkPad for more than 6 months now, I have gathered some experience regarding its sturdiness and comfort in use. My general impression is that the iSeries range is not entirely as robust as the higher end ThinkPads such as the A, T or X series. The initial image of robustness and sturdiness gradually gave way to an impression of slightly lower quality. Specifically, this was manifest on the keyboard, which at delivery sported the typical matte finish that gives your fingers a good grip on the keys without making them stick to the keys. However, after a couple of months the sweat in my fingers (I assume this was the cause) had dissolved the matte finish of a fourth of the keys. These keys are now glossy and slick, which makes the fingers stick more to the keys. Although this does in no way impede on the functioning of the keyboard, it is still a minor distraction in daily use. I imagine it would be possible to buy replacement keys from IBM, but I have yet to inquire about the price.
I quickly found out that there were some other small drawbacks with a machine that had no serial ports nor floppy drive. The serial port was needed when I wanted to connect my software to the computer for desktop synchronisation. My Palm Pilot uses a docking cradle that connects to the computer using the old RS-232C serial 9 pin port interface. The problem was solved by buying a PCMCIA 2.0 Serial Card (Socket S-I/O) that cost around USD 120.
The lack of a floppy drive is really only a nuisance when I am expected to exchange files in an environment that does not provide Ethernet connectivity. To me this happens about once a week. I have usually been able to work around this by e-mailing files in advance or similar, but an external drive is of course available from IBM.
The above mentioned deficiencies can only be considered minor detractions in the overall picture of a laptop, which sports absolutely excellent ergonomics and slightly above average robustness for its segment: I have been able to sit at the computer for 10+ hours in a row without suffering from any of the symptoms that are otherwise typical when working with non-ergonomic computers (i.e. sore eyes, wrists, elbows or "tired" fingers). The screen deserves a mention for its lucid sharpness, although 800x600 is a tad small, once you have grown used to the 1024x768 that today can be considered a standard on desktop machines.
The design and weight of the laptop is also quite good in my opinion. The weight of 2.4 kg is probably similar to other models in this range, but I think that IBM has one of the most attractive designs with the slightly sloped keyboard and black frame. I like to carry the Thinkpad around on 5 fingers like a professional waiter would carry a small tray. Perhaps this is indicative of how handy it is?
I have found the performance of the computer to be suitable for my needs. It boots in around 20 seconds or so, and once Windows is up and running, I am able to run between 4 - 6 applications simultaneously without any significant slowdown or visible drain in system resources.
Support
After about 4 months of use I experienced periodic problems when playing wave-sounds such as MP3s or the samples used by most games. The sound would suddenly turn into a distorted, screeching noise, and the mouse pointer would suddenly move in jagged movements around the screen, while the fan turned itself on (indicative of heavy CPU activity). A call to the IBM help desk indicated that new Windows-drivers were available for my sound card and this helped reduce the problem to a minimum (now happens less than once a month, whereas previously it would happen several times a week).
All in all, I am quite satisfied with this product, and I would not hesitate to recommend it to other students, who put emphasis on great ergonomics while remaining on a low budget. I feel that all of my buying criteria mentioned in the beginning were fulfilled, and only slight trade-offs or disappointments were encountered with regards to criteria #1 and 5.
Specification
Please note that this review is of the IBM ThinkPad iSeries Model 1330, which sports the following configuration:
Intel Celeron 500MHz Processor, 64MB SDRAM, 4MB VRAM, 6GB HDD, 10/100Mbit Ethernet, 56kbps V.90 modem, MS Windows 2000, MS Office SBE (no Powerpoint or Access)
Because of an error in the epinions-user interface, I was unable to specify a correct size for the hard disk drive.
Link
IBM Research Almaden
http://www.almaden.ibm.com/cs/user/
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 1600
Operating System: Windows
Processor: Intel Celeron
Processor speed: 401-500
Screen Size: 12
RAM: 64
Internal Storage: CD-ROM
Hard Drive (GB): 13-20
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Epinions.com ID:
knilaus
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Member: Kristoffer Nilaus Olsen
Location: Copenhagen, Denmark
Reviews written: 22
Trusted by: 35 members
About Me:
Just out of temporal stasis.
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