Lenovo announced ThinkPads for 'better sustainability and extended repairabilty'

https://news.lenovo.com/pressroom/press-releases/unleashing-innovation-and-better-sustainability-of-lenovos-latest-thinkpad-l-series-and-x-series-laptops/

by opengears • 2 years ago

68 91 2 years ago

news.lenovo.com

opengears2• 2 years ago

Lenovo announced new ThinkPads with "better sustainability and extended repairabilty'. The Intel variants are the L14 i Gen5, L16 i Gen1, L13 2-in-1 Gen 5, X13 Gen 5 and X13 2-in-1 Gen 5. AMD variants of the L14 Gen 5 and L16 Gen 1 have also been announced (but with sadly no TB4, but USB-4 only). The press release further reads that "One of the key features of the new ThinkPad L14 Gen 5 and L16 Gen 1 is enhanced repairability, with support from iFixit who have delivered a preliminary score of 9 out of 10.".

zer00eyz• 2 years ago

Do I want one? I sure do. Can I justify it? I can not.

I want to like linux desktop, I do. But Linux desktop feels more like it's part of the project and less like a tool.

cjk216• 2 years ago

Do they solder the USB-C connectors on the motherboard still? Because that has been actually the only fatality in the T470/T495/T14 machines I have. There is no way of effectively repairing the connector other than throwing the motherboard away as the connector shell usually rips up traces when it goes.

Apple put theirs on a replaceable daughter board, which while annoying to get out, is possible with minimal tools. I’d expect the same if iFixit are crowing on this.

Edit: did some googling and found out that no they haven’t fixed this flaw. The USB-C ports are still directly soldered to the motherboard. More landfill and completely compromises this marketing. And it makes a mockery of iFixit supposed 9/10 score.

Source: https://www.ifixit.com/Document/sunTY6dbbJvOMRjP/Repairabili...

daghamm• 2 years ago

Are there often problems with these connectors?

Asking because I bought a "broken" thinkpad very cheap and the only thing that doesn't work is the USB ports that occasionally stop working.

cjk216• 2 years ago

Yes very regularly. Also on Dell machines from experience. Yubikey wore out both USB-C ports on a dell 5550 in under a year.

PennRobotics5• 2 years ago

I don't know your particular model or situation and what the root cause would even be, but I have had issues with the USB ports that were later fixed in firmware, or one port that would stop working after a BIOS update until I disconnect the battery and wait a few minutes. Others on the Lenovo forums have identical/similar issues and resolutions.

I also had a functional laptop where they switched out the mainboard due to USB connector issues (which never showed up in BIOS tests).

Lenovo's approach to USB is a mystery.

throwaway484767• 2 years ago

Ifixit focuses on some weird criteria. Like pentalobe screws are annoying but not a real impediment to repair. Soldered NAND is a wear item and a WAY bigger deal.

cjk216• 2 years ago

iFixit are a business. They are driven on attention and sales. Not facts. Although some of the time they overlap.

bzzzt3• 2 years ago

Soldered NAND is a wear item and a WAY bigger deal.

"Citation needed". For anything resembling normal usage an SSD will last well beyond the economic lifetime of the rest of the components surrounding it. So why is it that big a deal to replace it?

0x38B• 2 years ago

This reminds me of Louis Rossman’s long-term use review of his Framework 13 (1); he was hard on it and killed some of the ports, but thanks to them being swappable, was able to just slot a new one in.

1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Sw06swtgY0

cjk216• 2 years ago

I think somewhere in the middle of the framework and Lenovo is appropriate. I don't mind spending some time replacing ports but I do mind spending money on buying pluggable ones I'm going to plug in once.

Apple have the right approach (apart from having to remove the logic board to get at it): https://support.apple.com/en-us/103915 ... port boards are individually purchasable from https://selfservicerepair.com

CalRobert• 2 years ago

The swappable ports are my single favourite thing about the framework. I love them. I, personally, still use a microsd card reader all the time, and having one just there, not sticking out, is really useful.

I no longer need to carry a hub or dongle or whatever when I take my laptop places. Just a power adapter (though tbf I wouldn't even need that if Framework had figured out battery life better).

Though as much as I like upgradability, I'm not sure it will make financial sense to upgrade instead of buy a new machine.

victorstanciu• 2 years ago

There is no way of effectively repairing the connector other than throwing the motherboard away

You're exaggerating. NorthridgeFix on YouTube has probably dozens of videos of him replacing USB-C connectors. Yes, he sometimes has to replace the traces with pad strips, but that's a long way to throwing the whole board away.

cjk216• 2 years ago

Not even slightly exaggerating. The repairs are overstated.

If you think these fixes last more than a few weeks you are probably mistaken. And due to the way footprints are designed for the shells there are occluded pins which can’t be resoldered or repaired. The end game is you have a USB-C connector that only works one way up on Thursdays when the moon is aligned with Jupiter.

BizarroLand• 2 years ago

I bet you could get one of those magnetic usb-c 100w power connectors and fix this flaw for the most part simply by virtue of a breakaway connector that put minimal strain on the laptop.

Of course, those connectors don't carry data, so for connecting to a dock you would still be sol.

schroeding2• 2 years ago

DIMM, keyboard, SSD and WWAN

Basically a return to the status quo of 10 years ago, isn't it?

I am inclined to believe that this (as well as Dell's Concept Luna) is a direct result of Framework's existence and may not have happened without them in this form.

happymellon7• 2 years ago

Probably, and that's not a bad thing.

I know that my next laptop would have been a switch from ThinkPads to Framework, and it probably still will be, but I know that there are plenty or organisations that can't move to Framework so having Lenovo fix this is great for many reasons.

schroeding2• 2 years ago

Yeah, it's great to see this kind of impact on other, way bigger vendors.

cherioo• 2 years ago

Those four things have almost always been replacement in many it not most thinkpads. This feels like pure marketing spin.

thisislife23• 2 years ago

Actually, they had been moving towards towards soldering ram and SSD. So this is kind of a positive step back. Thanks frame.work ...!

yread• 2 years ago

HP EliteBooks 840/5 and 640/5 also have all that and hp publishes very nice videos how to take the machine completely apart

m463• 2 years ago

Basically a return to the status quo of 10 years ago, isn't it?

couldn't help but imagine: this is the start of the transition to LAAS - laptop as a service (via subscription/advertising). :)

pjmlp2• 2 years ago

It is like Bio being back to how we used to buy food before the big supermarket chains, although more expensive than it used to be.

Snuupy3• 2 years ago

I use my laptop on a laptop stand on the couch and bed. Every time I slightly shift positions, the lap detection mode is triggered through the accelerometer (even though it's not on my lap) and the power limit throttles to 11W. You can clearly tell Lenovo does not dog food their own products, nor do they care about them. They've also released broken bios updates which ends up bricking devices. I can find links if people want to know more, but I have stopped recommending ThinkPads to friends and family. The quality is no longer there.

This is not a company that cares about their products - just one that attempts to extract the maximum possible value out of its consumers.

cjk216• 2 years ago

I just replaced my daughter’s T14 gen 3 with a MacBook Air M2 because the thinkpad lasts 2 hours on battery and gets hotter than satan’s nuts. Terrible machine.

happymellon7• 2 years ago

Weird, my AMD T14 gen 3 lasts 6-8 hours and doesn't get hot at all.

iforgotpassword• 2 years ago

To me it got bad around the time they gave up the docking station port and switched to USBC for that. We have such models at work now and they had multiple failures, like one USBC port dying, which was hilarious to figure out first because the docking station uses two, so it still half worked. Then the keyboard on one died. Another colleagues speakers died.

We had lots of models from the T series before, and while they were not all perfect they still worked perfectly and we usually got to take them home when they were replaced and they kept working for years to come after the inevitable battery swap.

Snuupy3• 2 years ago

Yup, planned obsolescence. Apple does it way more but it's still unacceptable. Might as well go with any other brand then since they're charging a premium anyway.

PennRobotics5• 2 years ago

Ironically, when I have the laptop on my lap, there is enough clearance between my legs to let air through. If I put the laptop on a mattress, it gets ridiculously hot because it doesn't activate lap mode and the mattress makes a great seal on all of the chassis bottom edges.

It's also a mismanagement of resources that someone is writing IMU drivers and some [clearly imperfect] decision logic, some other person is routing that IC onto the motherboard, the thing will need to be documented and bugfixed (and not necessarily by the same people that designed and wrote the thing), it adds another supply chain constraint, the whole subsystem is an unnecessary power consumption (even if it's optimized to 50 or 20 uA)...

There are much bigger fires to extinguish at Lenovo with their hardware/firmware/vendor/driver choices, and a handful of people are spending finite engineering resources on "lap mode."

Snuupy3• 2 years ago

Yes. Complete mismanagement and ruins user productivity but can't disable it "due to legal". No gamer would allow this to happen on their gaming laptops (nor afaik have been sued) but according to Lenovo no office worker can put their laptops on their laps with more than 11W TDP being delivered to the laptop. It's crazy.

The laptop stands readily available on amazon allow for airflow while being on a mattress, for example. Just poor design where you can tell they don't care about their products. I will be replacing this unit with either Framework or a Tong Fang laptop which costs half as much but delivers twice the sustained TDP (54W) even when not on lap detection mode, provides proper cooling via 2 fans/vacuum chambers and comes stock with PTM7950 - all things Lenovo keeps on devices that cost 2k+.

ThinkPads/Lenovo no longer take pride in their products. It's a milking machine.

diego_sandoval• 2 years ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superfish

SwiftyBug• 2 years ago

Lenovo began to bundle the software with some of its computers in September 2014

Is this a threat even if I choose the option to purchase a computer without an OS?

ivandenysov• 2 years ago

Even if not that still tells you that you are not just buying a product but also are a product in Lenovo’s eyes

happymellon7• 2 years ago

It wasn't in ThinkPads.

It wasn't only in Lenovo.

It was baked into the BIOS.

It only affected Windows, but Windows executed this pre-boot section and wouldn't allow it to be bypassed so reinfected after a reinstall.

It's removed by Windows Defender since 2015.

Is it a threat? Not at this point, but it should bring into question any Microsoft "secure computing" when they enabled this sort of behaviour with no way for users to protect themselves.

est• 2 years ago

key takeaway:

Komodia was founded by Barak Weichselbaum, a former programmer for Israel's IDF Intelligence Core

throwaway484767• 2 years ago

Ctrl+f "CAMM" 0 results

Guess not

happymellon7• 2 years ago

Amazon.com/s?k=camm+memory

0 results

Sounds pointless.

throwaway484767• 2 years ago

LPDDR will never come in SODIMM. Hardly pointless.

gradstudent• 2 years ago

Still no left-and-right charge ports. Why Lenovo, why is this so hard?

KeplerBoy• 2 years ago

Because it would add multiple dollars to the BoM.

squarefoot• 2 years ago

And traditional docking stations, I mean the ones you snap the laptop on. I find them incredibly useful with my older thinkpads, and they solve the problem brilliantly.

aragilar• 2 years ago

Can I have replaceable 95WHr of battery as there was previously?

MattPalmer1086• 2 years ago

I guess it's nice that it may be easier to repair, but Thinkpads have always been reasonably repairable, even if a bit fiddly. They also last a long time in my experience (current one is at 8 years old, same as the last one I had).

pjmlp2• 2 years ago

As usual "these new laptops are designed to optimally run Windows 11 and are poised to elevate productivity and streamline professional tasks."

Although apparently they are "Windows 11 Pro, Linux certified", so lets see.

At least we get our RAM, battery and harddisks components back.

PennRobotics5• 2 years ago

Don't forget to put the Wi-Fi card back in a slot!

I didn't want this stupid, buggy Qualcomm Wi-Fi adapter in my AMD ThinkPad (probably one major cause of 6.7.x suspend hanging) and wanted to switch it out with an AX210, but I can't because it's soldered on.

28304283409234• 2 years ago

I just hope they upgrade their 1992 speakers to something useable.

PennRobotics5• 2 years ago

Oh, and stop leaving the EQ/optimization to drivers or Dolby Access. Those don't make it into Linux.

reportgunner2• 2 years ago

Just buy an old thinkpad not whatever this is.

opengears2• 2 years ago

To be fair, I have a T430, but we need modern alternatives for 2024 and beyond. Personally I want to see a laptop with AMD CPU, AMD dGPU and Thunderbolt 4 ports.

reportgunner2• 2 years ago

I use a x201 and a T430 fine in 2024. Your modern alternative is to get a macbook

holri• 2 years ago

Does it run completely with free software without binary blobs? Any advancements in this regard? This is very important for sustainability in the long run.

ykonstant• 2 years ago

I had my department at the time buy me a P53 against their wishes; they wanted to get me a Dell workstation, since they had a partnership with Dell which included fast repair service etc.

I thought the P53 was the most reliable high end laptop I could get and was supposed to have an amazing keyboard. Instead, the keyboard was average at best and the trackpoint much worse than my older Dell workstation. Then, it was one hardware/firmware problem after another, until a small water spill put the cherry on top: wrecked performance and now it cannot boot if not plugged in.

Once upon a time, Thinkpads had great, water-resistant keyboards and a solid build with reliable ports, but now this has become a fairy tale. The article does not really address any of this. I am never buying a Thinkpad again, although I really don't know what my options are :( I hear Dell is tanking the quality of their high-end workstations too.

Gud• 2 years ago

My X1 gen 6 carbon has a broken USB charging port, which I could live with, but today the thunderbolt port also broke. Battery is also dead.

disqard• 2 years ago

"[...] are AI PCs ready to take AI workflows to the next level"

Every single thing has to be rubber-stamped with the magic word.

Part of me is sick of it, but another part of me is happy -- once it's overused enough to make everyone sick of it, it'll become an "avoid" word (e.g. we're starting to see this with "blockchain"), and then it'll go away.

j_h_o• 2 years ago

I'm frustrated with my T14s Gen 3 AMD/P14s Gen 3 AMD -- the LCD panel is attached with tape[1] (!!) and my LCD panel has slipped down a few times. I dislike single-use adhesives. I wish for them to go back to screwing in the panel into the lid.

[1] https://download.lenovo.com/pccbbs/mobiles_pdf/t14s_gen3_x13... page 101 (labelled page 95)

Lenovo announced ThinkPads for 'better sustainability and extended repairabilty'

Related Stories