What makes a good laptop? Unknowingly I've been asking myself that question for years. I wasn't looking for a definitive answer; I wasn't making notes; But I was trying out different laptops in the hopes to find the one that is right for me. The bost one. I think I've found an answer. And a surprisingly specific one.
Of course a good battery, a good screen, good speakers, and almost every detail about a laptop can be considered important in some situation or another. But when it comes down to it, what I've made out to be most important to me is: A good keyboard (whatever that means), reliability, endurance (also when in a dirty or dusty envirement) and repairability. Although I'm not sure whether the last one should be on that list. When a laptop of mine becomes unusable because something breaks, I tend to replace it because I want to try somethin new, anyway. I've tried an ultrabook for a while. It's fancy, but not important to me. I've tried a powerful one in the style of a Macbook Pro and didn't like that any more than the original. I had a fable for small netbooks for a while, subnotebooks and mini notebooks as well as some modern PDAs, and still think they're all great for certain use cases. But that's not what I want as an everyday laptop. I didn't seriously try gaming notebooks or those cheap, sleek discounter laptops (because why would I?) or a workstation laptop. I don't need that power on the go. When I need that power, I use a stationary machine. After a while, I stopped looking at new laptops or ones that were released in the last 10 years when I had the intention to buy one.
15 Years Or Older
One reason why I focus on older laptops is the keyboard. No new laptop has a keyboard with a good typing experience, keys with 1.5 mm of travel space or more. Newer laptops seem to be designed to be as thin as possible above all. That is a feature with almost no use. But what I consider a good keyboard is sacrificed to design guidelines. There are good business laptops from the 2010s with a Core2 Duo CPU or newer, with 4 or 8 GB of RAM, that are still fast enough for most everyday tasks. That's what I'm using right now and what I've used for a while. The displays are at best what I consider the minimum that allows me to use it for hours from different angles without getting annoyed. But that's good enough. No 4k screen. No reason to play h365 4k video files. So I don't usually notice that that's something that isn't possible with a Core2 Duo and old intel graphics chip anyway. Speakers also tend to be worse in older laptops. But even with modern ones with good speakers, if I want to enjoy the sound or want good bass or mix the profile myself or need volume, I rely on external speakers or headphones anyway. So there's not much of a difference. Batteries don't last as long on older laptops. But they are replacable in seconds and cheap to buy. So that's a plus for older laptops in my view. 15 to 18 year old laptops are thick and heavy compared to what's become normal. But not so much that it would be a problem to cary them all day, fit them in a bag or handle them with two hands and no table.
ThinkPad Legend
So, after hearing so many good things from so many people and having experienced something from every category I've decided to try ThinkPads for myself. Two T400s with different configuration, a T420, then an X201 that I got for free from a nice person who wanted to throw it away simply because of its age. I must admit I got hooked on the ThinkPad fan train for a bit. Those are very very good machines after all. I enjoy the price (used ThinkPads are everywhere and everybody wants to sell loads of them), the build quality, design and that's it. T4xx are good business laptops among quality good business laptops from other manufacturers. There are many, many small things that make uo the ThinkPad experience of the 2010s and earlier. I appreciate the status lights, middle mouse key, track point, separate function and multimedia keys, sleek docking station and easy to open screen cover lock. But they haven't become too important to my daily life. Those details were even more plenty in even older ThinkPads (and comparible laptops, I want to say. But there weren't really many comparible machines.). IBM ThinkPads were also definitely among those with really good keyboards. I like the clickery keys in old laptops better than more modern ones. But I don't consider laptops with CPUs older than Core2 Duos as viable options for everyday machines anymore. Everyday tasks for me include playing videos embedded in web pages and editing raster images as well as vector graphics. Core2 Duos with 4 GB or more RAM work fine. Everything older than that is for retro computing tinkering tasks.
Business Machines With Good Reputation
There are other laptops from the same time to be considered. Those in the business line of HP and Dell. In my experience and personal opinion, HP EliteBooks (as well as some HP Compaq laptops) provide a superior keyboard to those of T400s, but lack some other desireable features that you can trust to find in any old ThinkPad. And Dell Latitudes tend to be reliable and withstand my lifestyle better than ThinkPads from the same period but the keyboard experience varies. Dells come in rugged variants, but more important is that they, according to my experience, handle dust and other dirt better than their competitors. EliteBook keyboards make better use of the available surface area that a 14 or 15 inch screen gives the lower half of the device. The keys are spread out more, arrow keys aren't burried in the rest, insert, home, end and paging keys get their own row to the right. A unique layout, but not stranger than that of other laptop keyboards. A new Latitude keyboard feels much nicer than an EliteBook or ThinkPad keyboard. The keys are springy. When abused for years, they become as good as their competitors, then whimpy and stale. ThinkPad and keys stop working when they meet dust and keys break when cuttings or hard dirt gets under the caps. EliteBook keys just watch and wait to be cleaned. Either are good devices. But considering that both Latitudes and EliteBooks cost 50~70% more than comparible Thinkpads, it's easy to let the choice fall back to the brand with the best reputation: ThinkPad. Surprisingly (to me) that is, in the end, ThinkPads biggest advantage.
To be continued in another entry…