(Urgent) Help in Wellington please!

Is there anyone here who lives in Wellington and would be prepared to pick
up a (faulty) laptop from Turners auctions and post it to me for a small
consideration?

Unfortunately the auction finishes in two hours! It'd be great to hear back
from anyone who could help. (I have a T60 with a faulty motherboard so am
looking for a 'parts collection' and had just about given up - hence the
short notice - I only just saw it.) :-/

Cheers.
Shaun.

 

Damn! Just checked the type lookup and it's a short-screen model so no good
to me.

Thanks anyway folks.
--
/Shaun.

"Humans will have advanced a long, long, way when religious belief has a
cozy little classification in the DSM."
David Melville (in r.a.s.f1)
[Sent from my OrbitalT ocular implant interface.]

 

Well! After not seeing a T60 for parts going for a reasonable price on TM
for weeks I'm pleased I looked in tonight.

I just bought http://www.trademe.co.nz/Browse/Listing.aspx?id=627212737 and
am very happy with it. Again, I noticed it late so I was flustered and
forgot to tick the "Autobid' box - so maybe spent a few bucks more than I
needed to.

I'm looking forward to getting it - I'll finally be able to replace the
motherboard in the excellent 15" FlexView T60 I have that has a bad ethernet
chip - and have a bunch of spare parts to boot.

Yay!
--
/Shaun.

"Humans will have advanced a long, long, way when religious belief has a
cozy little classification in the DSM."
David Melville (in r.a.s.f1)
[Sent from my OrbitalT ocular implant interface.]

 

Congrats, T60s are too good to throw away. I bought one a couple of
years ago after seeing your prolific praise of them here

It's still going well and it feels more solid than any other laptop
I've ever used. Do you know if the new models are still of the same
quality?

 

Thanks. I kept a spare (15") and I recently let a very good mate have it.
Consequently I needed to replace it but the machine I bought to do the job
has a damaged ethernet chip - but is otherwise in excellent condition. So I
needed a motherboard replacement and I have my fingers crossed that the one
linked to above is a good one.

They're great aren't they? I have two now - a 15" that I've upgraded to a
UXGA screen as my main machine, in a dock on my desk. The other is a 14"
SXGA+ that I use when I'm too sore to sit at my desk for long. (I used to
use an X32 as my 'mobile machine' but alas, it's only 1024 x 768 pixels and
that's just not enough for using for any length of time.)

They're not. Some of the Lenovo ThinkPads are not too bad but some are just
crap. I've had an R61 and an R500 and couldn't get rid of them quickly
enough despite them both being newer and more powerful. Some of the later T
series are OK I'm told, just not as good as the T60.

The T60 was the last machine made that was still largely IBM designed. Even
though Lenovo had taken over by then IBM left some of their guys there for a
few years to ease them into it. The T60 was the last machine that *they* had
the last say with when it came to design and features. From there on they're
purely Lenovo and there's no way they can be as good.

IBM was losing money on it's ThinkPad operation (despite the large premium
you had to pay to own one), that's why they sold it to Lenovo. Therefore it
stands to reason Lenovo isn't making the latops as well as IBM did. Still, a
well-spec'ed T60 should still be powerful enough for a few years yet.

Cheers,
--
/Shaun.

"Humans will have advanced a long, long, way when religious belief has a
cozy little classification in the DSM."
David Melville (in r.a.s.f1)
[Sent from my OrbitalT ocular implant interface.]

 

Yeah, mine will be good for a while yet.

The new commercial line of HP laptops seem to be OK quality, we've got
a couple at work, but they just don't have the same solid feel as the
T60.

 

Yep, most of the hard-core ThinkPad guys on forums.thinkpad say that the
future of high-quality laptops seems to be Dell's business range, that
Lenovo have lost the plot.

I hear what you say about that solid feel though. I think that, for some
reason these days everyone wants everything to be small and (especially)
light. When something's really light it just doesn't feel as.... formidable
as a T4x or T60 ThinkPad does.

Cheers,
--
/Shaun.

"Humans will have advanced a long, long, way when religious belief has a
cozy little classification in the DSM."
David Melville (in r.a.s.f1)
[Sent from my OrbitalT ocular implant interface.]

 

Hmmm.... I think it was Dell that was mentioned in a thread I read there.
Perhaps I was wrong. I might see if I can find it again....

Cheers,
--
/Shaun.

"Humans will have advanced a long, long, way when religious belief has a
cozy little classification in the DSM."
David Melville (in r.a.s.f1)
[Sent from my OrbitalT ocular implant interface.]

 

I read on a forum today that the T60 has a better screen and stronger
case, but you can fit the mobo from a T61 into a T60 and get the best
of both. Don't know if I would want to go to that much effort though.

 

There's a catch to that though - the only T61 mobo that will fit into a T60
chassis is from a (very rare) 14.1" 4:3 T61 - and then there's a bit of
Dremel work to do. As by far most of the T61s are short-screen it can be
very hard to find a 4:3 T61. I know, I've been looking.

(The advantages are the T61 can take more RAM (8GB compared with the T60s
3GB) and a newer, faster CPU - but not by much.)
--
/Shaun.

"Humans will have advanced a long, long, way when religious belief has a
cozy little classification in the DSM."
David Melville (in r.a.s.f1)
[Sent from my OrbitalT ocular implant interface.]

 

That sounds like a sweet screen. Was it a PITA to find and fit? One of the
biggest reasons the TP crowd value the T60 so much is it was the *last* TP
that had an IPS screen factory-fitted. Lenovo never fitted an IPS screen to
a T61/p.

(There's a hugely long thread on the Lenovo forums about it - going back
years. Lenovo's stand was that they couldn't get at least two suppliers to
provide IPS screens for the T61 so they wouldn't offer them. Company policy
is that they won't fit any third-party item to a ThinkPad if there is only
one supplier of it. Otherwise if the supply company goes toes-up - or
decides to charge heaps more, then Lenovo are in the shit. The thread went
on for years with several posts by Lenovo representitives.)

I have an R61 here that a friend left me when he 'upgraded' to (my spare)
T60 UXGA IPS. The R61 has a hi-res short-screen and I get a headache when I
use it for more than an hour. Doing a clean install of Windows was terrible!

Yeah, they got progressively worse - it was all downhill from the T60
(unless you are prepared to 'FrankenPad' your T61. <g>).

Speaking of - I have an LED backlit UXGA 15" IPS screen sitting in customs
in Wellington. My mate who left the R61 and took my hi-specced T60 sent me a
'care package' when he got back to NYC. To replace my spare T60 he sent me a
screen he got from a forum member (TuuS) who wouldn't ship outside the US.
(Theory being I can sell the R61, get a standard T60 for the same money then
upgrade it to UXGA using the screen.) He also threw in a second set of
sheets for my spare bed as cushioning (it was a hassle washing and drying
the one set when he was staying here) and a few other odds and ends....

Now NZ Customs want me to pay over $120 GST and import duty before they'll
release it! They're even charging me GST on the US$80 it cost him to send
it! I'm going to call them later and see what can be sorted out as I don't
have the money. :-(
--
/Shaun.

"Humans will have advanced a long, long, way when religious belief has a
cozy little classification in the DSM."
David Melville (in r.a.s.f1)
[Sent from my OrbitalT ocular implant interface.]

 

Yes I read that somewhere else too. They don't make it easy do they?
You'd think they would have used the same mobo in all the T61 models.

I want to use 64-bit Linux, so I could use the extra RAM as well as
needing the better CPU. No rush though, the T60 will do me for the
meantime.

 

What a bugger! Best of luck sorting that out. What happens if you
don't pay them, do they auction it off? You might get your parcel for
five bucks if you put in a bid

 

That's a pretty good resolution. I doubt my eyes could handle it on a
screen that size though.

 

Thanks for the luck. I have no idea what would happen if I couldn't pay -
likely as you say, it would be auctioned off.

After 25 minutes on hold (0800 number thank the gods) I spoke to a guy and
explained to him that a friend from NYC had visited last month (I asked him
if he wanted the arrival and departure details as he could probably check -
he declined). Anyway, I said that I'm broke, a long-time invalid and, on his
return to NY my friend put together a 'care package' for me (true).

He asked me 'did I ask him for those specific things or did he pick them out
for me?'. I told him that he had a fair idea of what I'd like after spending
a month here (also true) and that I didn't ask him to send them to me
(again, true).

The customs guy said, OK, hang on then, let me do a few calculations.... and
I waited nearly 10 minutes while he clattered away on a keyboard - coughing
straight into the microphone at one point. Then he said that he'd send it on
to me, I wouldn't have to pay anything. Apparently there's a $110 dollar
'gift allowance' on duty and GST on stuff coming into the country - they
only collect if, after that's taken into account, the remainder is over $60.
(Any less and it's not worth the man-hours put into calculating and prinint
up forms etc. to collect.)

He said that, strictly speaking, as the calcs and mailing had already been
done in this case he should charge me the remaining $10 - but he'd write it
off and send the parcel on it's way. I haven't heard back from my friend but
I think he neglected to write 'gift' on the customs form - maybe.... I'll
find out either when he emails back or it gets here. Perhaps the fact that
he declared it as 'computer screen and parts' over-rode a 'gift'
declaration. (Maybe people are getting wise and having 'gift' written on
forms to bypass paying? Just speculation...)

Anyway the upshot is I won't have to put *another* charge on my credit card.
<phew> As it is I have a third party car insurance premium due next month
that will have to go 'on the plastic'.

Cheers,
--
/Shaun.

"Humans will have advanced a long, long, way when religious belief has a
cozy little classification in the DSM."
David Melville (in r.a.s.f1)
[Sent from my OrbitalT ocular implant interface.]

 

Well that was a lucky break. Good to know there are some govt
employees who go out of their way to help.

 

Fair enough. I hope you got it sorted.