Lenovo ThinkPad T60p April 17th, 2007 | by Jason Tomczak
Full Review
Features and Design Intel Powerhouse Crazy 4GB RAM Capacity Ports, Jacks, Nooks and Crannies Sturdy Construction Battery Life
The Lenovo ThinkPad T60p is a sleek, professional looking laptop that doesn't skimp on features. Usually reserved for strict business use, this particular ThinkPad is endowed with enough power and grace to find its way into mainstream use, even for creative applications. Inside and out, the T60p has a lot to offer.
Widescreen Goodness
The lower-spec T60p comes with a 4:3 aspect 14.1" screen so common to laptops of yesteryear. The real beauty of the T60p comes out when it's equipped with the optional WSXGA+ 15.4" widescreen LCD screen. The 16:9 widescreen ratio is perfect for movies and HD recordings, not to mention wide-format spreadsheets, room for designing 11"x17" marketing collateral, etc. In today’s age, laptops not sporting a widescreen LCD are less conducive to productivity and, let's face it, they're terribly uncool.
The T60p's 15.4" widescreen supports a native resolution of 1680x1050 pixels. That's the top standard for 15" laptops. Even the 15" MacBook Pro comes with a limiting 1440x900 screen res. One debatable downside is the lack of a glossy screen. I'm sure some people will gag at the idea of a glossy ThinkPad, but an equal or greater number may appreciate it.
Like many laptops on the market these days, the T60p comes with several processor configurations, depending on how much power you need and how much money you want to spend. The base level processor is the 2.0GHz Intel Core Duo. Also available are the 2.16GHz and 2.33GHz Core Duos. The next step up gives users the extra speed and efficiency of Intel's Core 2 Duo processors, specifically the 2.0GHz, 2.16GHz and 2.33GHz Core 2 Duo. If you can afford the 2.33GHz Core 2 Duo processor, Digital Trends highly recommends that you do so. Each of the Core 2 Duo processors are known to be much faster, more efficient and significantly cooler-running than their Core Duo counterparts.
One of the most impressive and desirable aspects of the T60p is the fact that RAM can be upgraded as high as 4GB! The Intel 945GM and 945PM chipsets found in varying models of the T60p allow for four whole gigabytes of lightning-fast PC2-5300 667MHz RAM. Intel and Lenovo earn major points for this drool-worthy spec.
The T60p has plenty of connections and ports for peripherals. On the right side of the laptop, there are two USB 2.0 ports and the DVD-RW/CD-RW drive. On the front bezel, there's only one button - the wireless radio switch. The infrared port is cleverly hidden in the front bezel. On the left side, there's a port for VGA-out, a dial-up modem for ye olde school connections, a gigabit ethernet (LAN) port, 1/8" audio in and audio out jacks, a single USB 2.0 port and a twin-height bay that accepts one 54mm ExpressCard and one PC Card (PCMCIA). The power cable plugs in to the back of the laptop, and the bottom of the T60p reveals a port for connecting to a docking station. One thing that seems to be missing is Firewire support. Not a single 4-pin or 6-pin FireWire port. Woops. 
The Left Side of the T60p
The Lenovo T60p laptop is a solid, well-constructed business laptop. With the world full of poorly built electronics that might break if breathed upon too hard, it's nice to know that this Lenovo has some backbone. Of course, the more substantial construction means added weight. The T60p weighs in at 5 lbs. 2 oz. without the battery and 6 lbs. 4 oz. with the battery. Compare this to a 15" MacBook Pro that weighs 5 lbs. 10 oz. with the battery. The difference is 10 oz. or .625 lbs. This might not seem like a lot on paper, but one's shoulder certainly begins to feel the extra weight when carried for a long time. On the upside, carrying an extra half-pound will help you burn a few more calories throughout the day. 
Lenovo ThinkPad T60p
Lenovo claims that the 15.4" T60p should get upwards of 6 hours of battery life starting from a full charge on the 6-cell battery. 9-cell batteries are supposed to provide upwards of 9 hours, and using the 9-cell battery together with a drive bay battery should give upwards of 11.5 hours. Maybe if you're running DOS.
In my tests (using a 9-cell battery), I found that the T60p gets good battery life (about 4 hours), but this is nowhere near the Lenovo spec. The only way I was able to coax more uptime from the T60p was to dim the screen way down and prevent use of the CD/DVD drive. So long as data is pulled from or saved to the hard drive and not an external device, the T60p gets much better battery life. For a sturdy, higher-performance 15.4" laptop, this is understandable and entirely expected. Turning off the wireless modem also saves a little battery life. The 9-hour claim for a 9-cell battery seems really far-fetched, even for obviously biased marketing material.
In short, if you're looking for a laptop that will run full-tilt on battery for the duration of a cross-country flight, and if this is your primary concern, you're looking at the wrong type of laptop. You may want to check out some of the X-series ultra-portables made by Lenovo. 
Lenovo ThinkPad T60p
by STeve Andre' on November 8, 2009:
“I've had my T60p for about three months now and love it. Very well built, something that most laptops seem to be lacking, these days. Lenovo is doing an excellent job of continuing on IBM's tradition of making great laptops. The T60p may be...” More...