A look at the ThinkPad T480
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- Опубликовано: 26 сен 2024
- Hello everyone! Here is my long-awaited video about the ThinkPad T480, a laptop that to many represents the end of an era for ThinkPads. In this video I'll be giving some of my thoughts about it, discussing some of the biggest pros and cons of the machine, and seeing how it stacks up against one of my favorite classic ThinkPads. Hope you guys enjoy, and thanks for watching!
I love how "last thinkpad" ranges from T43 to t480
The “Last” thinkpad is the last model under “IBM”
@@mashy712 So T60 then xD ? Even if it has been made by lenovo x) ?
@@Raphaelwelingston But I think Lenovo were the ones making the laptops for IBM even before IBM decided to sell their computers/laptops to them, kind of like how FOXCONN makes the PlayStation for Sony.
@@robertvuitton Good question ! I don't know the answer frankly ! So if you have any clue, it might be interresting !
@@robertvuitton The last model made by IBM was the 600X. They used to have a plant in Mexico and Ireland(?). All T/A/X/i series were outsourced. I believe the i Series, and maybe the 390, were the first models outsourced. I think the 570 was still IBM-made, but not positive about that. I don't know who actually made the T/A/X/i models, though.
I just bought a T480 in 2022 with the i5-8350u, 16GB RAM and 512GB SSD. Honestly, I couldn't complain about anything. Laptop has been good, hasn't experienced any lags with it. And upgrading some parts of it feels satisfying. Anyone who ever uses a Thinkpad should learn how to service and upgrade it themselves, because it's super easy (and satisfying).
It's like a mini desktop because of how upgradeable it is.
Things on the T480 that you can upgrade on your own:
- Screen (to WQHD, full HD 400 nits etc)
- The stock trackpad to a glass trackpad
- Keyboard to a backlit one if yours isn't
- 72Wh battery which is hot swappable with the current 24 Wh
- The plastic lid to magnesium lid
- Buy up to 64GBs of RAM
- Dual SSD using the LTE slot (useful when dual booting multiple OS)
Those are the upgrades I know, but who knows if there are other ways to upgrade it.
Very nice review. My T480 is on it's way to my home.
Wow nice ....I have a T740s I7 256GB I got for pics browsing and some snes retro games. How long do these laptops last ?
would you recommend the t480 over the 480s?
Did you buy it from Amazon?? Pls reply
@@mohamedaminerai7132Did you pick one sir?
The problem is that most electronics these days are made less and less serviceable and upgradable and in case of failure they just end up in landfills, since repairing them is nearly impossible. It's a great way to create e-waste, but this mentality has spread in most manufactured goods - from small appliances to cars.
But the T480 will be on my radar if my X230 ever gives up.
ur x230 will never give up...these laptops are immortal my friend...they dont build these anymore unfortunetly
That's how they make money
my P1 is a new laptop with beautiful serviceability for its size
X1 Extreme, P1 Gen 2, P53/P73 all have none soldered Ram.
P15/P17 are coming with removable Video card. I guess serviceability is now comes at premium price...
Yeah there should be some worldwide regulation to prevent such damage to our environment or wallet
Certified Lenovo Tech here, the one that rarely made it to my bench for repairs was the t420. It was a solid performer with sometimes a thermal paste issue, but not much more than that.
Hey good to hear that.. I am looking for uses Thinkpads.. pls suggest a good model that is still competent, not too expensive (may be around 300$), but still can be configured and specs bumped up in future?? I liked the T430 but I was told I need to think a bit newer model since it will be upgradable.
I loved my t420 and x220
Sandy bridge still ran pretty hot but it was still better than the t410s
@@sudo3870 Ya true that. upgrading old laptops are always a risk. but in general TPs tend to run for many years without any issues unlike any of the new gen laptops which are fragile and slow down in just 2 years
that was my second thinkpad :D it was A HUGE UPGRADE to the first T410 that i had... it felt so snappy with an ssd... it felt like a normal pc while webbrowsing and stuff...
now rocking a t460p... the most nice thing is the upgrade in GPU performance, wich makes it more usuabla for my needs (light video editing, even some more demanding software and effects works no problem
t420 was so lovely though... loft how sturdy it felt... still more than usable in 2023 for basic stuff
@@thiruvetti if you love what you do it doesnt matter... and if something breaks, get a second laptop for spare parts? i dont know... so many parts out there
There's an old saying "if it ain't broke don't fix it". Listen Lenovo
Nokia and Motorala listened and they are all DEAD. Companys sure dont seem to want to hire people like u who like to manage companys by "old says".
@@niuchajianfa6222 Nokia and Motorola died not because of old sayings, but rather because they threw buckets of money into developing their own version and failing. It was entirely possible for Nokia to survive with their camera quality as a selling point, but Nokia went with Windows phone and died while Android existed long before the Windows phone initiative. What worked back then was Android and Nokia just didn't listen.
@@niuchajianfa6222 Nokia and Motorola "died" because they dismissed the iPhone as a fad.
@@Kikker861 While Windows Phone was newer than Android, it has its origins in Windows Mobile, which was a form of CE. Microsoft were involved in the portable computer market long before Google. Even Apple were a couple of years before Microsoft with the Newton.
@@niuchajianfa6222 Guess who builds motorola phones nowadays. (lenovo)
Just bought a T480 in March of 2024 and it was the first ThinkPad in a while since I had traded my T400. I felt at home again when I first booted it up, there's something about a ThinkPad that sets it aside from other windows laptops. The build quality, upgradability and of course the track point nub which I prefer over the track pad. My father daily drove a T430 for years for work and that was where the obsession began.
I absolutely LOVE my T480 and have upgraded it significantly. Two upgrades addressing points you raised are A. getting a glass trackpad from an X1 Extreme, and B. Getting a dual heat-pipe cooler, allowing the CPU to stay cooler and achieve higher frequencies for longer.
I do agree that having charging ports not soldered to the board is a good idea, but to me that is the ONLY downside to the T480. With the updated thunderbolt firmware apparently fixing the bug, it is unfortunate that happened and Lenovo should repair any units, but it is no longer an issue.
Full list of my mods and upgrades:
Glass Trackpad from X1 Extreme
LowPower FHD Display from T490 (Part number N140HCG-GQ2 Rev.B1)
72wh external battery
2x8gb DDR4
1tb 2.5inch Sata SSD
Intel AX200 Wifi 6
Patch WWAN antennas installed
HP branded Cat 9 LTE Modem installed (Same part as Lenovo part, but $30 instead of $150)
Dual heat-pipe cooler (for DGPU models)
Modded BIOS to remove WWAN Whitelist
I suggest to buy a type c magnetic adapter, so U wont risk to break USB c ports
Thats nice. Im planning on getting one myself. and thankfully most of the problems are already resolved
Hey! That is great. Do you have any blogpost on those upgrades for DIYers ?
I realise this is a very old comment, but do you happen to know where you found this BIOS? Wouldn't mind modding mine..
You're a G for this upgrade list i know what im getting next, my X1 carbon just doesnt have the ports to do the work i wanna do
I loved the ThiccPad. It reminds me the happier golden age of the internet.
I got a P1 gen1 through my uni. Best machine I could have asked for. ram not soldered, 2 nvme slots, full size sd, 80wh battery, everything is rather easy to replace. and its so light and thin its amazing.
I have x1 extreme gen 2. I’m highly considering buying the P1 this Black Friday though.
I found a great deal on one, had some issues with fast bootup which caused instability. But now I love it, the 100% srgb screen is amazing as well as the performance
Hey Seb, I just wanted to let you know that I modded my t440 with a t450 trackpad and my t430 with an I7-3632qm, dual heatpipe fan, Artic Mx4 paste, 500gb ssd and 2x8gb DDR3L ram for a total (including the machine) of roughly 300$ CAD. I bought an Asus with the 3632qm for 100$, sold some of the parts, which greatly brought my cost down.
I've been using an i7 X230 for all my remote work throughout quarantine and it's great
Using windows or linux?
@@ovidioe.cabeza4750 windows
I got a T480s just a couple months ago. I’m really loving it! Currently running Linux mint and running my web design business on it. I’ll have 50+ tabs open on firefox and it just keeps truckin.
I even edited a few (simple) videos on it and it handled better then my old dell.
16gb of ram and 156gb SSD currently.
With mt current laptop Dell Lattitude E5330. I have such a hard time with Photoshop being so slow. As well as Logitech webcam sync. Forget about the software that helps edit the video for upload to youyube. Is T480 up to the task/speed( if I add in extra memory)?
@@cpan2552 I can't really say because I'm using Linux which runs leaner than Windows would. Which you would need if you want to continue using Photoshop. I actually recently switched over to a Mac Mini with the new M1 and man it's freaking game changing fast.
@@Svaren I got me an MSI gaming laptop. It is fast. No problem we're with photoshop or editting. What a difference $1400 makes!
@@cpan2552 My goodness, I'm editing full HD on a T400 with 30 mins of video rendering in just over 2 hours. On Linux Kdenlive in 4GB RAM. And its snappy, too. Mind you, T9900 processor of course, yet anything above 2.4Ghz is ok.
@@saraofnorthwales what is your secret i want to do video editing full HD and iam afraid that the t430 wouldnt be enough powerfull
I bought a refurbished t460 about a year ago and your videos have me wishing I went for either a t480 or an older model + upgrades! That said, I'm happy with the computer I bought and the retailer upgraded the specs during the refurbishing to 16 GB ram and a 500 GB SSD.
As long as you're happy with the T460, that's what matters! It's still a very good machine.
i got a 460 also cause i didnt know much when i bought it. works well enough for under 200 dollars
Its really sad, that the charging port is not a separate part. It hurts the survivability of the laptop so much! Ive changed charge ports on so many thinkpads, giving them the chance to live even longer.
Doesn't surprise me cause Lenovo wants the unit to fail. Then they will get the repair money to fix it. There is no more user serviceable products anywhere anymore. It sucks.
I agree it was the worst design decision of this range. It could and should have been on a daughter board which would have made it much more repairable
it's pretty weird, too. I was always under the impression that Thinkpads were built to last like 10 years easily.
Its 2020 bro, micro soldering is a thing now, fairly cheap
Anyone knows why Lenovo now has soldered RAM in almost all their models ???
What is the objective ??? Is to prevent repair in case of failure or is to impede upgrades???
Those laptops with soldered RAM do they have the DIMM slots also or they don't???
Any input appreciated
Bought my W520 in 2012, still using it today (upgraded hdd in 2014, left speaker cable were having contact prob, but it was a easy fix). I think 20/30 era were really the greatest.
I initially didn't fully understand why many people praised the Thinkpad so much, but after watching your videos on them, I finally decided to take the plunge.
Last month, after some research and money savings, I decided to purchase a T480 to replace my 2011 Toshiba Satellite with a broken keyboard connector(repaired with a note card piece by yours truly). After some searching I landed on one with an i5-8250U, 1080p IPS display model with no SSD or RAM for about $150. Put 16GB of ram in, a 256GB SSD, updated the firmware to fix the weird thunderbolt bug, and I love it. Getting it open was scary, but after opening it swapping parts was incredibly easy. It's quiet, fast, surprisingly thin, rugged, has great IO, good battery life even if the external battery is dead, and while I didn't really like the keyboard initially, it's really grown on me. Thank you Sebi, and the Thinkpad & Linux community for showing me the light :)
Welcome to the club! Glad you're happy with your purchase!
At my work I've owned, T420, T440, T470, and T490s (now) . My favorite T420 the real tough laptop. I work at a mining cooper, 4500 masl, 20C below zero in winter.
I bought my T480 with MX150 about 6 month ago and I did notice it is somewhat challenging to cool this laptop. I used an utility to run the fan at max all the time, as the fan is quieter than my ambient noise level even at full speed.
I also used much better thermal grease from Cooler Master, which did help a few degrees. What I finally did was to cut open the grills of the case around the fan blades to let the fan suck in more air. I did purchase a complete new bottom case (they call it D shell, same name convention as A, B, C pillars in cars), so in case I need to return it back to original condition, I can do that too.
So far it's been working great for me, I can't really go back to the older ThinkPads for daily use anymore, due to the significantly better graphics performance of MX150. Which completely steamrolled W541's Quadro graphics card.
My fan runs full tilt just on charge and running something like chrome.
@@williamsquibb5249 replace thermal paste with high grade ones, and carefully clean out all dust and dirt from the fan and heatsink when you have it out. It will make a huge difference.
Almost 3 years with my T480 and still going strong. Think it can go for another 3 years.
I bet it will last even 9 )
as someone who mainly uses a t480 for my personal work i'd say it's a decent laptop for the price. Here are a few of my thoughts:
- The build quality is very sturdy and the laptop is very rigid. Good keyboard and trackpad.
- The display is very ugly in my opinion, despite being 1080p it is very whitewashed with poor contrast. It is really the biggest weakness of the laptop in my opinion, makes everything unpleasing to look at. Every other laptop i've used in the last 7 years has had a more pleasing display with better colors, even if it had lower resolution.
- Stock performance is ok. I am a linux user and after using the laptop with ubuntu i would often cap out the RAM doing web development work. (running mongodb, nodejs backend server and react server as well as a few chrome tabs would put me at 8 gigs). Using the laptop with ubuntu for about half a year it became very slow, but after making a fresh install with a new linux distro it became relatively fast again. Overall it's passable.
- It would be nice if lenovo supported drivers or at least open sourced their windows ones for the fingerprint sensor, because on linux it is basically a place holder. But thats a lot to ask for.
Overall its a decent little machine, very reliable and discrete.
I'm still using my X220 for a laptop dedicated to my hobby research/education (Fish keeping)
I've been using ThinkPad's for work since 2010 and my personal favorite model is the T480. I liked it so much I bought one for personal use and got a great deal on it. I'm not knocking the older models because I've had a great experience with them too. I was particularly fond of my T430 before it was upgraded by my IT department.
Extremely well made and informative video. From a fellow diehard ThinkPad fan, thank you
Thanks for this very informative video. I've been using a T420 for a few years and it has served me well. I've heard some horror stories about newer models so have not felt the urge to upgrade. The only slight niggle is that the webcam stopped working about two years ago after a windows update, I've tried several 'fixes' since then, none of which work. This seems to be a common problem. One thing I like about the older machines is that they have a cd/dvd drive. I will likely upgrade to the T480 when the time comes.
I'm using a T420 as a poor man's server on our home LAN. I replaced the main HDD with an SSD and stuck a multi TB drive in the CD slot. In addition to the T420 both my wife and I have T520 laptop. Not cool and sexy like modern ultra thin laptops but we like them.
Always wanted one, now I am receiving a T450 as a hand-me-down for free, super looking forward to it. Seems like it's a decent step in-between T430 and T480. The replaceable power connector is a huge deal for me especially that I can simply get a USB-C adapter that should work with any 65-100w charging brick anyway.
Censored to prevent a comment war over how much thermal paste I should use, hahahaha, I remember when LGR did the same thing hahahah
7:50 THAT is how keyboard should look like: multimedia keys for volume, mute, microphone, rows above Fs.... oh man
Thank you for the 22-minute review. Enjoyed every minute of it. Looking forward to your future video about T480.
T430 is the perfect machine. I am Using it since 2016, bought it used, it's the best notebook ever. Easy to repair, lots or parts available online.
It's perfect as long as you swap the keyboard with a T420 keyboard.
Great and thorough video explanation the evolution of the T series in the 2010's.
I'm about to get a refurbed T480 for about 260 bucks. My last ThinkPad was a T61.
I hope you enjoy it!
@@SebisRandomTech i am confused. there are 2 hard drives? So If i want to install the 2.5 sata ssd with windows 10 pro would I also have to change that m2 hard drive?
@@narcissistinjurygiver2932 There is a 2.5" drive bay on the T480 that, depending on the configuration when it was built. comes with a 2.5" SATA hard drive or a bracket and a 2282 NVMe SSD. Either or.
Bravo. That was a nice review. You even bring up the problems like the Thunderbolt.
I still prefer the T430/T530.
The T480 is expensive in Canada even used.
Expect to price to drop once the 3 year lease goes up for businesses
For me, the W-series is the way to go. Because I don't care if it is a bit THICC and an old (not expensive) W-series Thinkpad performs equal or better than many newer Models.
@@32BitLink when will it be?
Expensive here too going for 650+ No thanks lol =) I'll just get the W531 and be happy =0
@@MrEugenio1994 for 2 year leases, cheaper offers by refurbishers started showing up by the beginning of this year.
I love the B Roll of the thinkpad just sitting in the forest
"For the first time we have laptop, tablets and smartphone all uses the same charger."
**shows an iPhone**
😎😎😎
@pat UISB-C only is a trend Macbook pushed and set the standard for. They just make too much money on cables to kill it for iphone and ipad.
@pat "waiting to see what's trending" my phone from 5 years ago had type-c, it's not exactly a new thing and it's certainly tried and true
@@acos21 But that also Thunderbolt, which is make it more useful and versatile (also allows for some "expansion" too e.g. eGPU, external PCIe slot, etc). Not to mention USB-C is more durable than microUSB.
@pat That simply exagerrating. The unibody aluminium + black keycaps design of Macbook Pro is only aged 11 years now and their last minor redesign is back in 2016.
"censored to prevent how much thermal paste apply" hahaahahahahahaahab that was hilarious, very appreciated
Modern problems require modern solutions.
We use our t410 s with 8 gig ram to play the sims 3 and it does very well.
Liar! No computer now or in the next 20 years will ever play "The Sims 3" very well
I assume you might only have the base game, no cc. Sims 3 ran slower than Sims 4 due to its open world map.
It might be. I also found that my 2019 laptop dies with the Sims 2 while my 11 year old Core duo runs it fine. That is because it only uses one CPU and the older CPU is much faster per core than most modern ones.
Sims 3 would have a similar problem, because it can only use 2 cores max
@@Vlad-1986 The Sims is quite a CPU intensive game.
@@Vlad-1986 The Sims 3 is an interesting game because it will run on the trashiest of hardware, but will struggle on modern hardware. I have an old 32 bit Lenovo Thinkstation with a Pentium 4D, 2GB of RAM, and Windows XP that runs Sims 3 almost as well as my Ryzen 7 2700 PC.
This is a superb overview and you are very fair. What stands out for me is that your analysis confirms the fact that Lenovo has been "cheaping out" since the T420 and T430. With the T420 the lack of USB 3 has long been soluble by using an express card USB 3 slot in card but some inferior ones can get hot, often because the supplied software is still in the world of Windows 7. Lenovo Service used to be effective in assisting with this in detail but has since gone down the same slippery slope as the products.
The full upgradeability of the T 420 is remarkable and with patience and care will still beat any business machine today. Using e-SATA slots never really caught on but for very fast and reliable transfer and cloning it has advantages over USB 3.
Full size SD cards used by photographers are very different from micro in an adapter thus by dumping full size Lenovo showed that it had lost its way in assuring the highest quality.
Similarly, a lid lock saves dirt getting into various places and maybe this is why Dell is using them again.
Lenovo will have to listen to you and others like you if they are to retain the trust of professional customers. Many educational customers here in Europe have ceased their loyalty and no longer bulk purchase but try machines as they are released and if they show no change in the trend to poorer quality old Lenovo stocked machines are chosen and Dell's return to quality at the highest end direct from the company could come too late for Lenovo to remedy.
Been hackintoshed since day one I got it. As Stable as a real macbook. Love it
You should tell that to @Alessandro De Marchi (see his comments on here).
@@SebisRandomTech Very heated exchange :). Every laptop has pros and cons. Apple stuff even tho are lag behind (not too much) and expensive, but they just work and hold their values as well as Thinkpad. I personally like Thinkpad because of the freedom in term of hardware upgrade, repair, and better performance/cost ratio. If I have more money, I would definitely buy a top Macbook, so I can forget all the hassles that I have gone through to get my hackintosh working. I always (day)dream of a day when Apple publicly license out their OS to other manufactures just like Windows. But well.
Alessandro De Marchi Lenovo also has its own quality, especially in T and P series. Comparing Apple and Lenovo is like comparing Apple and Orange. Apple is “better” because obviously they control almost entire product pipeline from hardware to software. And Apple is better because they only has limited hardware options which they dedicated their time tailor and optimize.
@@root.li.23 What are you still doing here dude? Don't you have anything better to do than troll about CrapBooks?
@@root.li.23 You're the one still making comments 2 weeks after the last reply to any. I have no problem with differing opinions, I *do* have a problem with statements that are misleading or flat out long, as are most of yours. You are the definition of a narcissist, no matter how much evidence you are presented with that goes against your false claims you outright refuse to admit to being wrong. MacBooks are not the worst laptops out there but they are *far* from the best and they have a *lot* of problems, especially the more recent models. I like ThinkPads because they are built well, have the best keyboards and pointing device out there, are easy to service or upgrade, and have good support from Lenovo and the community, *not* because I'm "attracted to some of their retro models". It's been two weeks since you first commented and you're making new replies out of nowhere, you are the kind of person who is incapable of admitting they are wrong and moving on. Some people just don't know when to quit.
I would say go for a T450s. It's a great balance between older ThinkPads and the more recent ones, especially if you can't upgrade the T430 yourself as others recommend (T450s can be upgraded to meet your needs as well). I got mine last year for a good price (260$ - i7, 8gb ram, 256gb ssd, full hd IPS display) and don't see the need to open the machine to change anything. I also still use the batteries that came with the laptop and they work great (at least 6hrs with WiFi and Bluetooth ON).
Still using ❓
@@AbuzarGhaffaree I've got a t450s with a dual core i5. Even with a new 72wh I recently bought it dies fairly quick just doing simple browsing. Whenever windows updates or I open a few too many tabs/applications it chokes up and the fans ramp up to a noticeably distracting level. Dual boot with debian and tend to get less fan noise, not much greater battery life. I would get at minimum a quad core thinkpad (t480 or later) if you are looking for a laptop still. Even with the downsides of the newer models its not worth having it stall out imo.
I love my T430s, one of the best purchases I've ever made. Never let me down when I need it. I use it as a portable uni/work computer and its excellent for my use which has a lot of engineering software and simulation programs.. Just wish the battery wasnt awful
That’s my biggest gripe with the T430s. Even with an UltraBay battery (those are slowly but surely becoming impossible to find) the battery life is still sub-par at best. My T430 (not -s) with a 9-cell battery lasts far longer.
glad I'm still rolling with my fully modded T430 :)
I still have a T430, as well as a T500, both still working very well. The newer things tend to break easier.
Great review! I love the T480 I use for work. It's maxed out and crunches huge spreadsheets and runs taxing development tools with ease. The WQHD screen is so nice.
I'm typing this on my personal T60. It was $0, has a better keyboard, form factor, Thinklight, and has a real lid latch. I consider it the better laptop. :-)
T440p with i7-4810MQ scores about 930 / 3030 in Geekbench 5 ^^ Good video, Sebi.
annafan83 that’s my current daily driver but I’m not gonna lie... twin ram sockets makes me wish I could afford one of these. I got lucky with a pawn shop find...
Never mind. My stupid brain. I have a t450s. Same thing applies about wanting dual ram slots and thunderbolt 3 though
They're quite comparable to their 8th gen 15W CPUs. So, price-to-performance ratio wise, they're actually not that far off.
@@hahaiseewhatyouredoing9086 yes but the 8th gen processors are so much more efficient
@@6kbps yup.
17:05 OMG I'm so glad to see someone else also has a broken fan shield! I was so sad when I saw mine was broken XD
Although there is many people complaint the design of current Thinkpad model. But every time I have a chance to touch these Thinkpad, I still fall in love with them.
I really like the nod to the fact that a lot of us Thinkpad users find the Trackpoint more appealing than the touchpad. Personally, the first Trackpoint I used was the one found on the 2011 HP Elitebook, which was a decent laptop, but definitively not on the same mark as Thinkpads are, that thing had rather awful feeling left and right click buttons, while my T460 feels like a dream compared to that.
Good video. I have a T480 and would not recommend it, had too many USB dock issues due to problems with the laptop's USB controller. It's not great fun when your 2nd monitor stops working all the time because it's connected to the dock that is connected to the laptop's USB port and the USB port goes on the fritz. Only fix is a hardware reset via the little pin hole on the bottom of the laptop. This happens over and over and no updates to BIOS or the laptop can fix it. I've heard of the same from others with a T480. ThinkPads are really not what they used to be back in the IBM days.
Still having these problems? Anyone else? I was looking to get a used t480
@@diogokamioka me too kindly suggest should i buy t480
"For the first time we have laptops, tablets and smartphones, that are all using the same charging connector"
*puts a tablet with micro-usb and an iPhone as an example*
Literally three different charging ports. Somehow I find it rather funny.
I think you’re the first one who understood the joke 😎
@@SebisRandomTech What about the T495? Not that much different, right? Plus it doesn't come with WinTel shit.
All of the same stupid design choices of the T490. Having AMD processors is its only advantage.
Plus there is the A485 which is a T480 with AMD chips.
id be happier with a thicker laptop as long as the keyboard/repairability/ports are good
A kingly review for the king of Thinkpads!
Awesome video Sebi!! So much detail and information in one video. I recently bought a mint condition silver T480s because i thought that having a newer Thinkpad would be better for me in business due to it's lighter weight and higher end graphics card. The seller i bought the unit from was given it as a gift and didn't need it due to their new job that provided a laptop to them. This unit was barely used and had ZERO wear. Yet when i received the unit(NOT CAUSED BY SHIPPING!) i noticed the poor workmanship of the unit. One of the clips holding the outer screen bezel was popped out and the "G" key made a terrible metallic clicking noise that i immediately scented was a faulty keyboard just ready to happen. This unit was only used for probably less than 50 hours by the original owner and the unit didn't impress me a bit. Even when i plugged in the USB-C charger into it's port, i could tell that it was going to fail within a year. The quality of the newer units just aren't there. And if i didn't buy one for myself i wouldn't have believed it. Warranty or not, i returned the unit because if a newer unit was giving me this much problem now, what was it going to be like in 2 years? So what do i do now?? I turned around and bought myself a NOS T440p with all the features i wanted in MINT/Out of the box status for less than $250.00. What a deal. I will gladly spend the $300 in upgrades as the machine is built like a tank. I do miss all the status lights, original keyboard and latch system like the T430 had in it's original design. Maybe someday someone out there will develop an app that would provide the status lights in the system tray as an add-on. Either way, i'm glad i watched all your videos and will stick to the older units forever.
excellent review. the charging port should definitely be a separate, user replaceable part, and this almost caused me not to order my T480. However, a deal came up for mine, FHD IPS display, with 512 NVME for $600, new from lenovo site. So I went for it, and I don't regret it. Very nice machine imo, nice and snappy, performs much better than my T420 dual core. My "solution" to the USB-C charging port, is using a magnetic adapter, which should prevent any sort of mechanical stress or wear from damaging or wearing out the port. I applied the patched firmware / driver for the thunderbolt chipset as soon as I got mine, so I'm hoping it won't be an issue in the future. Time will tell! I do tend to think, that the T480 may indeed by the last true thinkpad, despite it's charging port. I was able to upgrade my RAM to 32 GB, there are multiple NVME options, and I still have replaceable external / internal battery options, so the T480 should have a long lifetime!
I hope it works out for you! I'm curious to see how mine holds up.
The dual heatpipe heatsink intended for versions with the external GPU nearly doubles the cooling capacity for models without the GPU. It is a simple bolt-in replacement, just add a little foam to the gpu heat plate so it doesn't short out anything.
I wanted to buy ThinkPad P73, but I quickly switched to Zbook 17 G6. I was surprised how modular Zbook is and no screws to open it and swap some devices. It also uses daughter-board for graphic card so I'll be able to upgrade later. From what I heard next P-line devices will go back to modular philosophy, but some people don't have time to wait ;) Cheers.
Fun fact, the AMD card from that Zbook is one of the few that makes old iMacs able to run modern versions of MacOS without many drawbacks
Great review (as always, and I especially enjoy seeing ThinkPads with the Pittsburgh area scenery) with comparisons of past and recent thinkpads. I can only hope that there will be a return to more modular, upgradeable designs. Surprising that the T14 only goes up to 16 GB of soldered RAM (unless I’m missing something). I had a charging connector on a T450s that snapped off and it was such a breeze to replace. Oh well!!!! One can only hope that the Lenovo design team will go to bat for us one day and urge management to not make decisions based solely on cost -- there are enough ultrabooks out there).
Look forward to seeing your T430 upgrade videos.
t14 has soldered ram + 1 slot up to 32gb stick i think
This comment has aged well, with the frame.work laptop being around. My only problem is I could only ever like the classic Thinkpad keyboard, and can somehow tolerate the new type, and I hate anything else and can't type properly on them. Still browsing around to decide whether to get a t480, a new e14 gen3 amd, or just try and sneak a frame.work out of the US somehow. Modifying an older model seems a hobby in itself, not sure I want to do that, but I would love if we could really upgrade ourselves anything...
EVERY notebook in the world should get Thinkpad keyboard (or better), I would be so much happier and choice would be easier...
@@bencze465 framework is a meme, hp elitebooks never ditched socketed memory
God thank you, the first source to confirm for me that the T480 processor is soldered in and non-upgradable. I think I still may go for a T480 given the RAM and storage room, though I wish it had a CD drive. Still may choose it over a T440p for the battery life. Also for the purposes of clarity and anyone who may want to reply, besides getting an upgradable, older thinkpad, I might just shill out and get a new X390 for the simplicity.
had a t70 for work - so reliable and got shit done...
Then i came across a t480 for a 7th gen for 100 bucks, jumped on it. Fell back in love with the T series. Handed that one to my GF for school work and got a quad core i7 version for 150 that needed major refurbishing. Working on it now, but plan to keep this one for a while.
17:15 If you think about it, It's nice to have a hand warmer. I like that! One more advantage for the T480.
Maybe when I'm outside waiting for the train a hand warmer would be nice...
Just received my x240. Good device. I love it!
My W520 is still rocking strong after 8 years. It has three disks and can run Windows and two VM operating systems natively (e.g. Windows XP and Linux) all at the same time. IMO it's the best Thinkpad ever made.
what dock does it use? can it dock on a 2503 adv doc?
My W500 just keeled over. My T60p is still working fine. I still like those keyboards best. Bought a T430s i7 16G. Different keyboard but still excellent.
T480s with GeForce MX150 ans 1440p display here, just perfect
Watched this on my T460 and I love this thing especially after I installed a 1080p panel, installed a ssd and linux. All thanks to you Sebi
17:16 as someone who lives in the UK where it's always winter that can be useful 😊
Watching this on a Thinkpad A485, which is basically a T480 with an AMD chip instead. I managed to get it for almost half the price of the T480 during its launch because Lenovo was running some AMD discount on their website, which is really fortunate for me. I just wished that the cooling was better on this computer, but it has been awesome to use otherwise.
I just want a new Thinkpad with the old classic keyboard and all the green LEDs. Is it too much to ask for?
Unfortunately in the eyes of Lenovo executives, it is. Closest you can get is a T25 for the keyboard, P series for the LED's, and T430/W530 with classic keyboard mod for both.
I’m still using my T510. Bought it for $155 or Php8,400.00. It still works like a horse. 😃
I go back to the T23... always loved the T60
this guy is a laptop wizard 🧞
Thanks for your videos Sebi. You inspired me to buy and upgrade the T430 after a while looking around for a good machine and not being able to find one. I've not looked back since!
I recently discovered a cheap laptop on eBay in the UK and this caused me to get one because of the honest reviews.
I have a X1 Cabon and I just noticed the camera shutter cover!, thanks for that mate.
Actually, thermal throttling can occur long before a CPU reaches 100C. It just depends on the CPU, some won't thermal throttle only around 100, some will around 70-75. Mobile CPUs are more prone to thermal throttle at much lower temperatures, since laptoip cooling system in general is not that efficient compared to a desktop / gaming rig one (even though there is exceptions to the rule).
If laptop CPU are designed to not thermal throttle until 90C but you experience it when your CPU is only 70C, your laptop may be vendor/OEM locked.
A custom BIOS/UEFI can somewhat fix it, but it's not recommended because it's very very high risk, as not many laptop has custom BIOS support and it could potentially brick your entire laptop
I've had a T430 - T440 - T480 and the T440 is fine as long as you never ever used the trackpad or internal screen. The T480 is pretty great as well. The T430 was used so long ago but after I got work to give me an SSD and 16 gigs of ram it was much better. I got lucky all of mine have had pretty good i7 chips with dual batteries.
I've been using my T480S a lot since 2017 and still love it - it's simply a great laptop.
I'll soon be treating it to a new battery, as it's very easy to change.
Other downside of soldered ram is if it gets bad. Ram chips can die, and if its soldered, goodbye motherboard....
You can always send it the Rossman Group in NYC for repair.
@@beandrive they only do mac repairs
weltschmerz Since when, are you sure about that ?
weltschmerz no they don’t
Even if Rossman only works on Macs, they're not the only company in the world to do board-level repairs.
"Socketed processor" Me: Wait WHAT?! I'll take your entire stock.
i thought the cpu is soldered on the mainboard on the the t480?
@@kwye4883 it is. he was talking about T430
I've 2 Thinkpads with me till now T440s and L480, must say I somehow got used to the click style T440s touchpad! Still love my Thinkpads and looking at getting new ones once they are affordable.
I feel that T470 would the be true last Thinkpad (Removable battery, old detachable square charge port, Full size SD slot, old style dock connector at the bottom, full sawpable HDD RAM & WiFi cards)
Lenovo is just trying too hard to be like and compete with the XPS, HP Spectres and Razer blades with the latest T490 and T14(2020)!
I've just bought a T470 with i5 6300 2,4 GHz 8 GB ram .
Can it be upgraded or is everything soldered?
I can still get my money back and buy something else .
What would you recommend?
@@bendermi you can upgrade ram and ssd
I still recommend the W540 over any other ThinkPad.
Wow such a detailed video about a single laptop!! 👍👍👏👏
I've used a T480 as my daily driver for over two years and I'm still pleased with it.
I worked for IBM from 2010 to 2017. I was given three different laptops in those years, a used T61, a used T410 and a brand new T430. This last one was great, a bit bulky and heavy, but an all-round laptop with great performance and battery life. Obviously, I had to return it when I left in 2017, if I was to buy a laptop, I'd search for a used T430.
I worked on IBM in 2009-2011. I had T61, T400, T410. And in 2019 i purchased my T430.
Which one is better Lenovo l530 or l540?
@@markdrone013 good purchase. I suggest you to replace the 7200rpm drive for an SSD in case you didn't already
@@samildilshan9602 540
@@ImNotADeeJay are l530 good for the programming?
I have this laptop, before I had t420 and I fell in love with both!
If you upgrade the heatsink on your t480 with the dual heat pipe unit you'll have a better time with thermals (and light loads won't even have the fan kick in). You do need to protect the pins for the GPU as it's meant to cool it down.
Got the same model myself and absolutely loving it
Excellent video as always.
I have a Tinkpad T480 with i7 . Its just a good machine.
I had considered this model, since the T470 and T480 replaced the T440s/T450s. I like having the option for an m.2 SSD + 2.5" HDD. Also nice is that the touch function is now "baked" into the panel, so there's no glass overlay to affect the image. But what killed it for me is the terrible IPS panel, with ~60% sRGB gamut. The T440/T450 series had a ~95% gamut AUO panel. The 2016 X1 models even used a newer revision of the same AUO panel. Shame that Lenovo cheaped out for the T470/T480. I wonder if it was intentional, to create (more of) a gap between the T480s and the X1 Carbon, since the Txxxs models have gotten slimmer.
However, I picked up an X1 Yoga with QHD screen, which isn't as bad as I thought at 100% scaling, so maybe I will consider a T480 QHD in the future. BTW, I lucked out in getting one with an OLED screen, and whatever drawbacks you've heard about OLED, you don't care when you're actually looking at the awesome quality.
PS. I never cared for the older non-S variants. You might as well go back and get the last real ThinkPad, the 600X, designed and made by IBM. Everything after was made in China.
fun lil bit of info, someone modded a t480 with the thinkpad 25 anniversary keyboard, if I rememeber correctly. It looked lovely.
Yes, I briefly mentioned that towards the end of the video.
Still have my T420 i5 4gb ddr3 working as a typing laptop, working along with my Precision 7510 Xeon 32gb ddr4. I will consider Precision 7540 and Lenovo P53 when I need a 64gb laptop.
I have a T430 in really good condition. Bought it more than five years ago to use while studying. The only thing that needed a replacement was the original six cell battery that I switched out for a nine cell grippable one. Aside from being a heavier piece of kit, I'll still swear by it. Great laptop for everyday use as far as what I need out of it.
I`ve got a used T440 and I simply love it! It´s got an i5, it came with 4 GB, only one slot. I replaced it with an 8 GB and runs fast. It has two batteries, and two other slots for storage, one for a small 15 GB SSD for cache, but since I replaced the drive for an SSD, I use it for storage. I also discovered another slot, underneath the internal battery, for an MSata drive, I got one in Amazon, 128 GB, so now it has three drives. It is also touch, with fingerprint reader. I really love this machine.
i think this is the best laptop review / breakdown kinda video i've ever seen on youtube, my first time on your channel sebi, you have a such a great way of explain things comprehensively, really helpful.
i'm considering this laptop, i wonder if it'll last me a long time or not.
I've had one deal-beaker of a problem with the T480: some machines have problems accepting power (e.g., cannot even charge the batteries). A post on a Lenovo forum had said that Lenovo had some bad chips in some of their machines (or something to that extent).
Mine stopped accepting charge (plus a bunch of other symptoms), so I got it fixed at a local repair shop (there was still the start-up screen issue; but that seems common and benign). Shortly after getting it back though, something else broke. It will still charge the battery when turned off; but the other symptoms depend on the OS. Qubes: battery slowly drains. Windows: complains about power issues, but battery stays charged (however, I didn't buy the machine to run Windows, so I didn't exactly put it through its paces).
These seem to be very common. Mine randomly stopped accepting Lenovo's charger - I almost gave up on it, then tried out a Macbook charger and my Huawei phone charger. Funnily enough, it seems to accept all chargers except the official Lenovo one. The charger itself is fine, though, it works just fine with the T480 of a friend of mine.
I just got me a second handed T470 touch screen variant. This one is, as I'm seeing in your video, almost the same computer as the one you're reviewing (same keyboard, same fingerprint sensor, it does come with thunderbolt and has the caps and Fn indicators). Differences are then the processor (huge one here) and some ports and aesthetics. I guess it was a nice purchase then.
Finally! I have been waiting for this :)
Great video! I think I'm sold on buying a T480 for my next machine.
I can also recommend the A485 as it is basically a T480 but with a Ryzen Processor. I have one with 8GB Ram and larger Battery and I love it so far. The build quality is excellent just like the T480 and the Processor is very good for daily tasks. Also it is in general a little bit cheaper to get.
What's an A485?
Joe Smith Lenovo ThinkPad A485. If it has an A prefix and/or a 5 suffix, it means it has an AMD processor.
@@JackBandicootsBunker Good to know, thanks.
The A485 is basically a T480 but with a Ryzen Pro U Processer. They feel pretty much the same but battery life may be a little bit shorter then on intel processors. however with my large battery I can still use it almost all day.
The succesor A495 has all the quirks of T495 so sadly the A485 is also one of the last truly good Thinkpads.
@@BrianM180 And the graphics are way better.
I have an X250, X260, T450, T460s, T470, T470p.
The first Thinkpad model was T100 by Skynet