TPG 5 – TP Workstation Guide

I am SOOOO fucking late jesus christ.
Systems covered, T42p to P15 Gen 2

Google sheets link – Prices, RAM, CPU, GPU, LCD x2
i looked up all different info and got overwhelmed.
post office been making me work 6 days which didn’t help much, sometimes 10 to 12 hours. This just makes me want to lay in bed, and not really sit down & type 🙁

Laptops I own in this guide: W550s, T43p, T42p, G40, W500 (pending rebuild/sale)
Laptops I own in the past: W700ds, T60p, G41, W510, W520, W530, T460p
W550s youtube review
hit me up lenovo :)c

No A Series here, but G and T performance is…. T15p is here and same with T15g, but i got specs on these things, this time

Oh yeah there will be abbreviations… Not writing out P15s Gen 2 Intel everytime, its going to be P15s1gi…

Processor Type, Socketed, Removable, Older

Soldered CPU, Full Power Workstations, Late & Modern

Soldered ULV Systems, Late & Modern

Graphics Cards – Dedicated RAM options

Memory Types & Max it Price

Display Options, Older style (40 pin LVDS & w/e)

280N = 280 Nits
500C = 500:1 Contrast ratio
100% = Color gamut, original PSREFs did not say what specification, so maybe it was NTSC?
Wikipedia link
Only some 15″ SXGA+ and UXGA are IPS, you have a small chance of buying a laptop with a replaced screen that doesn’t have an IPS type. AFAIK no 16:10 screen came IPS, I THINK there are some AFFS modded options.

XGA    1024 x 768    DSTN > TN > TFT > AFFS > WVA =/> IPS > Dolby Vision > OLED? > QLED?
SXGA+  1280 x 1050
UXGA   1600 x 1200
QXGA   2048 x 1536   Term Shortening

WXGA   1280 x 768 
WXGA+  1440 x 900    X    X-Rite Calibrator
WSXGA+ 1680 x 1050   NSR  No Smudge, No Reflection
WUXGA  1920 x 1200   BLK  True Black
WQXGA  2560 x 1600   blue low blue light, removes a blue spectrum of color to lessen eye fatigue
WQUGA  3840 x 2400   Dim  DC Dimming, no flickering unlike PWM dimming at lower brightness

HD     1366 x 768    DV   Dolby Vision
HD+    1600 x 900    DVH  Dolby Vision HDR
FHD    1920 x 1080   DV4  Dolby Vision HDR 400
WQHD   2560 x 1440   DV5  Dolby Vision HDR 500
3K     2880 x 1620   
4K     3840 x 2160   % > NTSC > sRGB > Adobe > DCI-P3 > DCI-whateverthefuckcomesnow
UHD    3840 x 2160   Dolby Vision > DV HDR > DV HDR 400 > DV HDR 500 > DV HDR 1000 > TrueBlack 400 > etc

Low blue light – displayninja.com
DC dimming/PWM flicker – ezioglobal.com
Dolby Vision standards & True Black – displayhdr.org

Display Options, Modern eDP type

Price Guide

Model - Low - Mid - High - EX+ - #Sold - PSREF

Model - Laptop name & has a link to sold eBay listings, sorted by the lowest
Low   - Low price (not lowest), that boot to bios, & working screen & maybe at least a drive installed
        An average, about 1/6th or 1/4th of the page scrolled down if its 200 or less listings sold
        Most are ugly machines, untested, have damage auctions or a BIN/Offer priced to sell fast
Mid   - Middle price of laptops, usually come with OS & AC adapter, or as-is in better spec/condition
        about 1/2 of the page scrolled to maybe 3/5
High  - High end, should be working 100%, maybe refurb, better specs & not a shady seller, maybe NOS
        about 3/4 to 4/5 of the page scrolled down
EX+   - Overpriced units, either backed by seller brand, buzzwords, warranties or hugely upgraded specs
        NOS, New, BNIB, 9/10 of the page, the prices way much higher than High
#Sold - How many units have been sold, so more units sold, the better availability
        30 or lower is bad, either too many overpriced units, or just low amount in the market
        150+, you'll have a better chance getting a well spec'd machine
        300+, heaven, you'll find deals out there, plenty of surplus sales & parts
PSREF - Link to PSREF :)

Classic & Outdated 14″ to 17″

• My Recommendations
  • For muh nostalgia; T60p in 14″ or 15″, W500, W701ds
  • Real IBM gatekeeper mode – G40, R50p or T41p, swear they are amazing
  • Price & availability – W500 or T61p
  • Not that much sold…. T4x & G4x are a desert town, but others seem to be overpriced
  • Go IPS, 14″ SXGA+, 15.4″ WSXGA+ or WUXGA, otherwise get something smaller for this vintage

These machines are super old, I sort of reiterate what I’ve said in other guides, but seriously the T60p, T42p, G41 nVidia or maybe Z61p are like purely for that collectors feel. W500 is last of “muh build quality”, however there is a noticeable difference from the T61p & T60p. T43p I’ve got gives me mixed feelings, its thinner than a T60p, but the Pentium M just sucks online, & it doesn’t have a Windows key… Lenovo added that on the T60p, so there’s a bit of a testament to IBM vs M$ for that (though it was on iSeries and I think late 300 machines had the win key). OH yeah, T61p can do quadcore mod if you’re up to it, I think W500 can too, but so can a T400 much more easily.

Full Power Workstations W, P, & T15g
15″, 17″

• There was no quadcore, 5th gen/broadwell workstation on the big 4… W550s may suffice
• W541 is just the W540 w/ the touchpad swap, nothing else added
• T15p & P15v are extremely similar machines, they are the same footprint as the P15s & T15
  • Instead of USB-C, they use a 135W charger
  • They have full power CPUs, not ULVs like P15s/T15
  • Their mobo’s & side ports configurations are different
• T15g is essentially a P15 but with GTX graphics & cheaper
• P51 $750 is… well a decent cut off point for price/performance
• W540 for cheap quadcore upgradable
• 17″ P Series is good for the big screen…
  • Color accuracy, brightness & panel options/upgrade very limited!
  • 15″ screen spank them, 14″ screens are bountiful

Nab a P5x or a T15g for power. P7x and P17 are super expensive, P15v/T15p are alright, but not going full power on the GPU/RAM. Get at least a 4GB video card in this price range if you could. Remember, you cannot upgrade dGPU’s with non-Lenovo SKU/FRU cards that were not available with the system. They are whitelisted, not like Dell or HP workstations… Also any Gen 2 machine, maybe see what Lenovo is offering for sale brand new.

fwiw, I nabbed a Dell Precision 7730 Xeon for $900 + $120 in upgrades/repairs, P4200 GPU with 8GB ram, which is equal to the P72 specs… except the cheapest Xeon P72 cost $1340… but had a 4K display vs FHD ($300 display)

15″ Slim Workstations

• W550s & P50s can use the 3K T550 screen, just do an entire lid swap if you’re going 15.6 to 15.5
• P1 = X1E, just quadro graphics & xeon instead of i9 i think….
• Price/Performance – P53s low, or P52s… maybe P1 for sexyness?
• Seriously those OLED screen options on the P1….

Yeah a lot of these are out of my price territory here & they are super far out I really don’t know what to say. The 3K W550s touch panel has some visual issues bc of the brightness & glass overlay, hard to say but its similar to the X61 Tablet SXGA+ uglyness vs the X60 SXGA+ panel. Not sure what to really recommend out of these, as I had issue with the dualcore i7-5600U’s performance and meh Quadro K620?. The cool thing about the P1 is that it doesn’t have a numberpad, so finally a centered-ish trackpoint/touchpad on a 15″ or 16″ screen. Seriously the P1 is 16:10 which is awesome, but i wish lenovo would just make a 3:4 or 3:2 laptop, Z Series may change that (X13 G2 is 16:10 i think) 😀

14″ P – ThinkPads

• P40 is ULV, T4xxp is full power, P43s & P14s is ULV
• All P40, P43s, & P14s Gen 1 Intel laptops will come with discrete graphics as standard
  • all i7 T4xxp systems came with discrete graphics, i5 units have it as optional
  • All P14s AMD units have integrated Radeon graphics, they are not discrete!
  • P14s G1 Intel i5 units come with dedicated graphics cards, but i7 units might not? (wtf?????)
    • There was only a few configurations which let me have iGPU, rare but idk
• P14s (not G1 AMD) can have 100% Adobe screen or DCI-P3 on G2’s.
• no touchscreen options on T4xxp laptops

These are cheap “P Series” type of machines. IMO the P14s and P43s are basically gimped T4xx laptops. Seriously! Lenovo made a meh 14″ workstation, the T4xxp units, and then just gave up. They made the T25 anniversary edition, and wow’d everyone with a quadcore t470s…. so they just made that again, but without the based keyboard. Out of these machines, I’ve only owned the T460p, don’t buy one of these with the base i7-6700, and also don’t get a T470p with the i7-7700hq, they suck, nab one with the *820hq bc of that cache. 🙂 I do have to say, the NVMe HDD caddy on the T460p did speed up rendering and file transferring with an external USB quite a bit. But at that point, maybe splurge for the P43s, since NVMe comes standard with it. I really don’t know how well P14s AMD total rendering performances goes against the Intel i5 nVidia sibling, but it could be a fun thhing to test *cough, cough Lenovo give me three cough cough*