Lenovo, the Treasure Hunter of Tech

Thinkpads are truly awesome - but the problem is that lenovo is buying into the macbook hype machine without putting thought around it&#x27;s design process.<p>for example, I recently bought a T430S as opposed to one of the newer T440 ranges. the touchpad is an abomination - and plus they soldered one of the RAMs to the motherboard. Seriously ? One of the <i>biggest</i> differentiators that thinkpads have is their upgradability.<p>I can easily upgrade the CPU of a T430 series [1] and bump up the ram to 16 gb. the newer thinkpads lose both those abilities. The Thinkpad designers have not been able to make up their minds on what they want to build - which is why we see lines like T430&#x2F;T430s&#x2F;T430u&#x2F;T430e and T440&#x2F;T440s&#x2F;T440p.<p>[1] <a href="http://forum.notebookreview.com/lenovo/684625-t430-upgrade.html" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;forum.notebookreview.com&#x2F;lenovo&#x2F;684625-t430-upgrade.h...</a>

All well and nice but:<p>What is the current Thinkpad worth its once trustworthy brand? The way to drive and keep the profits seams to be to lure customers who trusted a brand for <i>years</i> into buying quite frankly ridiculously manufactured surrogate products with the brand-label in the right place... well maybe turned 180 for the new coolness factor ;)

I used to own a ThinkPad Edge-I bought it when I was much poorer than I am now, and needed a decent laptop. It was nice to have a relatively cheap computer with the TP branding, but over time I came to realize that it was nothing more than a generic cheap 14 inch laptop with the TP branding.<p>When you consider what TPs used to be, and what people think of when they think of TPs...well, either the Edge wasn&#x27;t a true ThinkPad, or Lenovo is seriously diluting the brand. See also the ThinkPad tablet they came out with.

Fascinating story. Lenovo&#x27;s rise to prominence reminds me of Haier, especially the presence of a charismatic, ambitious leadership figure not content to settle for just the domestic market. But why are there raccoons all over the article?

I use their P780. I bought it for the battery and I was right the battery is beyond excellent and I am saying this based on 2 day&#x27;s use with 3G ON.<p>But the rest of the things on that phone are either bad or just mediocre. Not to mention the bloat and poor software leave a lot to be desired and a near certainly that there&#x27;s nothing post 4.2. On top of that they use MediaTek that apparently stops custom ROMs from coming into picture.

I&#x27;ve had 4 ThinkPads - T21, T42, R60, and now a T510 which I bought new in 2010. My plan is to buy a MacBook next time around, because when you look at price for performance, the MBP Retina blasts pretty much everything out of the water - even the T530 - Apples pricing over the last 4 years has come down, and Lenovo has stayed the same.

Typing on an ideapad Y510p - its an excellent machine. I know that phones and tablets have the seat at the head table right now, but I can&#x27;t imagine not having a laptop sitting on the kitchen table. Others seem to be dropping that ball ... or at least racing to the bottom. Lenovo laptops always seem a smart choice.

Next up: How Lenovo Escapes Heat Death

I can feel the end of American economic might. Facebook&#x2F;Instagram&#x2F;Whatsapp will not cut it. Pretty sad.