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One thing to highlight: T-series Lenovo laptops are mainstream business products shipped at a huge scale.
This is not a small-scale experimental product for the tinkerers. This may define the biggest laptop segment if it works out well. It might be the first time in a while that something like this hits such a huge market.
Does 10/10 mean it's got RAM and drives accessible without needing to disassemble the whole fucking thing?
Nice to see both aren't soldered onto the motherboard, but we've still gone backwards in the last 20 years.
Back in the day every screw on thinkpads had a series of little symbols on them to tell you which ones you needed to undo in order to get to the ram, storage, keyboard, and fans. Without needing a repair manual. I hope they brought that back!
without needing to disassemble the whole fucking thing
well you still need to take the bottom cover off
Nah they soldiered it to the cpu cooler cause fuck you thats why
Read the article. They're using replaceable modules.
They got scared by Framework sucess
Exactly, but it still won't get them my money. I believe in rewarding companies who had the balls to listen to their customers first with my dollars. Framework will be my next laptop no matter what any other competitor comes out with.
They're the only reason we're seeing any company starting to u-turn and make modular/repairable laptops.
Well, good...
Though reparability is a good part of it, another would be a concrete commitment that the form factor of various things will be consistent generation to generation, that Gen 8 boards will fit into a current laptop.
I suppose Framework will be the better laptop for individuals looking to buy a new laptop, but also business class laptops come with fancy enterprise things like on-site repairs. So I think large corporations, the main customers of new T series Thinkpads, will continue buying them just the same anyway.
I think the people benefitting the most here actually are going to be the people buying off-lease Thinkpads. Those of us who know a quality used laptop is better than a cheapo new one (like a Pavilion or Ideapad), but also don’t want to spring for a brand new laptop (in which case Framework would be the best option - they’d be great used too, but they’re not that common on the used market)
yeah, my company recently switched away from dell to Framework laptops. a couple of my coworkers with the Framework laptops really like them. They like how sturdy they are. The magnesium alloy case doesn't flex at all. Our dell laptops with plastic cases often get dented and bent so eastily, and cause various problems.
We also have a couple Lenovo laptops, and I haven't heard of any issues. Generally, the plastic used for Lenovo's cases are noticeably thicker and harder than dells'.
I definitely feel a sense of ease knowing that if anything goes wrong with our framework laptops, I will most likely be able to fix it.
That's awesome, but what issues did they have with dell? They're pretty easy to disassemble and repair if you don't buy the cheap consumer shit, get latitudes. But I'm all for straying away for framework.
Could they please cooperate with Framework and create Universal Joints?
At a guess, such cooperation would undermine Lenovo's profit margin and would thus be a non-starter for them.
Enter government regulation, to pinch corporations by the ear and drag them to doing what's right for society.
I HATE the idea if you can't make money off it, even if would make the world 10x better for everyone, companies won't do it. Shareholders gotta eat!!
This its why capitalism is failing. Shareholder profit is a fundamentally unsustainable incentive.
Just a lil nitpick: article is by iFixit who is a Lenovo business partner. So perhaps less objective than one might hope.
They even state it them selves in the article, so it is not like they are trying to hide this. Also they say that this is not the end all be all of reparability, which IMO should merit not then getting a 10/10 but idk what their metrics are.
It seems to me that Lenovo’s repairably is more affected by that iFixit partnership than the opposite. I don’t see anything factually wrong or suspicious in the article.
Nevertheless, a conflict of interests is possible.
I agree, but like others have said, it bodes well that they're open about this in the article
As someone who has changed a laptop keyboard before.
That picture says it all.
Picture's worth a thousand expletives.
I use iFixit's guides all the time, so I would hope that their score isn't affected by it. I've seen them as being fairly good at their role.
This is true, but they're also not wrong that fully-modular USB-C ports is an absolutely huge win. It's one of the biggest things when it comes to laptops these days.
There's a difference between 'repairable' and 'upgradable.' Most of the comments seem to conflate the two. Lenovo isn't doing a Framework.
It's a smart move. Differentiates them from other laptop-makers for corporate IT, who can do the parts swaps themselves. Also smart is associating the brand with iFixit and working to get a 10/10. That'll be what sets them apart from all the others, at least for the next year or two.
There's a difference between 'repairable' and 'upgradable.'
Absolutely! I've got a Lenovo IdeaPad Flex 5 (laptop/tablet thingy).
I've upgraded/replaced the ssd - no problem.
Unfortunately, this laptop has an issue with the keyboard: the left section/panel intermittently stops sending inputs. Meaning, keys like escape, a, w, shift, l-control - just stop (even in the bios). I'd read that they keyboard "collects" static which causes problems with certain sections of the keyboard.
I thought I'd see how difficult it would be to replace the keyboard. I watched a teardown video, and of course you need to remove everything... but I lost it when, the person in the video used a heat gun to melt "plastic rivits" that connected the keyboard to the motherboard case. Then with the replacement keyboard needed to remelt the plastic rivits.
This laptop is not repairable. In fact, I swore I'd never buy another Lenovo again as a result. ... but if their focus is on making them repairable (and their recent partnership with GrapheneOS edit: oops, that's Motorola and GrapheneOS) - I might be eating crow tonight.
Note that ThinkPad and IdeaPad are practically different companies with how Lenovo acts.
Fully expect IdeaPads to continue to be shit. ThinkPad can do the most wondrous good stuff in the world and IdeaPad will stay garbage.
And yes, I went through the same exact maddeningly shitty keyboard replacement procedure. Never again IdeaPad, though ThinkPad has been fine.
Bonus points, ThinkPad brand never shipped Superfish, and most of the firmware security flaws have been IdeaPad side. It's amazing how half-assed they are with that brand yet pretty competent with ThinkPad.
oops, that's Motorola
https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/d/motorola-smartphones/ Same company, actually, so you were basically right the first time!
I picked up a 2025 P14s Gen 6. Wanted Ethernet and the ability to easily swap both RAM sticks in the future. Apart from the soldered WiFi chip, this computer is by far one of the most modern and repairable ones I’ve seen. Perfectly runs Fedora KDE, too.
T series are also fantastic, but at the time it wasn’t as repairable given one RAM stick was soldered and the other was replaceable. Also because of the form factor it didn’t have Ethernet.
Can’t go wrong with a P series if your needs are similar to mine in a computer for long-term use.
Edit: Forgot to add that while my P14s Gen 6 is great, the biggest complaint is the soldered USB C ports for power delivery. That's a huge point of failure. I mitigate the weak point by using a magnetic USB C cable. It's nice to see the the new T series has modular USB C / thunderbolt ports and remediates the weak point that was a common complaint for users.
I like my P16, but I found that despite being brand new the build quality is a little shoddy. There's a creak when I rest my right hand next to the track pad, the screen actually overhangs to the side of the keyboard! And a couple other plastic bits seem like they creaked and behaved poorly since I received it. Good components though.
Lenovo also owns the Motorola phone brand, and they're going to adopt/allow GrapheneOS. I think they know how to grab customers right now, and I honestly like it.
Isnt lenovo the company that used to make the rugged military laptops that actually had Chinese or foreign backdoors installed?