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Laptop vs Tablet

3K views 47 replies 6 participants last post by  Lasnap 
#1 ·
So i've been out of the loop for a few years regarding specs but I was wondering
what can I get for the best bang for my buck between the £200-300
to run windows, what's going offer the best performance / storage experience, I probably leaning more towards Intel® Celeron laptops as i3's seem a bit too pricey for me to justify, but as far as tablets / convertable touchscreen laptops go i'm completely blind, I don't know anything beyond Android and the Tegra X1 being the best mobile gpu / soc which is a null point since I want to be running windows anyway.
 
#2 ·
I recently purchased a used Lenovo Thinkpad T420 with an I5 2520m and Nvidia NVS 4200m which is basically the business equivalent of a Nvidia Geforce 520m. It also has gbs of ram and a 1600x900res TN panel. It works perfectly fine for lighter/older gaming and blows those celeron based laptops out of the water. The kicker is I only paid $220 for the laptop on Amazon. The only extra thing I had to purchase was a Replacement battery since the battery that was in the laptop when I got it had been recalled by Lenovo. so that was an extra $70 on top of the $220 so it was a total of $290. Which should easily fit within your budget. since its a barely used thinkpad before I got it I don't think its going to have any issues minus that battery. Since its a thinkpad it will litterally last for years.

Contact the seller on amazon before ou buy to double check the specs to make sure you get both the 1600x900 res screen and the Nvidia NVS 4200m. As there are plenty out there that are just a lousy 1366x768 res screen and just have the intergrated intel hd graphics which just aren't up the task.
 
#12 ·
If I resize the main os parition back to 160gb then have 160gb free for another partition will I be able to clone the windows 7 partition onto the free second partition under a different drive letter and update it to windows 10 without effecting the first windows 7 partition?, i'll probably clone the windows 10 partition to a external drive or nas once I know it runs without issue, if the bios allows ethernet or usb boot.
 
#16 · (Edited)
Had it two days now getting around 25-30fps in Dolphin for Wii games had to install some DirectX update to get DirectX with it working even though it's fully updated to sp1, seems to give 3-5fps benefit over OpenGL or it's a placibo effect either way it seems more constant, dxdialog kept reporting the gpu as the intergrated Intel one with optimus mode, changing it to discrete switched it over to the nvidia one.
Playing the F1 2012 steam demo I can get around 29fps with 720p res and lower settings but it gets red hot around 90+C.

WEI score gave me
pro: 7.1
ram: 5.9
graphics: 5.1
gaming graphics: 6.5
hdd: 4.8
 
#17 ·
You might have to use throttle stop to help balance cpu speeds vs cpu temps. Yeah I had to disable the intel igp in the bios to get some games to use the dedicated nvidia card myself. The CPU can go get has high as 98 in temps. I had a problem where my CPU would constantly throttle itself to x8 mulitpler leaving my cpu running at only 800mhz even when plugged in which is why I had to grab throttle stop in the first place to help even out the kinks. putting throttle stop between 20 and 25 mutlitper is the best for keeping the cpu temps below 90 for when you don't need the full power of the system.

My WEI stats are

WEI 5.1
CPU: 7.1
RAM 5.9
Graphics 5.1
Gaming graphics 6.5
HDD 5.9
 
#19 · (Edited)
The Thinkpad T420 is known to run on the hot side to be honest. 90+ is quite common for the laptop

Ok after searching google for a bit it seems like replacing the thermal grease will drop the temps from 95+ down to less then 80

Here is a good tutorial on replacing the thermal paste

http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/t420-thermal-paste-issue-replacement-tutorial.676055/

Before I do it to my Thinkpad I need to see if I have any thermal paste left otherwise I am going to need to buy another tube of it.
 
#20 ·
I'd like to fix it but I'd probably end up breaking it on the over hand
I might upgrade the internal HDD, I was only getting 70MB/s Read/Write
from the ST9320328CS whilst my wdbu6y0020bbk-eesn over
the StarTech ECUSB3S11 ExpressCard was giving me 110MB/s,
playing Umbrella Chronicles and Darkside I was getting a lot of lag
and audio stutter on the ST932032CS but was almost gone on the wdbu6y0020bbk-eesn.
 
#22 ·
What key did you use when upgrading to win10?

I tried 3 but all are rejected :-(
1: Printed on the battery slot.
2: My Computer, Properties
3: Pirform Speccy, vbs script
Code:
Set WshShell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
MsgBox ConvertToKey(WshShell.RegRead("HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\DigitalProductId"))

Function ConvertToKey(Key)
Const KeyOffset = 52
i = 28
Chars = "BCDFGHJKMPQRTVWXY2346789"
Do
Cur = 0
x = 14
Do
Cur = Cur * 256
Cur = Key(x + KeyOffset) + Cur
Key(x + KeyOffset) = (Cur \ 24) And 255
Cur = Cur Mod 24
x = x -1
Loop While x >= 0
i = i -1
KeyOutput = Mid(Chars, Cur + 1, 1) & KeyOutput
If (((29 - i) Mod 6) = 0) And (i <> -1) Then
i = i -1
KeyOutput = "-" & KeyOutput
End If
Loop While i >= 0
ConvertToKey = KeyOutput
End Function
 
#23 · (Edited)
I have tried to upgrade via this http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

and I get stuck at 32% overall and 6% on installing features and drivers. I am currently unable to back anything up off the HDD to do a fresh install since I had a 500gb external die on me and had to get files off that before it would no longer boot.

Could give the tool I linked to a try and see if that works. Might want to remove your key from the code you posted

Also make sure you are using the proper Windows 10 version for the windows 7 that is on the thinkpad. For example my thinkpad came with Windows 7 Pro so I would be upgrading to windows 10 Pro and NOT Windows 10 Home.
 
#24 ·
I created a separate partition from the unused space and did a clean install on it but it wouldn't activate guesss that only works via upgrade so I activated it with KMSAuto Lite, eveything is unlocked like the personalisation options etc, but Windows Update fails.
Now I have windows 7 & 10 on dual boot.
 
#25 ·
Yeah the upgrade proccess turns the windows 7 key into a windows 10 key that you can then use to do a fresh install. Since you did not do that first it would not let you use the windows 7 key to install windows 10.

I currently have 79gb free out of 450gb so yeah partitioning is not really an option unless I go for something like 16gb for windows 10. I plan on trying to install windows 10 onto a 64gb, 120/8gb mSATA ssd and keep windows 7 on the hdd for now. I need money for another stick of 4gb ram and thermal paste if I don't have enough in storage along with money for said SSD upgrade as well.
 
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