ThinkPad’s 30th Anniversary: An Insider’s Perspective
Sadly they don&#x27;t make them like they used to. Keyboards and repairability comes to mind.<p>I don&#x27;t mind the chiclet keycaps, but Lenovo really ruined the keyboard when they went from the 7 row layout [0] to the current 6 row layout [1].<p>Each new generation of ThinkPad reduces the travel distance of the keyboard - they&#x27;ve gone from 2.5 mm in the T420 (2011) to 1.5 mm in the T14 G3 (2022). 1 mm doesn&#x27;t sound like on paper, but you immediately notice the difference if you switch between them. I don&#x27;t understand why Lenovo doesn&#x27;t add an extra 1 mm to the thickness of their laptops, at least it would restore the reputation for typing feel on ThinkPads.<p>For repairability: soldered WLAN cards, 1 SO-DIMM slot or soldered RAM on T&#x2F;X series machines (HP offers 2x SO-DIMM slots on most EliteBooks) are a step backwards.<p>USB-C charging sounds good at first, but the ports start to wear out after 2 years and become loose. They are soldered to the motherboard, so good luck repairing them if you aren&#x27;t good at micro soldering.<p>[0] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.notebookcheck.net&#x2F;fileadmin&#x2F;_migrated&#x2F;pics&#x2F;t420_tastatur1_02.jpg" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.notebookcheck.net&#x2F;fileadmin&#x2F;_migrated&#x2F;pics&#x2F;t420_...</a><p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.notebookcheck.net&#x2F;fileadmin&#x2F;_processed_&#x2F;f&#x2F;5&#x2F;csm_IMG_6065_208e57da37.jpg" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.notebookcheck.net&#x2F;fileadmin&#x2F;_processed_&#x2F;f&#x2F;5&#x2F;csm_...</a>