Anyone have the i7 620LM, or i5 560M X201t?

[Agent 9]

I am looking for a bit of real world uses of the X201t with either of these processors (I can't find much of any info on how the i5 560M performs with battery life, heat, and noise)

I know the i7 is powerful, and has good battery life; but I would like to know about the standard voltage i5 560M


Also, has anybody found any really useful expresscards to use with the X201t?

[kvirtanen]

Whoa, it's been this long and no answers :0

I've got the one with 560M. I got it because of the 2x graphics speed compared to other options. Photoshop and other 3D programs run very smoothly without stuttering. I didn't have a chance to try the units anywhere prior to buying so I wanted to be on the safe side considering the prices - I don't know if there's a real-world difference between these.

Hmm.. the battery life is around 4 hours - maybe 5 with minimum settings - with standard use, probably wifi off - so it's a bit more power hungry. It doesn't get hot at all, contrary to some posts you can find around the net. The fan might run most of the time, but to be honest, I really don't even hear it. (ok I can hear it if I start to listen)

Re: express cards, I just posted a question about them in the Lenovo Community forums: http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/X-Series...ns/td-p/460299

[kvirtanen]

OK, I actually measured the battery life now.

In moderate use my 8-cell battery (under a year old) lasts 2h 30min. After turning off wireless, setting backlight to half (6), throttling down the CPU and basically letting the computer drain the battery down while doing nothing it lasts 3:52.

I'm beginning to suspect that there's something wrong with the battery, I mean, the CPU can't be THAT hungry, can it?

[Agent 9]

Thanks for the reply, I find it interesting you are reporting such abysmal battery life on a 'new' battery; next time you are using the computer on battery power (fully charged) be sure to check the percentage a few times each hour and watch to see if it jumps dramatically at a point or not (for example if it jumps from 58% to 40% in 20min then the battery is heavily worn yet not calibrated to read so)

I am not sure about Lenovo, but HP has a 1year warranty on all batteries (even ones that come with the computer), with which you can get one replacement battery within that time for free, maybe look into that.


Also, I have found that doing a clean install of Windows and setting everything up properly is the best thing you can do to improve efficiency and battery life (if the COA sticker is still present on your X201t then you can use any old Windows 7 install disc and install the version your COA sticker is for and have it fully/ legally activated -you can even download a DVD iso from the internet and use the serial to do the same)

Is there any chance you can get a drain rate on the battery? I think there is Lenovo provided software that should be able to give you a mW drain rate (when idle it should be 7-9mW or less, and under moderate load 9-14mW. I know Battery Bar does this, though somewhat inaccurately

[kvirtanen]

I'll be sure to try that out, hopefully I'll be able to answer you quicker than before :) Maybe there really is something wrong with the battery. I've been able to improve the situation with my own power scheme.

Yeah, there has been quite a few little problems with this fellow, the battery not being the only one..

[kvirtanen]

Here's my BatteryBar test with X201T, i5-560M, 8GB RAM, Win7 64-bit, using a custom power scheme that is meant to be very conservative

DISCHARGE RATES

• wireless off, backlight at 8 (halfway), no active processes crunching in the background, running on battery, conservative CPU
  
• around -12 800mW
• in theory the battery life should be around 5:10h (66.2Wh battery)

• WIFI on, backlight at 15 (full), web surfing, running on battery, conservative CPU
• discharge rate at idle around -15 966mW to -16 436mW
• in theory the battery life should be around 4:10h (66.2Wh battery)
• for my battery test I'm using these settings because they depict my usage realistically

CONCLUSIONS

Battery lasted for 3:09h (from 10:00am to 13:09pm) before the computer shut down automatically

• this included surfing the web on WIFI with backlight on max setting
• CPU was set to throttle down whenever possible
• BB and Windows were almost as accurate, though BB gave 3hrs of battery life in the beginning while Win7 gave 4hrs
• BatteryBar estimates the full lifetime of the battery to be 3:09h
• Battery Wear 3.9% of 95386mWh (this changed after the test)
  
  • this was 0%/66290mWh before making the test
  • The battery is supposed to be 66290 mWh, so something is off in BB

• average discharge rate would have to be around -21000mW for the battery to run out this fast
  
  • if we believe BB (battery capacity 95.3Wh, which it's not) the figure would be even more ridiculous -30200mW

So, the question remains: Do I have a faulty battery? ?:-/