Written by Serban Spirescu

Published on: 2024-12-08

I feel a weird attraction to this Thinkpad. I bought it out of spite of MacOS and Windnoes and I thought it was a compulsive buy, but it turned out it was not! I wanted a laptop that has the portability of a Macbook and the flexibility of Linux. I wanted a great keyboard for building up this website. I wanted a nice screen to be able to play some beloved games. I didn't get that last thing, but I got so much more!

I absolutely love it! I’ve always thought of ThinkPads as reliable workhorses—machines that let me install whatever I want (hello, Linux!) with fantastic keyboards and that iconic red TrackPoint. But I never realized they had such a cult-like following (in the best way possible), full of people who are deeply passionate and proud of their devices. Honestly, the enthusiasm surrounding ThinkPads feels on par with Apple’s most devoted fans, and I find it incredibly entertaining. Browsing the ThinkPad subreddit and reading personal blogs about them has become a strangely relaxing pastime.

Look and feel I do own a M1 MacBook Air, but after about a year and a half, I completely switched to Linux. I needed a device that matched the portability of the MacBook but also gave me the freedom to install my distro of choice—Linux Mint. Enter my ThinkPad T14 Gen 1, powered by an AMD CPU with 16GB of soldered RAM—a perfect Christmas gift to myself. I bought it refurbished at a reasonable price, and aside from an above-average battery, it arrived in mint! condition (pun intended).

The keyboard is fantastic, every key works perfectly. The TrackPoint, however, is a little janky—it jumps around unpredictably, but I’ve read that this is a Linux-specific issue and performs much smoother on Windows. I did manage to reduce the TrackPoint sensitivity via the command line, which helped. The trackpad? It’s the plastic, terrible one. But let’s be honest—ThinkPad trackpads have always been subpar, and I don’t see a reason to upgrade to a glass one since it still does the job. The chassis is in great shape, no visible scratches. It originally came with a skin around the keyboard and top cover, but I removed the keyboard skin since its rough texture wasn’t the most comfortable—now it looks even better.

I’ve picked the short straw and did end up with the lower-quality BOE display, but honestly, it’s functional, so I won’t complain. Also, my keyboard isn’t backlit, but that was never a deal-breaker for me. (Future me here, this has come back to bite me in the ass. The amount of times I tilted the screen to light the keyboard and see what I’m typing is way more than I bargained for. :( )

Performance I suspected the ThinkPad would hold up, and I was right—it performs at least as well as a M1 MacBook Air. I tested some of my favorite games: Lord of the Rings Online and Classic WoW, both of which run beautifully. Final Fantasy XIV is next on my list, and I have no doubt it’ll work just as well. (Future me here again, it did not, I have max 30fps :( )
I also upgraded the RAM to 32GB, filling the available RAM slot to run in dual-channel mode. This upgrade made a noticeable difference, especially for gaming, since the system shares memory with the GPU.

Beyond gaming, I wouldn’t call myself a power user. My needs are simple: web browsing, checking emails, coding, and building this website, which I’m sure will be extra fun. I also want the ability to access my NAS via VPN, back up photos from my phone, view them on a larger screen, and sync my address book, calendar, and cloud storage with Mailbox.org.

Sure, I could technically do all of this on my MacBook too, but that’s not the point. I need my Linux!

Conclusion All in all, I am pretty pleased with my new laptop. It can handle a lot, with a few hiccups. The monitor leaves a lot to be desired, the trackpad as well, but oh boy do I feel like I own the thing. No more mandatory iCloud login to be able to download apps and update them, no more messing with registries in order to make a local account and no more popups to subscribe to 365. Thanks Thinkpad and Linux!