Great aspects of the x61 tablet.....

[SNF122]

I know most users post on forums about negative content and how it can be fixed, but I am just asking for those with positive stories about their x61 tablet to post on here.

You can post anything you want...It could be a story or just how happy you are with your tablet...

As soon as I get mine(on the 7th of Jan), I will make sure to post all of the great things....

I'm sure that a lot of people that view these forums as guests would greatly appreciate this...

[Tiffany Boggs]

The X61 is a solid tablet. It can handle all the daily bumps and bruises. You dont have to worry about this sleek tablet breaking on you. Lenovo even tested dropping one and spilling water on it.

The chassis is solid and it is lightweight. The touch interface and active digitizer gives you plenty of navigating opportunities. It works great in tablet or notebook mode.

[Rushan]

I have had my X61 tablet since the end of June, but didn't get to play with it until mid July. It has been to school with me every day since the end of August to the end of Finals week (this week). I have been able to take two days of notes a total of about 4 to 5 hours of use per battery charge (8 cell). Since I am an EE major it has been used to run C++, MatLAB R2007a SE, and Xilinx code without having any problems. Also able to handle the reports and papers with out any problems (the keyboard is awesome). In almost all my classes I was the only one with a tablet and I got some unique looks and questions, but everyone thought it was a great machine. I keep it in the Lenovo sleeve with the plastic cover while taking notes and while transporting it between classes. The case protects the screen well and have not had a problem yet, even though it does look warn after all the note taking on the plastic. The wireless on the tablet is superb and I will soon be able to test its N capabilities with my new router. I highly recommend this table to any student if they can afford it. It is also decent for gaming as I have played all of Half-Life 2, HL2 episode one, portal, and soon to play HL2 episode two and team fortress on it. CS:Source plays ok on it, but have not tried online play yet (have not tried with new X3100 drivers though). After using the trackpoint it is hard for me to use a touchpad on other laptops, and even have problems using a mouse on the X61T since I always default to the trackpoint now. Vista Ultimate does a great job with handling my note taking, and does pretty good at converting to text as well. I have to say the SXGA+ screen is just awesome to use. This tablet takes a lot of abuse and keeps on working, and is right now the best notebook/tablet that I have been able to work on to date (I have worked on quite a few). I guess I could go on ... but to end the tablet is strong and will take your daily abuse. My tablet specs are in my signature.

[student]

Intels Santa Rosa platform... its totally fantastic. The X61T is first laptop I have used that has desktop like speed and responses. Ironic no, that the only good thing I can find about the X61T is not from Lenovo.

[quantum]

I'll share an experience with y'all which reminds me why I loved my x61t:

I used to work for a local TV station in the Turkish Republic of North Cyprus. The station was co-owned by a local university (Eastern Mediterranean University) and I was one of the people responsible for local news. On the day that the Turkish and Greek borders were opened for local citizens, there was a surge of former residents from each side striving to see what had happened to their homes/land/relatives (in that order, ironically). We had a crew set up at the two border gates that had been opened, and I made a call, left a single camera for a live feed at the border and took another one with me and my crew: we spoke to one of the Greek families crossing over and they agreed to be the subjects of a short documentary about their return. Working with two Sony DVCAMs, we started filming right at the border, having them tell us their stories about how they left their home and what it was like to be coming back.

We started rolling, and changed tapes at each stop. While the film crew continued filming, I started mashing cuts together in Adobe Premiere Pro. The heavy work of color correction and the CPU intensive task of rendering was draining the 4 cell pretty fast, so at the first chance I got, I swapped it with the 8 cell and continued as I charged the %80 discharged 4 cell. I took quick notes regarding questionable shots that may not be appropriate for airing.

Long story short, the Lenovo was fantastic. We could re-use the tapes we had (and we obviously didn't have enough) so we followed the family from 8 am to about 6 pm with constant filming. I charged the batteries wherever I could (grocery stores, inverter in the chase car, neighbors of the family). I had zero downtime, was editing throughout the whole thing, and in all eventuality we aired the documentary after the channel chief reviewed my notes and cut out a couple scenes. We stopped filming at 6 and the program aired at 6:22. Fastest/bestest video journalism EVER.

What made the whole thing possible was the fantastic battery life, light weight that allowed me to carry the thing around at the locations and MT/MV screen that allowed me to perform tasks standing up, walking, in the car... The Lenovo withstood extreme heat (summer on a Mediterranean island), dust/dirt and sand (they went to the beach and to what used to be their orange grove), liquids (nothing serious really, a small water spill from a bottle while running, and drops of sweat got through the keyboard from my forehead), shocks (running after the camera crew with the machine on, fumbled once but caught it in the air) and general abuse (poking the screen with my sweaty fingers, scribbling notes too fast etc)...

All in all, a great experience made possible by technology.

[pibach]

Great trackpoint, keyboard, durable chassis, screen resolution (SXGA+), 4:3 is perfect (don't like widescreens), fast, Linux friendly, good writing feel, huge HDD (mine came with Samsung 250JI), like the design

[x60t]

I love it because it doesn't have any construction problems that other people might have.

I thought I'd miss the IBM logo (now "ThinkPad X series"). Yes, but only for the first few days.

I got a SXGA+ type. I use it with a 19" LCD screen connected most of the time, just because the font size is too small for long time working. I love the real estate that it gives me though. It's cool for such a small notebook.

The keyboard is superb.

Time for notebook mode vs tablet mode is roughly 9:1. Even though I don't use inking often, whenever I use it (usually use it as a drawing/writing board on my desk rather than holding it walking around), I'd find it extremely useful! Worth the investment on a tablet pc.

Love it.

[shademar]

Haven't had mine very long, and this is my first tablet/lightweight notebook, but here goes:

The screen (XGA MV/MT) is great. I hadn't realized how dim my old 15.4 laptop screen was until I set it up next to the new tablet...plugged in the x61t is very notably brighter, better colors, ect. I initially had reservations about XGA resolution, but for a 12.1 inch screen it ends up being about right (I generally like running at much higher res, but I have an external monitor for when I need the space, ect.)

The aspect ratio is very nice for reading/editing papers. I have an anti-glare writeshield screen protector on it but the screen's inherent anti-glare coating is superior (I still want the protection though.)

The thing is quite speedy (my specs are 1.8ghz, 2gb, 7200rpm 100gb). Generally speaking it also seems pretty solid. My unit has some wobble in the hinge which is my only cause for concern thus far. Hopefully, this isn't something that'll get worse, in which case I can live with it, but I guess time shall tell.

Love the touchscreen/pen dual interface. I'm finding myself using the passive touchscreen quite a bit in laptop mode and the pen a lot of the time in tablet mode. Both are extremely intuitive. In fact non poke-able screens are already beginning to feel frustrating...

Trackpoint mouse thingy is turning out to be great. Took about a day to get used to but now it's pretty much second nature. Less hanging my wrist into unsupported space at the edge of the keyboard and less repetitive motions than with using a touchpad. Labwork's already an ergonomic nightmare, so anything to spare my hands a bit is nice.

Only a few days into owning a tablet and PDF annotator + MS OneNote07 alone make the tablet functionality worth it for me (I read and edit a lot of papers in various formats, and I'm really impressed by how these programs work to facilitate this. This is actually something I wasn't expecting to be as neat as it sounded in theory, only to find it's in fact much neater in practice.) Haven't even tried it yet for taking notes at seminars or for lab notebook purposes. Also haven't tried it for graphical editing, the main thing I was interested in.

[pibach]

I got a SXGA+ type. I use it with a 19" LCD screen connected most of the time, just because the font size is too small for long time working.

Just increase the font 1pixel, that makes the difference! To do that:
* right click desktop
* choose last item "personalize"
* if you have Aero enabled, click the link to switch to the other options view
* there select all fonts that are possible (4x here) and change them from 9pt to 10pt. This will work on all Apps. You can go higher, but I find 10pt to be the best balance of readability and real estate. DPI should remain as is, don't change that since scaling does not work precisely.

SXGA+ on 12" is perfect and I don't use my external monitor much.

[rock7777]

Just increase the font 1pixel, that makes the difference! To do that:
* right click desktop
* choose last item "personalize"
* if you have Aero enabled, click the link to switch to the other options view
* there select all fonts that are possible (4x here) and change them from 9pt to 10pt. This will work on all Apps. You can go higher, but I find 10pt to be the best balance of readability and real estate. DPI should remain as is, don't change that since scaling does not work precisely.

SXGA+ on 12" is perfect and I don't use my external monitor much.

Thanks for the tip pibach. You say this works on all apps? What exactly does it do? Does it increase all fonts displayed by 1pt or does it try to make all fonts 10pt (even the larger ones)?

A few more tips:

* Replace your pen tips with the Wacom Felt Nibs. I bought mine here. They feel miles better than the plastic ones that comes with your system. The plastic ones don't feel like any pen or pencil I've ever used - its way too slippery. With the felt nibs, I feel like I have much more control. Writing with it feels like a cross between a regular ball point pen and a pencil - almost perfect.

* Get a microfiber cloth to clean your screen. It's kind of freaky how much the SXGA+ screen get smudged with the oils from your hands and fingers. It is pretty much impossible to get rid of the smudges with ordinary cloths. I bought the Shwamee Microfiber and it works like a charm.

The X61 Tablet is a masterpiece in design and functionality. Those tips just make your experience that much better.