And one of the most awesome things about Thinkpads not mentioned; you can get every (most?) replacement part directly from Lenovo. You can actually look up the part number in the service manual, order it, and replace it yourself. For nerds like us, this is sooo nice sometimes, when you just wanna get it fixed quickly, from the comfort of your own home.
The fact that there are easily accessible service manuals (that tell you how to fix the computer) or sometimes videos (that show you how to fix the computer) is also a nice plus.
Good to hear that Lenovo has continued to do this after the split from IBM - I ordered a new front bezel for my X40 when it cracked and the amount of parts available was staggering.
Didn't knew this, thanks. I also like the fact that the (rear) battery is easily replacable. Also something more recent laptops do avoid due to "the thin contest"
Recent laptops don't just avoid replaceable batteries due to thickness or weight; they avoid them because they want to cram as many battery cells in as possible, and provide longer battery life. A modern laptop chassis contains 50-80% battery cells by volume; every bit of the volume not occupied by other components gets filled by battery.
So thickness and weight are the drivers for this: You can always build a laptop that has the same battery capacity with a detachable battery as you can with a non-detachable. It's just going to be thicker and heavier.
It'll also have a great deal of wasted space, more moving parts, more breakable components, less structural support, additional hardware and software validation requirements, and require some careful engineering to avoid having it fall over backward when you open the screen slightly past vertical (battery cells work nicely as a counterweight). All for a laptop that wouldn't sell as well because people do care about size and weight.
Getting the same battery capacity would require a battery much larger than the classic removable ThinkPad battery; you'd need a system where you can remove a battery 60-80% the size of the chassis.
On the flip side, you can still replace the battery after a few years when it loses enough of its capacity; it just requires a bit more work. And for people who want more battery capacity and currently swap batteries for that, the trend towards using USB-C as the universal charging port will make it easier to have compatible external batteries, that will also work with your phone and other devices.
Why would you open the laptop screen when there is no battery? The only time when you have no battery in the laptop is the few seconds it takes to replace one with another.
AFAIK, fixed batteries are located in the very same place as the removable ones: at the rear of the laptop. They are not spread everywhere, there is no hyper-advanced design is that respect, and they definitely do not occupy 60-80% of the chassis. They could be pulled away / inserted back from the rear is the design choice was such.
> AFAIK, fixed batteries are located in the very same place as the removable ones: at the rear of the laptop.
Not typically. The tiny system board lives near the back of the laptop, to connect to the ports and the screen. (Often, the system board doesn't even take up the full width of the back of the laptop, and instead has ribbon cables connecting the ports on one side to the system board.) The battery takes up all the space under the front and middle of the laptop.
> They are not spread everywhere, there is no hyper-advanced design is that respect, and they definitely do not occupy 60-80% of the chassis.
I've seen the insides of many laptops, both in person and via pictures. I've seen battery cells laid out in many different shapes around the system board and other components, including Ls, Us, and Hs, and in multiple packets of cells with minimal connections between them.
As for "advanced design", https://www.apple.com/macbook/design/ made a point of talking about its terraced battery cells to fit the enclosure. And while some laptops might not go that far, I've seen many laptops shape groups of battery cells around other components to make a non-rectangular battery.
And as for volume, I've personally seen the internals of many laptops, and the better the laptop, the higher proportion of the volume that consists of battery cells. I wouldn't have given those estimated numbers if I hadn't seen laptops fitting both ends of that range and various points in the middle. (Some quick searches suggest that much smaller laptops, and lower-end laptops, may dip as low as 40-50% battery cells; medium and large laptops, and those intended as higher-end or with higher expected battery life, have more.)
I totally agree that integrated batteries sell better - I just wanted to point out that the driver is "cram the same capacity in less space and weight". It's a tradeoff between the three, and since a lot of people prefer lighter, smaller laptops over serviceability, that's where things go. (Written on a laptop with a non-removable battery).
I'm still waiting for a USB C battery pack that can output the 20V that the XPS 13 requires. That said Dell's external battery pack is excellent, though extremely expensive.
A new keyboard is like 40-50 € for most models, for example. But don't expect to get a sparkling new system board for 200 €. New rubber feet are like 10 € (but it's the whole set for all rubber feet of the system). For the X20x there are still some parts available new from distributors. Which is like 6-7 years of parts supply.
