ThinkPad T61

[Singapore]

I just bought a laptop of ThinkPad T61 with (PC2-5300) 1GB of ram (1 DIMM) and upgraded to 2 GB by adding another 1 GB ram to the other DIMM. When I checked BIOS, Memory indicates: 2,048MB in total. However, the Welcome Center of Windows Vista shows only 1.96GB or 2,014MB. Does anyone know why? And how about your T61?

Another question is about the battery lasting time. The battery of my T61 is a 4-cell one.
I charged the battery for over 10 hours before I used it the first time. However, it lasted for only 1.5 hours and shut the system down when I used it at the first time. Will it increase lasting time if I repeat use it for several time? How about your T61?

 

[SergeC]

Your video hardware is using a bit of your system RAM as its frame buffer, therefore that bit is unavailable to Windows.

 

[Singapore]

Thanks for your response.

 

[Ruptga]

SergeC is right about the video memory, it's dynamically allocated, minimum is 8MB, and I believe maximum is 224MB, but that's for GMA 950, it's 300-something if you have a Santa Rosa notebook.

about batteries, the old NiMH batteries kept their charge better if you drained them fully and recharged them fully, but Lithium Ion batteries (the ones all laptops use today) last longer if you don't fully discharge them. Battery life steadily decreases as the things are used and age, but the battery should last at least a year or two (IIRC) before it's noticable

 

[slugg]

I just got my T61 yesterday. I'm dual booting XP Pro and Vista Business. I've noticed a much higher battery life in XP Pro. I get about 6.5 hours in XP pro with a 7 cell "extended" battery and the slim ultrabay battery. With Vista, I get an abysmal 4.5 hours. This is with screen brightness to a little above minimum, active hard disk protection (motion sensing thing), wifi and bluetooth enabled, and the nVidia Quadro video card. Wifi is the intel ABGN card.

As for the memory, yes the video card shares a little bit of memory with the rest of your computer.

Let me ask you something... Do you have the nVidia Powermizer (whatever its called) in Vista? I can get to it in XP, but its as if its simply not there in Vista. I took the drivers from IBM's site as nVidia's drivers wouldn't install for some reason. I have a feeling that's the reason for my declined battery life in Vista, although it might be Aero. I'm new to Vista, so I really don't know what's going on.

Overall, I'm extremely impressed with this notebook. This is the second notebook I've owned (first = dell inspiron) and it blows away any other laptop I've ever used in terms of quality. If I can answer any more questions about the computer, let me know!