Lenovo Thinkpad T430 Built Business Laptop Computer (Intel Dual Core i5 Up to 3.3 Ghz Processor, 8GB Memory, 320GB HDD, Webcam, DVD, Windows 10 Professional) (Renewed)

I really like my Lenovo Thinkpad and I will tell you why. I recently ordered, a new 2 in 1 "TabTop type PC. It's not like an older PC (Personal Computer) at all. It is basically a Windows 10 Touchscreen Tablet with a keyboard. It only has 1 USB 3.0 Port so if you use a USB mouse you can't plug in a Flashdrive at the same time. It has a USB 3.1 port but I went to Walmart and Best Buy and there is not a single plug in device you can buy that uses USB 3.1 so it is basically useless until new devices come out utilizing the new USB standard The bios is fixed, that means it wont boot from a cd rom, like for installing Windows 7 or 8.1, or even Widows 10. It won't read from a USB CD rom plugged into the USB Port, it just beeps and locks up the the mouse and keyboard. Can't load or play anything from a CD - Nero, Microsoft Office, Mp3, Mp4 music and videos. You're now supposed to download all your "apps" from the Microsoft Store. Thinner and lighter is much about phasing out CD based software, so CD software has to be loaded onto flashdrives. Doable but extra time and expense. I wanted to load Ubuntu as a dual boot, can't do it, Windows 10 only. It looks like this machine represents the future "brave new world of Microsoft" It is not a Computer like we have gotten used to. You are limited to the world of MS Windows 10 touchscreen as it is basically, more of a tablet aimed at the Smartphone demographic. My wife's Galaxy Tab seems to be as much or more useable for 1/4 the price. If I wanted to ground her all I would have to do is take away her Galaxy.Now, about the Lenovo, just reverse everything I just said. The Thinkpad T430 is a true PC. You can do all of the things you can't do with the Windows Tablet and more. It will run Windows XP, 7, 8.1 and Windows 10. Without a touchscreen, using a mouse you can just about fully duplicate any Windows 10 function activated by touch, though touch is deemed to be "way cool" and more up to date, overall a little faster. The Lenovo Website not only has drivers for every OS and internal device, but how-to Videos abound that show you how to do everything! It acts like a real PC. It's got plenty of ports. i5 CPU and 7200 rpm HD is more than adequate for every day usage though there are two easily accessible places to upgrade to ssd for a total of two terabytes! It just works. Two screws and you can upgrade the RAM and even install a PCIe mSata ssd card, or replace the HD with an ssd, one screw and it slides out, no need to open the covers. It uses a special thinner, 2.5 inch drive so you have to make sure you order the right form factor. The CD rom drive also easily slides out in seconds and is user replaceable. These are all FRU's aka Field Replaceable Units. An old IBM term, (I worked for IBM back in the day). The T430 is one of the most durable, versatile PC's I have ever used. It has all the benefits of "Old School" but not really old, without some of the shortercomings of some of the new breed of machines heading down the pike. If you wan't a real PC that does everything you want it to do, then the T430 more than fills the bill.Don't really want to dis TabTop users, just that the PC world is vaguely divided between Old School Windows 7 Right Click mouse and keyboard folks and Touchscreen Smartphone folks; kinda like the Demecans and Republicrats. a sveldt 2.2 lb .5 inch thick new machine versus a 6 lb has everything does everything, comes with a built-in cd rom drive, Old School Laptop. My Granddaughters think I'm a dinosaur, but cute, like Barney. Since you won't see them go 5 minutes without checking their iphone, they automatically gravitate towards the newer MacBook Air and Surface Pro.Located along side the memory slot easily accessible by two screws is an mSata slot. I installed a 256 gb Samsung V-NAND SSD 850 EVO mSATA board. They're available up to 1tb. In my machine there was a screw already in the RH locator post. about a ten second operation with two wires that have to be folded out of the way. The Lenovo copper cooling fan located under the keyboard is relatively large and heavy duty. I didn't notice anything other than a slight temperature increase with the ssd installed. I downloaded both the Samsung cloning and Management software, pretty much a no-brainer. I removed the regular 2.5 inch drive and use it for backup and external storage. There is a definite performance boost and the T430 now performs like a machine costing 3x more. The best of both worlds in my opinion, plus it's built like a tank. Some folks are concerned with weight; I don't see where a few pounds can make that much of a real-world difference when used mainly as a desktop or even as a Laptop, but that's just me. Last time I flew in an airplane it was roomy and comfortable, the stewardesses were all under 40, plus you got a meal flying coach, and no nard-groping. TSA to ruin your day.I bought a new 9 cell battery for $40.00 and some Windows 7 and 8.1 recovery disks from ebay. I decided to give Windows 10 a second look and for the first time I used Cortana. My wife is talking into her tablet so I thought I'd give it a try. She's fast and really smart, (i.e. Cortana), my wife, like me is not so fast anymore. A time-saver when browsing the Internet, so I'm going to stick with 10 for a while and see how it goes.Overall, I'm like the cat who ate the canary. I got a really good machine at a really good price. Upon arrival it looked like a machine that had some use, but not bent or beat-up, better than I expected. Doesn't matter much, as nine times out of ten computers either work, or they don't. This one works as good as new and I'm a happy camper.

I bought this "recertified" laptop with some trepidation, since I have had mixed success with such purchases in the past. However, I consider this purchase is an unqualified success.For background, I do not need a personal laptop much except when I travel. I build my own desktop PCs and I have a pretty robust rig in my man-cave for most needs at home, plus a HTPC in the family room. I therefore don't want to sink a lot of money into something I only use occasionally. On the other hand, knowing a thing or two about computers, I found the new offerings in the $300-$350 range to be pretty disappointing to say the least. We're pretty much talking a cheaply built piece of flimsy plastic with 4GB of RAM and a clunky processor at that price point. A prime example being the Acer piece of junk my new ThinkPad T430 is replacing. So my conundrum was how to get prime rib performance and quality on a hamburger budget (and no, I'm not a vegetarian!).My computer at work gave me the basis for my solution. My work computer is a HP ProBook laptop that plugs into a docking station at work and I take it home on the weekends and some evenings. I have had my current ProBook for about two years. Being a government computer, it is pretty much clobbered with government software and connects via a sluggish network but with 8GB of RAM and an Intel i5 processor, it has performed as well as one could expect and has held up exceptionally well to daily use (nearly 7 days a week due to the nature of my job .. BTW, think about that the next time you sneer at civil service folks since some of us do have real jobs!). So I started looking for recertified HP ProBooks and EliteBooks but after reading lots of reviews that compared them with Lenovo ThinkPads, I expanded my search to include those. Although I have not had a ThinkPad since they were owned by IBM, the T430s looked like the best bang for the buck and so far, that seems to have been a very good call.So here is a summary of my mostly positive experience so far. As some reviewers have mentioned, the computer arrives well packaged. True statement and that's more than I can say about Amazon's outer box, which was way too big, allowing the inner box to move around a lot. Fortunately, the inner packaging (highly recyclable, BTW) kept the computer snug and reasonably protected from shock. I expected to see some wear and scratches and found none, zero, nada, zilch, goose-egg and null-set instances of blemishes. The ruggedly superb build quality was clearly evident from the moment I opened the box. I nearly broke into a happy dance but fortunately thought better of it.The first boot-up was pleasantly uneventful. Windows 10 ran its usual start-up wizards, giving me gentle prompts for WiFi connection, log-in to my Microsoft account, etc.. No drama there. Once the initial set up was complete, Windows of course asked if I wanted to install updates. Pro-tip: say yes, since much of that are security updates but then expect the process to take a while (2 hours in my case since there was a big service pack involved). It's worth it though.Once updated, I did the next thing I always do with a new laptop, namely embarking on a search and destroy mission for bloatware. This was the only real surprise in the whole out-of-box experience. Amazingly, no bloatware! I went to the uninstall programs section in Control Panel and found maybe five items listed, all of which the laptop needed. Pleasantly surprised, I moved on to load my personal apps and configure Windows the way I have it on my other computers. No glitches and superb, smooth performance throughout. A word to the wise, although a computer "can" run Windows 10 on 4GB, I consider 8GB to be the minimum for decent performance. I may upgrade to 16GB down the road but the performance I have seen so far puts that much lower on my to-do list.Looking ahead, I plan to upgrade the T430 to a SSD at some point. For upgraders, the ease with which you can access the HDD and RAM was one of the big selling points for buying a corporate grade laptop. In contrast, the Acer that I am relegating to the recycle bin required extensive disassembly and removal of the motherboard to access the RAM. No, really, I am not exaggerating! Check YouTube.My ThinkPad T430 is clearly a keeper!Okay, so this would not be a proper Amazon review unless I found something negative to say, so this is the best I can come up with:1) Amazon needs to stop using trained bears in their packaging section. Jeez! I am glad I have that off my chest.2) A printed "quick-start" guide in the box would have been nice. For instance, the day after initial start-up, I got the "Activate Windows" message on my desktop. I am well used to this process on my desktop builds but I have not needed to do that on a newly purchased laptop before since they are typically pre-activated at the factory. I briefly thought, "oh crap, here we go with unlicensed software," but to my relief, the authenticity label was right where it was supposed to be on the bottom. However, what all purchasers might not notice is a "scratch-off" section obscuring part of the activation code. I happened to notice that from experience but I am not sure everyone would. With the complete activation code revealed, activation was a snap. A couple page guide that covers "expectation management" kind of things such as the activation process, wouldn't be that hard or expensive, would it? Come on, guys!3) While I hate bloatware and other unnecessary stuff occupying hard drive space, it would have been a nice touch to include the Lenovo User Manual on the hard drive (and pointed out in the aforementioned quick-start guide). It's easy enough to download but it would have been a thoughtful inclusion.4) If you have read the other reviews, you probably already know the T430 does not have HDMI. Not a deal-breaker for me and I'll probably buy an adapter just in case I need to connect to a HDMI display for some reason. But if you absolutely must have HDMI installed, you'll need to look elsewhere. So there, I told you too. But I think having 4 USB ports, 2 of which are USB-3, more than compensates since I never met a USB port I didn't like (and use).That's as close to negative as I can get. Otherwise, my T430 and I are off to a great start. Some users who look at a computer as an appliance may be put off by the lack of additional software. No, this does not have Microsoft Office installed, so don't ask in Amazon's Questions and Answers section and you'd probably get some clown telling you "I don't know" anyway. Snarky comments aside, I cannot recommend this to someone absolutely lacking in computer skills and would suggest that those folks stick to their iPhones and tablets (still a bit snarky, huh?). But for those in my situation who are not intimidated by the Windows 10 environment, can live without leading/bleeding edge technology but still want a durable and reliable laptop, you've come to the right place. The notable exception would be gamers and you poor suckers are going to have to plunk-down the big bucks for a gaming laptop if mobility is that important to you. Hint: Desktops still have a role and gaming is one of the reasons!So with the above caveats noted, the Lenovo ThinkPad T430 gets five stars and my strongest recommendation. This piece of cyber prime rib is delicious!

It's not sexy, but it's a great machine for the price. It has excellent RAM capability and is fairly tough/hardy - I travel a lot and it has held up very well. It's quite bulky/clunky (like I said, not really "fun"), but I like the screen size for large photos/graphic projects. It processes quickly and was in excellent condition when I received it, even though it was refurbished. I highly, highly recommend this machine if you're looking for an affordable, highly functional, utterly unsexy laptop.