Miss the old ThinkPads? Consider an Elitebook

[A]

Correct, not to mention if you look at the other USB port that is on the left side, it has a small daughter board with a single USB. If a manufacturer wanted to make it easily serviceable without soldering, they can do the same for the USB-C port. So the whole notion of saying there is any advantage to barrels is silly.

For any laptop 100W or below, you are better off with 2 USB-C charge ports.

Though you technically aren't even limited to 100W. That is simply the specifications. A manufacturer can always go above those specs if they include slightly thicker cables. Just like the Dell XPS which had a 130W USB-C charger.

Hi,

Yeah, it's true that you can put USB-C on a cable (and I believe I even mention this in the article). My point is that it's not terribly common, and in this case the EliteBook doesn't do that. Plus, someone mentioned (and you noticed) that the barrel was soldered, so yeah I'd agree there's little benefit to it regarding repairability.

Thing is, USB-PD is fairly more complicated electrically than just taking a standard DC power plug. Things can go wrong much more easily with that opposed to just a standard charging circuit to a charging rail.

USB-PD is great (I love it, I can charge my phone with my laptop charger), but until more companies start putting their cables on daughter boards, I'm not going to be the biggest fan of it.

The point I was trying to making was that having a barrel in itself isn't a good thing, a good thing would be having 2 USB-C ports on both sides all of them connected to daughterboards. Look, I bought a cheap HP Chromebook 14 G5 for $150. (The lesser known HP 14-ca052wm models that are for some reason a lot cheaper, not sure why, maybe they are meant for foreign markets and imported, I don't know). That cheap $150 laptop has USB-C charging from both sides!, and both sides USB are on their own daughterboards!

So the question boils down, is asking the same from a product that cost 10-20X more that unreasonable?

I'm sure that it's not out of the question that there is less circuits on a barrel port, so in theory less can go wrong. But it isn't to the point where it is that significant. I venture if I had 2 USB-C ports to charge from, the ports will outlast the lifespan of the laptop easily.

From my experience, what usually breaks is the power connector cable. And I'd have a much harder time getting a replacement barrel cable then a USB-C cable. Especially since universal chargers tend to be a hit or miss. They work okay for a few months, but due to not being 100% fit, I think it causes the port more damage. Not to the point it'll break, but I've had cases where universal chargers stopped working on that laptop if you don't align the cable perfectly after a few months while official cable still works fine.

Maybe more news outlets should put pressure on manufacturers to design their laptops more properly. Then we can have more laptops with USB-C charging on daughterboards, cause if a $150 laptop can do it, is there any excuse?

[Seriouscat]

I'm not sure if this is the right place to ask. But if one decides to get a Thinkpad anyway, then is there any with

1) a good IPS sRGB display that is at least FullHD,
2) good battery capacity (at least six to eight hours browsing, reading and writing) and
3) good keyboard for a Thinkpad

in 14" or 15" size (14" preferred)? How far back in time would one need to go if buying second hand if none of the new ones are good? I plan to hunt through all the reviews unless someone has a quick answer to this.

[Paulinus]

Seriously. Have you used both, for extended (months?) period of time?
I've got to use, zbook14g1, zbook14g3, 840g5 (and zbook14g5, same machine), zbook14g6, t480, t490 and now t495.
#1 ergonomics
Trackpoint in hp is unusable, compared to tp. Precision sux, autodrift after a month. One plus, you can disable it, and remap keys to get four touchpad buttons.
Touchpad, different, but comparable
Keyboard? geez, don't even get me started. It's like comparing apple abomination to actual, or 5y older products.
HP keyboard is ok, if you use two, max three fingers to type, not for serious work. It was superb, and I loved it, in g4 and older machines.
And what about that thing in right upper corner? skype keys? non reconfigurable? Instead of pause/break and insert?¿??
And linux users love that? gimme a break.
That was major turnoff for me, I've preffered to get back my old g1, and returned all those hp.

#2 screen
Both sides has some awesome options, if you want to pay for them.
Most are too dim, washed out, or even low res (HDready... seriously??)
But, lenovo has that lowpower series, which I love.
And hp has that magical privacy filter. It's awesome, one and only, which I can use and recommend. And that was only reason to try that g5/g6 again and again. But no, I cannot use that crappy keyboard :/

#3 connectors
I must say, hp has upper hand here.
That "old" slide in port replicator connector is awesome. It works, always, and don't give a damn about thunderbolt.
Seriously, afair, noone used tb for replicators correctly. It's notoriuously crappy, disconnects all the time, and everyone (hp, dell, lenovo) has probems with tb. Just apple can do it properly, and thats a shame
Back to topic, hp has stable working port replicator. Lenovo does not.
Got both generations of pro and ultra replicators for t480/90/95, and let me say, it's not working good.
t480/90 use thunderbolt for connection, and you can read in many places, how hard lenovo dropped ball, with intel's helping hand, on tb3 in that laptops. Yes, all that rage was for tb3, integrated with usbc connectors, which is faulty.
And now, t495, with amd ryzen. Of course, there is only pure usb-c, which should work better, and dockstation isn't new, it's the same as for t480/90. But nope, nada.
T495 has perfectly fine working usbc, but when you try to use dockstation? things happen. It's ok, if you dont have anything connected to dock.
But lets say, you have lcd panel, or three, for comfort. If you are lucky, and insert t495 in sleep mode, with lid open, it may, or may not, work. One time, everything is fine, 1h later, nope, nothing is dected, just connected power brick. After all updates, lenovo suggests to do hard shutdown (shift+ctrl+click on shutdown windows), with laptop undocked. Then dock it, open lid, and start from scratch.
Great, thats awesome, just needed to write notes from meeting, do some drawings, spawn new cluster of machines, and run for another meeting.

#4 upgrades
Both companies have whitelisted components, so upgrade is possible for ram, and not too mutch more.
Hp may be pricier, but you can buy lte modem, ssd, or other parts. Lenovo? not so mutch. Maybe 2-3 years after release, when laptops go second hands.
But alas, dimms. Hp win there. You can have 32G ram (maybe even 64 now?).
Or upgrade to max later.
Lenovo says, that 32G is uspported, but: go and find one. That's not possible, everyone is selling 8g soldered + 8/16 in dimm slot.
There should be another one, with 16g soldered, and free slot, or just 32gb ram, but I wasn't able to buy it in europe. As usual, US have broader offer.

Finally. Lenovo won ergonomically.
I've got my old zbook14g1, and t495 + t490 from work. on paper, I'll want to preorder gen10 lenovo with ryzen 4000. But again, no, I need to test, read fine print, ask people, etc. Before buying worthless piece of plastic for 250euro.
Or maybe, hp will finally give and option to remap buttons? Or to exchange keyboard for non-collaboration in cto models?
We'll see.
Take care, stay healthy.

[Loki Rautio]

Please note that all comments below this one are from a previous version of this article. This article has since been rewritten completely, so previous comments don't reflect the content of this updated version.

[Rachael Conley]

I have to say, after using the HP elite book series for well over four years and the Lenovo just short of 9 months, I detest my Lenovo. The trackpad is super sensitive to commuter woes and I had to replace my first laptop within 3 months due to glitchy trackpad and broken webcam. That crappy plastic shell cracks easily, yes, but absorbs NOTHING. My second one has already cracked. What an absolute piece of crap. This was during corona, so I was only moving from room to room and barely commuting. Not robust at all! Also not impressed with RAM for doing high powered analysis that the hp seemingly handled better (though this may have something to do with the graphics card, about which I know nothing)

In contrast, I had my hp elite book for four years while commuting daily. What a beast! This thing handled drops, toddlers, slight water damage, and never even a glitch.

So, disagree after using both extensively

HP elitebook > Lenovo thinkpad

[Nikoooooo]

Thinkpads are so overhyped thanks to their fanboys. They always come with the worst screens and speakers and the least amount of features when compared the elitebooks and latitudes. I always go with the elitebooks, never regretted my desicion

[Brian Lech]

You forgot one major factor when dealing with an enterprise environment.  The ability for the vendor to turn around inventory quickly.  I have no experience with ordering bulk quantities of Thinkpads, Dell however... I suppose they are ok if you like waiting 5 weeks for your items to be delivered.

HP's are great because of their ready to ship models.  It was the number one reason we switched from a Dell shop to HP.  I can get product from HP in 2 to 8 days, anything from Dell was a month or more at best.  Cost to performance the HP's cant be beat.