First ThinkPad advice

[Tyomaans]

I'd like to buy a thinkpad because I heard of the legendary durability and longevity. I am a college student and I'll be using the laptop to write, program a little and in the future years maybe use CAD modeling. I also want to keep the device for a long time. What is the best ThinkPad I can still buy new in the box? My budget is something around 1200 USD and I know thats not much money to get a Thinkpad. I was looking at E series especially E15 with i5-10210 16gb of ram and 512GB SSD or i7-10510 with 8GB of ram and 256GB SSD as i can upgrade later to 16/512. I also heard that L series is better when it comes to budget Thinkpads but my main concern is that anything from the low end series will lack the "ThinkPad" experience. Maybe there are some older models T series like T490 to consider in my budget and are better purchase?

[kfzhu1229]

I was looking at E series especially E15 with i5-10210 16gb of ram and 512GB SSD or i7-10510 with 8GB of ram and 256GB SSD as i can upgrade later to 16/512. I also heard that L series is better when it comes to budget Thinkpads but my main concern is that anything from the low end series will lack the "ThinkPad" experience. Maybe there are some older models T series like T490 to consider in my budget and are better purchase? Please advice me.

Well let me give you my experience with buying my ThinkPad brand new back in 2013. I also had similar choices. I can either get a ThinkPad T530 with low end i3-2328m, 2GB RAM, but with discrete NVS 5400M; a T530 with Pentium dual core, 4GB RAM, iGPU; a E530 with i5-2520m, 4GB RAM. My parents then pushed me to get a E530 but I didn't. I went with the first option. I had some bad time with the factory x64 installation of Windows 7 due to 2GB of RAM, but after I learnt how to switch to 32bit I had no problems since. the discrete GPU also meant that I can upgrade everything and it can actually become a high end durable system, and that's what I have now. Now I have the same T530 but upgraded the CPU to a i7-3720QM, RAM to 16GB DDR3L, screen to 1080p, and it's a very nice laptop - if it weren't for the stupid Lenovo battery cucking.
So if I were you, I would choose the older T series like T490 or T590 instead of a newer budget E series. This is especially true when I had a look at the internals (PCB layout, structural support, etc) of the newer ThinkPad E series - it's utter rubbish and doesn't look any higher end than the Lenovo ideapad and that's certainly not gonna last you a very long time.
Though you might even wanna consider a T580 instead because the T590 has only one user upgradable RAM slot, handicapping your upgrade potential down the line. Besides you can get higher specs with the T580 than a T590 too because it's a year older.

[cadillacmike68]

A ThinkPad T series, even if its a few years old will last you a LOT longer than an E or L series. I won't get anything but a T series.

If you want a better layout, then the slightly older T530 T430 or W530 (or T/W 440 / 540) will give you a better overall layout and they still have competetive CPUs. Get one with the discrete graphics, you can't upgrade to that without getting a new motherboard. The Ws can go to 32GB RAM, Ts up to 16GB. You can upgrade as you need to.

The T/W x30 series still has the trackpoint and left / right buttons - far superior to the T/W x40 series.

If you are not a fan of winblows 10 get one with Win 7 pro 64. and get a second HDD / SSD. you should also have a large capacity USB HDD for backups. Back it up (I use Acronie True Image 20 - to non-subscription one) and restore to the spare and then put the spare in and "upgrade" to w10 if you like. Then put that drive away until you really want / need w10.

[dr_st]

1200 USD should be able to get you a new-in-box T-series even of the latest generation (or maybe one before that). Just not the most high-end configuration. However, if CAD modeling is a possibility in the future, this may call for a discrete GPU, and a workstation model, like the P-series. Those would be harder to find new in this price range.

[kfzhu1229]

A ThinkPad T series, even if its a few years old will last you a LOT longer than an E or L series. I won't get anything but a T series.

If you want a better layout, then the slightly older T530 T430 or W530 (or T/W 440 / 540) will give you a better overall layout and they still have competetive CPUs. Get one with the discrete graphics, you can't upgrade to that without getting a new motherboard. The Ws can go to 32GB RAM, Ts up to 16GB. You can upgrade as you need to.

The T/W x30 series still has the trackpoint and left / right buttons - far superior to the T/W x40 series.

Well some $1000 is just total overkill for something like these. These are more meant as options if you have maximum of $500 budget. Unless you plan to get something like a Dell Precision M4700 and then spend $500 dollars on a MxM type A GTX 1050 Ti, which totally kills the point.
For this money it can be better invested in getting newer and more futureproof machines like the T480/T580 while getting high enough specs at the same time.
Also just to be clear only the xx40 series have the pointing device problems, the xx50 and later gave back the trackpoint buttons but unfortunately never the touchpad buttons. For those you need a T/Wx30 or a new Dell Latitude.

[Screamer]

Also just to be clear only the xx40 series have the pointing device problems

With the exception of the E445, E545, and the W541.

the xx50 and later gave back the trackpoint buttons but unfortunately never the touchpad buttons.

Not exactly. The P50, P51, P52, P53, P70, P71, P72, and the P73 retained the touchpad buttons.