Lenovo’s new ThinkPads score 10/10 for repairability
ifixit.com
ifixit.com
Everything works pretty well out of the box, it never really overheats, Linux support required basically no effort with NixOS, the keyboard feels pretty nice, the screen is bright and easy to read, and fortunately I bought it when RAM prices weren't insane so I got the 64GB model.
I haven't tried repairing it yet but considering how well it's been working I'm not even sure I'll need ever need to. If this laptop gets stolen, I will likely just buy another ThinkPad, I'm a complete convert.
I remember a Thinkpad BIOS update ended up destroying both undervolting and overclocking, and required a "chip-clip" programmer to revert.
It's a real problem that BIOS updates for consumer systems never come with a meaningful changelog, so evaluating whether a particular update is a good idea or not is basically impossible.
I guess I did “ have a specific bug that needs fixed”; I just didn’t know it!
(And I'm trying to avoid talking about microcode updates, which is a whole other story of fuckups)
Regarding Thinkpad BIOS: I have a Raspberry Pi Zero and a self soldered RP2040 programmer [1] in my travel kit for a reason. When travelling, a lot of the Cellebrite rootkits rely on an OEM BIOS, so they typically reflash your BIOS in the "we gonna check your laptop" phase.
[1] would totally recommend serprog, it's awesome: https://codeberg.org/Riku_V/pico-serprog
I've had the laptop for about two years now and it still runs just as well as the day I bought it. I'm very happy with it.
[1] No I will not stick with Windows. Please feel free to read through my comment history to see why, but TL;DR I just don't like it.
Aside from that one dell laptop, though, I generally avoid HP and dell entirely, so perhaps that's why.
I never really figured out how to get the discrete card working consistently, and since then I haven't bought a laptop with an Nvidia card.
I've had issues with wifi cards and sound drivers and the like as well, though it's going a lot better now than it was a decade ago.
It's not acceptable on a high-end laptop nowadays (120hz minimum). Imagine the reduction in headaches, fatigue and nausea if we stopped tolerating this penny-pinching.
My main requirement for a next laptop is running NixOS (coming from Macbook land). It’s probably this or one of the new XPS models, but not clear what NixOS support looks like there.
In the case of my ThinkPad, you can see there is literally no extra work required: https://github.com/NixOS/nixos-hardware/blob/master/lenovo/t...
Still, doesn't mean you shouldn't look into other brands, obviously. Take a look at that repo to see if there's obvious compatibility stuff.
My only grievance is a bit buggy firmware. When I turn laptop on or reboot, speakers will randomly be muted (not a problem after OS boots, but for example in UEFI it'll either beep or not beep and that's random). UEFI interface was a bit buggy regarding mouse control, for example I've used to touch and drag things in boot order, but it didn't work and I have to actually press touchbar button down and keeping it like that move cursor. But touch drag works in other places. Not a big issue bit the first time I encountered it, I spent good few minutes trying to make sense of it, as I thought it just does not allow me to reorder boot entries or something like that. But these are small issues and once you've installed OS, you never deal with that.
Oh, and another complaint is that their BIOS update procedure is super weird. I have to find computer with Windows, download some exe, unpack things, find some BAT file and write to USB drive things, then boot from it. Theoretically they publish stuff to fwupd but I don't like this service. My best BIOS update experience was on Asus PC. I just put some bin file onto FAT32 USB drive, entered UEFI configuration, chose "update", selected that file and that's about it. Super easy, every manufacturer must implement this workflow.
Anyway I'm satistfied owner and my next laptop will likely be Thinkpad. Mostly because its stellar Linux support, but also because I didn't have any major issues with my current laptop.
Basically right now my setup is super simple and restricted and I have to make it significantly more complicated and insecure to allow fwupd to work.
While most of the hardware works, hibernate doesn't, which annoys me. Fingerprint scanner also only works randomly at login, Linux issue I assume. Machine was crashing once a week (logs suggest it was AMDGPU related), but not since the firmware update, so fingers crossed that's fixed. In retrospect I wish I got the L14, didn't realize I would need more RAM at the time.
Tossed Kubuntu on it and every single piece of hardware was found and worked right out of the box. The hardware linux support has been fantastic.
Feels like the old A31p in practical grunt but thinner and easier to maintain.
Today I Learned about LPCAMM2, which is refreshing, seeing soldered-on memory always felt like some kind of slide into disposable barbarism.
[0] https://www.ifixit.com/News/95078/lpcamm2-memory-is-finally-...
Regarding the T14 and T16, I'm frustrated that in my market (AU), they don't sell better screens than 1920x1200. I'd like to have a brighter 3k or 4k screen.
The LPCAMM2 seems to be limited to the Intel models, according to the pc mag article.
https://www.pcmag.com/news/lenovo-thinkpad-t14-gen-7-hands-o...
That is usually my concern with things like the modular ports and replaceable keyboards too. By the time I actually need to replace anything it could be 10 years from now, could I actually source these parts easily?
Regardless, that is a excellent problem to have compared to other less repairable laptops. I have been running my current laptop for 10 years, by the time it's unrepairable I might switch to this.
I imagine it will be kind of like USB-C. It's new and uncommon for a few years until suddenly everywhere you look has piles of it.
Edge connector RAM may one day be looked back on as "old style memory" like SIPP and DIPP is now.
I don’t have the tools or skills to replace soldered on memory chips when they fail. Nobody at my place of work does. Nobody was doing that type of work in a warranty centre I worked in either.
I’d need to buy an entire motherboard which will much more expensive, and likely more time consuming, than swapping a couple of memory modules.
One time upgrading workstations, 4 of the 20 Corsair kits were sent for RMA. Those aren’t great odds.
I would guess that soldering them to the board reduces the points of failure, the slots can and do fail. However, I’ve also seen soldered components coming off as the cause of failures, but it is usually a part that gets hot combined with a design flaw.
That being said, I really did have one bad stick of RAM once in my life, and it really does cause strange seemingly random problems.
Plus, no way to put more RAM/replace RAM with larger module if it's soldered on.
I think making it impossible to upgrade is a somewhat bigger problem, at least while the machine is still in-warranty.
Traditionally, RAM has been one of the more-common upgrades to make as needs or budgets change, so soldering it in looks like planned-obsolescence.
99% of people will not be replacing the USB-C port, they'll just bin the device and buy a new one or live with a dead port. So the effort is 80% PR 20% actual usefulness.
I am waiting to jump ship to a different manufacturer, but nobody is challenging ThinkPad on keyboard quality/layout and Linux support, the two factors where I'm totally unwilling to compromise. (Tuxedo is close but still not the better alternative.)
I’m no expert but it sounds plausible to me. From a manufacturing perspective, it makes sense that they’d want modular RAM so they can configure them at point of sale instead of having to manufacture multiple motherboards with only RAM sizes being different.
Cool how memory converged on the same grid-of-pins solution as CPUs.
Was there some issue in customer support, or getting spare parts?
Is it about the new products that have since come out?
I'm also using a Framework notebook for the past two years and have been quite happy, but nothing needed replacement so far...
That said, I've owned them personally for 10+ years, so looking for objective thoughts outside repairability as the article covers.
But older Thinkpads (not sure about newer (~5 years old) ones, certainly not brand brand new models) have great support of alternative firmware such as coreboot and libreboot, other projects that disable Intel ME and the like.
<in reference to hardware buttons in the spaceship control panel>
USA astronaut: "This is an American aircraft, you don't know the parts"
Russian astronaut: "Ah, American parts, Russian parts... all made in Taiwan!"
Almost every upgrade of firmware for my Lenovo laptop is CVEs recently. I have no doubts they share that with their government and keep some backdoors opened.
Anyway, every die? citation needed.
Also. If true, what's the alternative?
AMD's PSP (now ASP) seems to be more of a local attack surface[2] that has its fair share of vulnerabilities.[3]
[1] https://www.franksworld.com/2025/09/18/the-intel-backdoor-no...
[2] https://www.digit.in/features/laptops/intel-me-and-amd-psp-t...
[3] https://www.amd.com/en/resources/product-security/bulletin/a...
> Going from a high score to the highest score isn’t usually about making minor tweaks. It requires fighting for every small, boring, consequential decision—the ones that determine whether a repair isn’t merely possible or practical, but within easy reach.
Then they give this Laptop a 10/10. One look at the internals and without a shadow of doubt it's not as as repairable friendly as framework laptop.
Not sure what they are smoking.
Yea someone else said it but bios updates on certain models can be hit or miss. But definitely better than dell or hp. I'd take Asus over Lenovo any day for bios though.
Bottom of the page
I'm the current owner of a T14s (gen3 AMD) and the non-replaceable wifi chip has been my biggest pain point with it. I'm somewhat disappointed to see them give this 10/10 score with that problem unresolved.
according to lspci it's a Qualcomm QCNFA765 and it works great under Linux...until you suspend the machine. after it wakes up from suspend, it will only stay connected for a few seconds to a minute before dropping the connection and re-establishing it.
I've replaced wifi chips in other Thinkpads I've owned, so I naively assumed this would be the same as well - just swapping out the M.2 card. but no such luck, it's soldered in place.
I ended up using systemd to rmmod-then-modprobe the ath11k_pci module when the system resumes from sleep. this is annoying because it adds a delay of several extra seconds before the machine is ready to use, but none of the "smaller hammer" workarounds I attempted worked at all.
One thing which worries me, is how easily the Qualcomm core platforms run novel OS because I don't see indications they are avoiding blob dependency either in the core, or in peripheral control. It will probably be fine if you run the Lenovo tailored linux release, but if you want to run a BSD or something else you might find either you're on a slower path, or you have less battery life, or you simply can't drive some devices. (I am a user not a kernel/devicedriver developer so if I misunderstand blobbyness and why things like wifi cards often don't work please don't hate me)
But for hardware replacement? This is ace! I like the other sources which people use too, but Lenovo has a worldwide warranty, and has agents almost everywhere so your ability to be on-the-road, pick up a phone, quote a number and get a part is significantly enhanced. (in my experience)
Not even an attempt to clear the ai smell out of this piece.
Later, Framework send me a laptop in 1 week and later a replacement screen in less then a week. It's been 3 years ago now.
I generally have it always plugged in, but it's not great.
The bad points: - The colored bezel is shit. - The way is open wasn't good for me and had to switch the hinges. Now I don't even think about it, but it was really bad before. - The 60W Power adapter doesn't last long and had to change it each year. Now I switch to the 180W. - The battery is ok but not exceptional
The good points: - The screen is very good (don't remember which one I choose, but not the first one, nor the last, I remember only 3 options so ...). - The compute power is quite good, I'm impressed about that. - Easy to clean, open it with the screwdriver, a little "Compressed air" on it, a little "Eyeglass Cleaner", and it's basically new. - The support was very very good. I had a defective screen kit. The ask me for photos, twice (two opinions from different people). Then conclude, like I already did, that it was an internal problem (but they have to verify I'm not responsible for the defect, that is normal) and send me a display kit free of charge. I had to send back the old on, free of charge too.
Yes exactly! To me it's surely the biggest win. It's very easy to break them when the power chord is plugged in. I'm really pleased that we will now be able to fix them without having to change the whole motherboard (which surely very few people do because of expansive and how ridiculous it sounds)
I replaced the batteries a few months ago and it was painless.
https://www.reddit.com/r/thinkpad/comments/bibx3p/t470s_supp...
I immediately switched it to Fedora and everything worked out of the box except the fingerprint reader which started working a few weeks later after a firmware update (also handled effortlessly/perfectly within Gnome - and it still gets updates!)
With OpenAI completely destroying the component supply chain in 2026 I think this requires citations
(Typing this from a T14 gen 1.)
OTOH unofficially T480 (not S) can work with two 32 GB SODIMMs. I did not try that.
(I wish the AMD-based thinkpads supported ECC RAM. Ryzen 7 mobile CPUs technically allow for that.)
I bought an internal and external battery and the external one quickly started bloating.
The models I owned, or were work assigned, upgrading mem/disk was never an issue, the device could live until it died of motherboard issues, or similar non-upgradable components.
10, Lenovo ThinkPad T14 Gen 7 and T16 Gen 5
10, Framework Laptop 12
10, Framework Laptop 16
9, Lenovo ThinkPad L16 Gen 2
9, Lenovo ThinkPad 13w 2-in-1 Gen 3
9, Lenovo ThinkPad L14 Gen 6
9, Lenovo ThinkPad E14 Gen 7
9, Lenovo ThinkPad E16 Gen 3
9, Lenovo ThinkPad T14 Gen 6
9, Lenovo ThinkPad T16 Gen 4
9, Lenovo ThinkPad E16 Gen 2
9, Lenovo ThinkPad E14 Gen 6
9, Lenovo ThinkPad L14 Gen 5
9, Lenovo ThinkPad T16 Gen 3
9, Lenovo ThinkPad T14 Gen 5
8, Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 3
8, Microsoft Surface Laptop 7
7, Lenovo ThinkPad T14 Gen 3
5, MacBook Air 13″ (M4)
5, MacBook Air 15″ (M2)
5, MacBook Air 13″ (M2)
5, MacBook Pro 14″ (M1)
4, MacBook Pro 14-inch (M5, 2025)
https://www.ifixit.com/repairability/laptop-repairability-sc...
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1R_egXm7iwR0isCt_UxcG...
This new modular thinkpad will be crazy for refurb market, I wonder how is Lenovo going to prevent that eating into their sales. This probably means that corporate bulk purchases are majority of their sales and they don't fear to canibalize themselves which makes you wonder why they switched to soldered ram - incredibly unpopular move - at all.
The only other device I've owned which might have that sort of longevity is my Fujitsu Stylistic ST-4110 (which I quite miss for its transflective display).
Really wish the Lenovo Yogabook 9i was in the ThinkPad line and that it had a Wacom EMR stylus....
The most annoying part is that the key matrix isn't set up to 3-key rollover with the copilot key like it would be for a real modifier key. (I'd assumed they'd just keep the matrix they used when there was a modifier in that spot. Nope.) Consequently, some key combinations, e.g. ralt-rcontrol-spacebar, don't work. Press them, nothing happens. Infuriating.
From what I understand, Gen 2 was the last one to have S3, and newer versions with si0x will have higher power consumption in sleep mode, right?
Whereas Lenovo laptops (non Thinkpads) from 2007 and 2021 are very solid nearly unbreakable.
By elevating ThinkPad T-series above other laptops by reputation, do iFixit weaken their notion of objective repairability ratings?
That made me start looking into their scores. The Thinkpad E14 Gen 7 gets a 9/10 despite soldered ports, a pile of easily breakable plastic clips, a flimsy plastic case, and a riveted keyboard/top case assembly. To me that sounds _worse_ than the M5 MacBook Pro, which scores 4/10 (soldered storage unlike the E14, easily replaceable ports, and a riveted keyboard/top case assembly.) I would personally rather have replaceable ports than non-soldered storage, but putting my personal preferences aside, I think it’s hard to argue that difference between the two is worth going from a 4/10 to a 9/10.
What Lenovo pays us for: They send us devices. We score them and report internally on their repairability. Lenovo has actually made their repairability snapshot reports public, so you can see some of the documents we've given them, for instance: https://www.ifixit.com/Document/sunTY6dbbJvOMRjP/Repairabili...
What Lenovo doesn't pay us for: Any particular score (they've worked really hard for the 10/10). This blog post/press release.
There are other companies paying us for similar services, and most of them do not get 10/10s or glowing coverage on our site. Companies don't get any extra credit for working with us instead of providing repair in another way.
To be clear, our repairability scoring is an objective system that involves engineers taking apart dozens of devices in each category to calibrate each scorecard. Making a new scorecard takes us hundreds of hours. Giving a score to a product using that scorecard is also a time-consuming human thing, disassembling a product, building out a disassembly tree (like the one in the snapshot I linked above), turning the process into something legible to our spreadsheets.
M5 MacBook vs. ThinkPad E14 Gen 7, the ThinkPad wins on modular storage, modular memory, battery replacement is dead simple, it’s easier to get inside, and you only need a Phillips screwdriver and a pry tool for most common repairs. A lot of the concerns you bring up ("easily breakable," "flimsy") are matters of durability. We generally prefer clips over glues, and we didn't find the clips to be unusually breakable in our testing. Durability matters, but we try hard to separate it from repairability in our scoring. Assemblies and soldered ports absolutely played into why the E14 Gen 7 didn't get a 10/10.
Re: AI-generated prose... we do indeed use LLMs to support our small team of human writers when drafting content. That said, we don't publish anything without multiple humans reviewing. In this case, we were thorough in our human fact checking, but I agree we missed the mark on style.
Looking at the differences between the M5 Macbook Pro vs E14 Gen 7 I still don't quite feel that the scoring is fair. It is true that the battery is more difficult to replace and the memory/storage are soldered in the Mac. However, the soldered ports for the Thinkpad are a pretty big downside. I bet that if you surveyed regular users, they would be more likely to prefer replaceable ports to upgradeable memory/storage. The battery replacement also does not seem terribly difficult on the Mac; most of the repair guide is about Apple's neurotic use of torque drivers and adhesive activators. If you are happy with the build quality and durability of modern Thinkpads, these steps are entirely unnecessary.
I suspect a substantial factor in the scoring is Apple's fasteners - the drivers for which, of course, are now in every electronics repair kit in the world, not to mention typically included for free with replacement parts on Amazon. Is this really worth a substantial hit to Apple's scores?
worldwide onsite service response times and parts availability are top notch as well.
[1]: https://www.ifixit.com/repairability/laptop-repairability-sc...
> Full disclosure: iFixit has an ongoing business relationship with Lenovo, and we are hopelessly biased in favor of repairable products.
I've been using various Thinkpads for 10+ years and have yet to use this feature. But hey, to each his own :)
But in today's market it's still one of the most simple to change batteries. And you know you can still purchase a genuine one, 4 years later for a reasonable price
Edit: a link[1] for those that aren't familiar
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superfish#Lenovo_security_inci...
Didn’t Dell and Sony have similar controversies?
I think I'm going to cry...happy tears. :')
Of the four I bought for employees. Two have had serious issues.
I love that they have way less thermal throttling than the X1 I had before
My first laptop was an IBM Thinkpad, and while it was a great piece of hardware, I don’t see myself ever buying another one as long an Lenovo owns the brand.
Like, no, we should absolutely not forget that, but the impact for me is low, and I prefer to have the superior hardware.
I represent pricing in $/warranty year. (If you want me to believe the product is worth more, stand by it in the form of a warranty. But if a company isn't going to put their warranty where their mouth is, well.)
Lenovo used to warrant their product; my previous Thinkpad, which came with a then-pathetic (Thinkpads used to be four year warranties!) 3 year warranty, for ~$1200, or $400/warranty year.
I can't mock up a purchase for either laptop reviewed, as neither are available at any price. So, we'll do the predecessor. Those start at $1300/y; that represents an increase in price of ~14% YoY … which obviously is not tracking inflation.
That's enough to put smaller manufacturers who don't benefit from large supply chains, like Framework, in spitting distance.
But is it comparable? The base screen is "45%NTSC", and AFAICT from the reviews, the consensus is "don't do it". The other option is an sRGB screen. The base SSD is half the size now, but it is also upgradable to 1 TiB if you fork over $. The OS can be removed now, which actually knocks $90 off the "base" price! The dGPU is just quite literally gone. And nine years later, and the RAM is still the same size, but as we all know, software definitely hasn't gotten more bloated in the past nine years.
So, oddly, my current Thinkpad is down for the count right now. After 9 years, it suffered the first real HW failure: the motherboard. The first one took ~3 weeks to ship, and it was defective. The next one only took ~2 weeks, and the patient is still in surgery, so fingers crossed?
My biggest repairability question: … have they fixed the power brick to not have the cable melded into the brick? The cable is what breaks, and it costs probably like $3.50, but because it's molded into the main AC/DC converter brick, you have to scrap the entire thing and Lenovo charges for those like they're made from the tears of angels. If you just make a connector there, you raise the cost of the brick a few cents, maybe a few dollars … and save $50? $60 down the road in repairs, and untold amounts of eWaste.
We have probably 10 Thinkpads at the house. Three power bricks have been rendered useless (and four USB-C ports) because Lenovo has set their part selection and engineering design to "best value for the company" rather than "best quality for the end user".
Also, the PD negotiation of the Lenovo bricks is unusual, where it will not provide significant current at the 5 volt base USB power to some non-laptop devices and also not accept fast charging rates from some non-Lenovo chargers: Our ThinkPads will charge using some high-wattage smartphone chargers but not every one of them. Every once in a while we find a device with a USB-C charging port (e.g. baby monitor display) that will charge with any charger around the house but not with the Lenovo laptop charger.
A recent move saw India's leader break with BRICS to flag with West Asia Israel
(No, not Windows.)
(No, not Linux.)
* "This isn't X. It's Y"
* "Some sentence emphasizing something. Describing the same thing with different framing. Describing it a third time but punchier.
* The em-dash of course
* A hard to describe sense of "cheesiness"
I only hope the models get good enough to not be so samey in the future.
This is the "Reddit" factor. I picked up on it being LLM written with this sentence:
"This is the treacherous, final-boss stage where repairability usually dies,"
> "These are not complaints, merely observations."
> "There are repairable laptops, and then there are ThinkPads."
> "iFixit approached the relationship as collaborators, not critics."
> "[...] they didn’t declare victory and go home. They kept pushing."
> "Designing for repairability doesn’t mean compromising innovation or premium experiences; when done well, it actually drives smarter innovation, better modularity, and more resilient platforms."
> "It would be one thing to make a highly repairable but low-volume niche device or concept. Instead, Lenovo just threw down a gauntlet by notching a 10/10 repairability score on their mainstream-iest business laptop."
> "This is [...] how repair goes from being an enthusiast’s “nice-to-have” to being baked into procurement checklists and fleet-management decisions."
Unless I'm reading for pleasure, I want everything in concise summaries. I don't need flowery language. Or even complete sentences.
Maybe an LLM verbosity slider that dynamically truncates text we don't need. I'll dial mine down.
Presumably the smelly AI text problem is just ... a problem that will be solved. Or maybe we'll just get used to it.
I'm glad I haven't let AI write much for me, its better for it to help me develop my ideas and writing and do the work to learn, explore and end up with something where my brain is in the gym. . Passive generation might not always map well to passive consumption
It was about a very fragile part of the process, and so it seemed like an error of omission that seemed atypical for iFixIt. It made me suspect the instructions might not have been wholly human written. I feel a bit vindicated for that suspicion.
The most generous interpretation I can have for this type of article is that it's a second-order phenomenon. If it was written by a human, it was written by one who consumes a lot of AI generated content and whose standards for what they produce have slipped.
Why would you hope to be more easily fooled?
Thank you for replying, but that doesn’t answer the question. Why would you want to make made up bullshit output more tolerable to read? Being intolerable to read is a feature, it’s a useful signal to know a piece of text may not have had human review, and that you should spend your time reading something else.
I use that same strategy with website consent banners. If a website is so invasive that they go out of their way to make rejection hard (which, by the way, is against the law), I know it’s a company not worth supporting.
If the studies that say that humans prefer AI writers are to be believed then you'd be a fool not to
I find that Gemini uses that phrase way too much.
It sounds like repairability means dividing device into smaller not repairable parts and make extra money off of it.
For instance, can I get those replaceable ports on Mouser?
Repairwashing.
> Lenovo tells us, “The biggest challenge in getting to a 10/10 was balancing repairability with all the other expectations of a commercial device: performance, reliability, thermal efficiency, form factor, and design integrity. Repairability isn’t achieved by a single change: it requires many small, intentional decisions across the entire system, and each of those decisions can introduce trade-offs.