ThinkPad T43Sabine has finally given the okay to buy a laptop due to a variety of reasons, and I have been looking around, but it did not take me long to find the best machine for my dollar in the Lenovo (IBM) ThinkPad T43. It is an amazing machine getting pretty high ratings in every review I read.

The one I want to grab is the ThinkPad T43 (DFU). It is not the top of the T43 line, but it is all the machine that I would need over the next two years or so.

Features:
Intel® Pentium® M Processor 740 (1.70 GHz)
Microsoft® Windows® XP Professional Edition
60 GB Hard drive
512MB memory
CD-RW/DVD Combo
14.1″ TFT display
Gigabit Ethernet
ATI Mobility RADEON x300 Graphics
Wireless 802.11 b/g included
Integrated Fingerprint Reader

With an additional A/C Adapter
an additional ThinkPad Battery and an Premiere Leather Carrying Case

Price: $1,898.00

The last line is the only problem…Price… That is before taxes and any shipping fees, so I would be looking at an easy $2200 Canadian dollars. Currently, I have set in place a plan to save around $200 a month for the next eleven months in hopes of purchasing this machine.

Sabine is laughing at me about it as one of the main reasons that have come up for purchasing a laptop is sort of two fold. We have a western facing apartment, on the third floor, and other building close enough to stop all wind dead in its tracks. This leads us to an apartment that is twenty-five degrees warmer inside than it is outside. Which at times can get hot enough that I almost feel the humidity of summer in my apartment, as well as I would love to get out of my apartment and have some of the white noise of people doing their thing.

Being in a home office means a fair amount of great advantages, but an equal amount of downsides. One of the biggest is the fact that while I love Sabine, she is the only human contact I have 99% of the time. Sure I talk to people on MSN, but with so many people so busy all the time, the conversaions are never in the depth I require to feel fulfilled in my “human contact quota”. Running over to a cafe or restaurant with Wireless to get some work done would allow me a more connected feeling as I would have that living white noise that I am lacking while working at home, as well as it would allow me a change of venue that would hopefully be a little cooler than I am sure this no-air conditioner apartment will be this summer.

I always wondered why there were so many vacancies in this building on the same side of the building as my apartment…

Update: I bought it and I am very pleased.