Customer reviews from lenovo.com
Lenovo - ThinkPad T490 14" Laptop - Intel Core i7 - 8GB Memory - 256GB Solid State Drive
Average customer rating
4.7
(1,103 Reviews)
Rating breakdown 1,103 reviews
5 Stars
851
4 Stars
184
3 Stars
34
2 Stars
10
1 Star
24
96%of customers recommend this product.
(
827 out of
862)
Customer Reviews for Lenovo - ThinkPad T490 14" Laptop - Intel Core i7 - 8GB Memory - 256GB Solid State Drive
Posted by: Anonymous
from Santiago, Chile
Verified Purchase:Yes
[This review was collected as part of a promotion.] Excellent product, but forgot to add backlit keyboard, it should be a default feature!
I would recommend this to a friend!
Written by a customer while visiting lenovo.com
Posted by: Jdod
from New mexico
Verified Purchase:Yes
[This review was collected as part of a promotion.] I have been using t-series Lenovo for over 20 years. Best laptops on the market for business. Durable, high quality machines
I would recommend this to a friend!
Written by a customer while visiting lenovo.com
Customer Rating
1
Extremely Disappointed
on November 18, 2020
Posted by: Dylan 010
The thinkpad review:
Received the laptop a few days ago and after some initial joy I have been regretting this purchase.
Being a long time thinkpad user I have come to expect a certain level of quality from the thinkpad name. I have previously owned/used a T61p and most recently a T440s, so I use my thinkpads for a long time before replacing them. I liked the price point of the T490 and was impressed by the specifications and ultimately was swayed by the high resolution and color accurate display.
The spec I purchased for those wondering:
i7 10510U
16GB of RAM
512GB SSD
1440p IPS Display
I have yet to do any real work on the laptop but I am shocked at the lack of power of this machine. I expected a significant amount more performance from a 10th generation i7 coming off the back of the 4th generation i5 in my old T440s. Perhaps intel is to blame for this pathetic showing, but have we really progressed this little in the last 7 years? The thermal solution seems to be worse than in the T440s and I can't figure out why. Surely 6 generations of improvements on the CPU architecture will have created some power efficiency improvements (and therefore become more thermally performant), but I can't seem to find any. This machine is positively volcanic on my lap, I can't believe it runs so hot watching a stream or just when watching a YouTube video.
The same issues I was experiencing with my T440s are unfortunately present on the new machine. It's slow to go full screen on videos and has difficult doing the smallest of actions like displaying info in the Task Manager or tracking my inputs on the trackpoint/trackpad. I cannot believe it has frozen on me in just my first few days of use, this feels inexcusable for a new laptop to do. Perhaps windows is to blame here, but I can't make so many excuses considering my windows desktop is so much snappier, all the while a few generations older.
To add to my woes the laptop has been utterly disastrous at updating. Not sure what Lenovo loads up into their flavor of windows, but it seems to be out of date. The computer had several windows updates pending out of the box, more than I was expecting. It bluescreened on the windows feature update and wasted about an hour of my time undoing the changes. That has to be a new record, not one but two bluescreens in the first week of ownership.
Enough doom and gloom, lets focus on some of the positives. The screen is fantastically bright and colorful, one of the best I've seen in a laptop. The keyboard and build quality are excellent and what you'd expect from a thinkpad. That's where my praise ends though, the screen is really the only exceptional part of this device.
Overall thoughts:
Pros:
-Best in class screen
-Same thinkpad keyboard and build that I like
Cons:
-Dangerously hot under light workloads
-Fan is whiny, seems incapable of keeping the machine cool
-Poor CPU performance, does not feel like a laptop should in 2020
-Speakers are lacking in bass and general clarity
-Fingerprint sensor is inaccurate
-Battery life is underwhelming even at low brightness/resolution
-Trackpad material is not easy to move fingers across
-Software is seemingly unstable (may not be fault of Lenovo)
I will continue to use this machine for another week or so before deciding whether to return it or not.
No, I would not recommend this to a friend.
Response from lenovo.comBy Adrian_Lenovo, Customer Service, November 19, 2020
Lenovo appreciates all feedback and thank you for taking the time to rate and review our product! We apologize for your inconvenience. Please refer to our Technical Support at https://support.lenovo.com/us/en/.
Also, our Lenovo Vantage app allows you to update drivers, run device diagnostics and take advantage of other tools to get more out of your device. Please access this link in regards to Lenovo Vantage https://support.lenovo.com/by/en/solutions/ht505081 as well as this link for a video overview https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2_hmA_XHs0.
Very Respectfully,
Adrian_Lenovo
Also, our Lenovo Vantage app allows you to update drivers, run device diagnostics and take advantage of other tools to get more out of your device. Please access this link in regards to Lenovo Vantage https://support.lenovo.com/by/en/solutions/ht505081 as well as this link for a video overview https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2_hmA_XHs0.
Very Respectfully,
Adrian_Lenovo
Written by a customer while visiting lenovo.com
Posted by: Tony Aipperspach
from Rochester MN
Verified Purchase:Yes
[This review was collected as part of a promotion.] My old laptop was a T440. The T490 is noticeably faster, a little smaller (same screen size however!) lighter and the battery lasts longer. I use my laptop every day and I'm very happy with this upgrade.
I would recommend this to a friend!
Written by a customer while visiting lenovo.com
Posted by: WesleyNJ09
from NJ
Verified Purchase:Yes
[This review was collected as part of a promotion.] It is a nice piece. I like the machine and enjoy it very much.
I would recommend this to a friend!
Written by a customer while visiting lenovo.com
Posted by: Joe1000
Verified Purchase:Yes
[This review was collected as part of a promotion.] Well-built; clutter free desktop (no advertisements or trial-ware littering the Windows desktop); snappy performance;
Written by a customer while visiting lenovo.com
Posted by: BhaskarK
from Jaipur, India
Verified Purchase:Yes
[This review was collected as part of a promotion.] Beautiful machine. I've been using it for programming for a month now and I love the battery life and the matte screen. The only issue I have is with the response time on screen but it is only noticeable if I'm playing a game or something.
I would recommend this to a friend!
Written by a customer while visiting lenovo.com
Posted by: Tim_O_N
from Denver, CO
Verified Purchase:Yes
[This review was collected as part of a promotion.] This laptop starts quickly and runs quiet. Not a big fan of the mouse pad, but that's in large part because I always use an external mouse. Was pleasantly surprised to have such good tracking information available when it was in transit.
I would recommend this to a friend!
Written by a customer while visiting lenovo.com