Design
The Lenovo ThinkPad T410s is best described as the world’s largest ultra-portable. The 14” display and wide chassis provides plenty of room for a comfortable keyboard and trackpad, but the T410s is less than an inch thick and weighs less than four pounds. This means that the laptop, although physically large, feels no different in a bag than your average 13” ultra-portable.
Aesthetically, this format doesn’t impress. The T410s might wow a few observers with its thin chassis, but most people will simply assume that it is just another ThinkPad. As you’d expect, the laptop’s color scheme does nothing to change this assumption. The T410s is only available in matte black and the lid has the same dull scratch-resistant coating that ThinkPads have used for years. While the keyboard has a nice layout, which we’ll talk about in the User Interface section below, the interior is otherwise drab.
Of course, ThinkPads have used this unimpressive aesthetic design for years because it has practical benefits. The matte black plastic resists fingerprints, so you don’t have to travel with a terry-cloth in your bag. Scratches are also usually repelled, so you can quickly move the ThinkPad into or out of a bag without worrying about metal zippers or other items destroying the laptop’s surface. And even if the ThinkPad does end up with a few wounds, who cares? Scratches on a ThinkPad are best thought of as battle scars.
The size of the ThinkPad T410s is practical as well. Small laptops, particularly those with a display size below 13 inches, often feel cramped. That’s fine if you’re only going to be using the laptop for short bursts, but the ThinkPad T410s is built for business travelers who will be using the T410s as their primary computer while on the road. In this situation the larger display size makes a lot of sense, particularly because these travelers are already lugging around large bags. Shaving a couple inches off the size of a laptop won’t dramatically change the load they have to carry around.
