Buying a refurbished Lenovo ThinkPad X230

[Great Satan]

My old laptop is finally in its death throes, and I'm in the market for a decent budget laptop. Based on your recommendations in other threads, I'm considering a refurbished X230 ThinkPad via an eBay seller.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Lenovo-Thinkpad-X230-Core-i5-2-60GHz-16GB-Ram-Office-SSD-Windows-10-Laptop/322036489063?hash=item4afadedb67:m:m9kx2dvHLIUGL-d3RL3AQZg

I don't know so much about hardware. I take it having 8GB RAM and 240GB SSD is a good thing, right? £299.99 still puts it within my budget and I'd be very happy with the improved performance. Should I choose the SSD option or buy a separate, different SSD and try installing that myself?

[Sebastian Cobb]

I've got that model. Really happy with it.

Although I think I paid less than £150 for mine and threw a 250gb ssd in it for £70 (I bought an SK Hyinx one, but I see you can get reasonable models from other brands for as cheap as £40 these days). So you might be better off doing that; unlike most laptops it just slides out of the side.

Mine also only came with 4gb of ram (2+2gb) but I assumed it was one 4 stick, so bought an extra 4gb from cash converters for a tenner to take it up to 6.

I've only used it with windows 10 briefly, but it seemed quite responsive. It was great on linux and now I've managed to install OSX on it. Which works ok minus a couple of niggles.

[nugget]

I also bought a refurbished X230 about 6 months ago, 8GB RAM and 256GB SSD. It's a great laptop and the small size suits me because I take it travelling a lot, although it's a bit fatter than the latest laptop models tend to be. The advantage here is that is has a proper Ethernet port, which most of the current slimline lapotops are missing. I paid 310 quid so the price is consistent with what you'd be paying.

It looks like you'd only save about 60 quid by not having the SSD, so unless you already have an SSD you want to use then I'd just buy one with the SSD already installed.

[paruses]

That looks very tempting. I need to buy a new laptop due to an incident with some tea.

What's the battery like on it? It says two hours but given that, in my experience, battery life is about 1/4 of what's promised.

Also - with 16gb of RAM is all that useable? For some reason I thought that laptops could only access 8.

[Sebastian Cobb]

I also bought a refurbished X230 about 6 months ago, 8GB RAM and 256GB SSD. It's a great laptop and the small size suits me because I take it travelling a lot, although it's a bit fatter than the latest laptop models tend to be. The advantage here is that is has a proper Ethernet port, which most of the current slimline lapotops are missing. I paid 310 quid so the price is consistent with what you'd be paying.

It looks like you'd only save about 60 quid by not having the SSD, so unless you already have an SSD you want to use then I'd just buy one with the SSD already installed.

Other sellers are selling the base hdd and 4gb of ram configuration for 140 though. Still with 12 months warranty.

You can get 240gb ssd's for 40 quid:
https://www.hotukdeals.com/tag/ssd

[hermitical]

What are the screens like? We watch all our tv/films etc on our current laptop, it's a few years old now so I  worry it won't have much life left in it

[Sebastian Cobb]

They're good enough. They do ones with xps screens as well.

[nugget]

Other sellers are selling the base hdd and 4gb of ram configuration for 140 though. Still with 12 months warranty.

You can get 240gb ssd's for 40 quid:
https://www.hotukdeals.com/tag/ssd

Actually, looking again at the link in the OP, the 8GB RAM 240GB SSD version is £240 with Windows 10. It only goes up to £300 if you add in Office 365. I think that's already pretty good value but if you have the time and know-how to buy the lowest spec version and upgrade the RAM, HD, and install the operating system (are Windows 10 licenses transferable? I really have no idea they work) then you could certainly save a few quid.

I notice that hermitical asked about watching films/TV so I think it's worth pointing out that the screen is only 12.5 inches. It's a matter of preference but personally I'd prefer a larger screen just for watching stuff on.

Regarding battery life, it can last a few hours quite comfortably. Definitely longer than 2 hours.