ThinkPad T430s WQHD Upgrade – Part 1

ThinkPad T430s WQHD Upgrade – Part 1:

I’m a huge ThinkPad supporter. Ever since the purchase of my X220, I’ve fallen in love with these black, basic looking laptops with their red trackpoint.

What’s so great about them? well, let me give you a quick rundown…

• Durable
• Professional looking
• Business grade
• Excellent hardware maintenance manuals and support
• Easily upgradeable and serviceable

Now they do have some cons about them, but in my opinion the worst one being screen resolution.
I’m writing this in 2018 and some laptops are still deigned and sold with 1366×768 resolution.

I have a few ThinkPads but we will focus on my T430s for the purpose of this post.

The T430s doesn’t have a terrible resolution, being 1600×900 but it could be better. A well known user on ThinkPads.com forum, by the name of RMSMajestic and a partner (Javi-Jie) created a WQHD upgrade kit for the T420s/T430s ThinkPad model.

This upgrade kit does not require any soldering, which is fantastic news and one of the main reasons I was sold on it.  The kit arrived a few weeks ago and I’ve been on the hunt for a reasonably priced screen to use.

Just a few nights ago, I pulled the trigger on a AUO B140QAN01.5 display panel.  This is the same panel that was sold on the ThinkPad T470s line not long ago.  The review’s were pretty good for the WQHD display  and based on the panel specs, seems to be a bit better than the LG LP140QH1-SPB1 panel.

The LG panel uses IPS technology while the AUO uses AHVA and the brightness is a bit better on the AUO panel but will use slightly more power (5.49W vs 3.76W).

IPS (In Plance Switching) are generally considered the best overall LCD Technology for image quality, color accuracy and viewing angles.

AHVA (Developed by AUO, Advanced Hyper-Viewing Angle) also considered one of the best all around panel type.

Regardless of that, either panel would be a complete upgrade over what was planned and installed by Lenovo initially.

The panel is on it’s way and I’m eagerly waiting to get it and install it. I can’t wait for the laptop to be transformed and have a much better display and resolution to experience.

Stay tuned.