yea it's late here in MI and I'm just wondering. My first was a 720 I have maybe a dozen 701's and mabe 20 760's I also have two RISC based TP's but I'm pretty sure they are dead. I'm sure I have 10 or 20 750's too I used to own a used computer store and kept way too much stuff when I closed it LOL
My rareist is probably my 530CS, I've had a 310 and I have a near new 380Z here on my desk (a couple 380's out in back too) I use the 380Z to log into my headless server. (the older hardware is acually very good for that stuff or firewalls) I have never owned an S series or a 240Z (I bought a 240Z on eBay but the guy never shipped it so I did a paypal claim) My best find was a new in box 700c I sold it on eBay for quite a bit and still have the email from the woman thanking me Man I miss the days of selling a used 770Z for over 1k. I still LOVE the keyboards on the 760's They need to bring them back. BTW I'm typing this on an old IBM clicky (best keyboard ever) Yes I even have one of the black ones with the trackpoint LOL

My first Thinkpad was a 360 with a token ring card in it for office work.
http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Category:360
Having worked for IBM for 23 years from the mid 70's through 2000, I was issued a new model every couple of years, so I used just about every model since then. When I left the company I bought every model (several times over) from then on.

The first ThinkPad I used was purchased thorugh my employer and it was a 700C.

A short while later, I bought the first ThinkPad that I would personally own, a 700.

I believe those were among the first models actually called ThinkPads. I've owned ThinkPads ever since.

My first Thinkpad or laptop for that matter was a T30. I had been working a temp job and had been wanting a computer that I could call my own. For some reason while looking through the Bay and failing to win the bid on a couple of Dells I noticed the IBM Thinkpad. The design certainly seemed very bland and plain to me. Yet it intrigued me so I bid on it and kept vigil over the price as I joined the bidding competition.

Hmmm.. 1.8 ghz PIV. That seemed a bit more adequate than other laptops I had seen that had all types of pre-installed software (AVG, Open Office, etc) all loaded on a Pentium II laptop! The marketing presentation for those Pentium II laptops were pretty promising I have to admit. Their Bay page was chock-full of images and they even included snazzy words to describe the cutting-edge performance the laptops would deliver. I wonder how the people who bought those Pentium II are feeling about their performance now?

The 40gb HDD that came with the T30 was peanuts compared to the 250gb WD we had in my family desktop. Still I knew that for a first timer I could get by with this.

To my horror after paying for it and reading a little more on my purchase I read about the design flaw of the machine- the infamous memory slot issue. Well my machine arrived and I was aghast at how horrible it was packaged. It was supported by two styrofoam pieces that fit at the sides of the laptop and nothing else. The cardboard box it had come in had been opened and there was no newspaper or styrofoam! Luckily it was intact and once I got home I booted it up and it turned on. I could have let the seller know how displeased I was with how shoddy my T30 had been delivered but it worked. There were no defects in it from the transit from Rhode Island to sunny (not all the time) Arizona. Hence I kept it.

It was around that time I search engined and found this site. I discovered how to test both slots to ensure that I did not have the flaw. I got lucky- both slots worked... and as I discovered 256mb of RAM was no way to go! I eventually upgraded to 768mb of RAM. This worked very well for my machine and my needs until I felt the curiosity to try other types of Thinkpads

So that's my first Thinkpad. I miss that T30 and may get one for nostalgia in the future. I had to sell it off as my financial situation necessitated the need. I managed to save what was left of the sale and had a part-time job miles away to finance a new purchase- the R52. Collecting Thinkpads is getting more expensive these days so I just have to go to Nursing school now to compensate for that! lol. Regardless I'm having a blast collecting em'

I never worked for IBM but My first PC was a PS/2 Mod 80 and I've had IBM's ever since. (well first PC if you don't include my Timex Sinclair or Atari 800) LOL I still have them both. I'll have to drag them out and show the kids I've been meaning to get some of my 701's running. I know the battereis in most of them leaked

I remember that memory slot issue. We fixed it by popping in a 512MB stick LOL (hey we sold used PC's) IBM did fix them for a while, they had an ECA but that ran out. I seem to recall having to tell easyserv we worked for a certain co to get them fixed at the end.

My first was a 770E. Didn't buy it new. Sheesh they were expensive when new. I think I gave around $350 for a refurbished unit, and joined this forum shortly after that. Used it for over two years without a battery in it at all. Then decided I wanted a battery, so paid about $80 for one from battery refill, then just a month or so later, the wife decided I should sell it to one of her workmates. I did, because I thought "now I can get whatever I want", and I've been messin' around with several models, and a couple of dozen Thinkpads have come and gone in the last couple of years.

Jan 1992 I bought my very first ThinkPad, a 700C.

Then in Jan 1993, a 720C. And on and on every year till 1998 when I bought the 600E & wow! What a machine that was. The true beginning of my great love of ThinkPads. I also bought several 3xx series in that same time frame from 1992 till 1998. The love affair was on. Then in May of 2000 I bought a T20 and once again, I was just shocked at what a fine machine it was. Its also important to note that my MAIN computer has always been a ThinkPad due to my demanding travel schedule. Thus I've always been an early adopter of (then) IBM's fastest and most resource laden ThinkPads. And to be honest my OCH..ha..ha.. Usually had me buying two of each, so as to have a "spare" in case one went down and I had no time to deal with it on the road. Of course that was back when we didn't have the rescue & recovery utility we have today.
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Since the T20, I've bought every new T series as they were released. T series ThinkPads have been the mission critical part of my work life ever since. In this same time frame from then to now I have also bought on average two or three other new laptops of various brands each year, just to use as a basis of comparison & for fun. So I can say in all honesty, that not another laptop by any of the other manufacturers have come close to the overall quality, stability, reliability & durability than a ThinkPad. Just like their isn't a day I don't leave the house without my car keys, there hasn't been a day (yes not one) that I haven't had a ThinkPad with me. The X model has been my "weekend" companion for years. Yet that said its also important to note that I own more than one business that is a large scale 24/7 enterprise, thus connectivity is my choice and its served me well.
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While we are talking IBM/ThinkPad History I would like to personally thank *Harry C* for being such great guy, terrific contributor, and a huge asset to our forum.
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Cheers...
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My 1st was 600E, before that I had HP Omnibook 4100. What a difference there was!
Every laptop I've had since has been Thinkpad.

I upgraded 600E with 750MHz PIII, 5400rpm 8mb cache HDD and maxxed out RAM and used it for two years. Still regretting the selling a bit.

Many of the posters in this thread said they owned a 700C. I was lucky enough to pick one up on eBay with the original box and all the original paperwork. I think I now have an original setup as shipped. The only thing I'm missing is a "keyboard template". I'm guessing this is a plastic strip used to label the function keys. Does anyone remember seeing one?

My 1st Thinkpad was a 760CD purchased not that long ago (year or so). I had laptops at work since the 1990's but never needed my own at home (I used desktops since the 286 was new).

Since that 1st laptop I started collecting them and now have around 30 or so, just about all are Thinkpads.

I LOVED my 760CD 90Mhz, (I bought my 310 and 380 about the same time but still went back to my 760CD) probably the 3rd Thinkpad I ever purchased. I did the 120MHz upgrade too, what a PITA LOL I guess those 760's and 770's are why I can tolerate repairing Mac laptops LOL
I have a fully loaded 760XL sitting near my desk, I'll probably pop an XGA screen on it or just pull the mwave crap out of an XD.
I need something to remote into my storage server and other than no internal FDD I really do like 760's the best, besides my next door neighbor bought my 380Z today

The 760CD is great except for the special RAM, had to pay a few bucks to get mine to a more usable 40MB.

The MWAVE is great if you like video in/out/capture.

The only mac laptops I have are 5 Wallstreet G3's which are very easy to work on.

The 770's are nice too, I need a new keyboard for my 770E but my 770 works just fine.

Mwave blue screens with anything newer than Win98 unless I'm doing something wrong. wall streets, I'll give you that. Modular and pretty easy.
Two dozen screws to replace a HDD in a clamshell and in the older 12inch iBooks the LAST part to come out to replace a bad CD is the CD. you should not have to remove a screen, motherboard and every other single part in a laptop to replace a cd drive LOL.
Titanium Powerbooks you will have to replace the bezel to replace a screen, aluminums have the motherboards glued to the heat sink and you will dent the back cover putting in a new screen. Wanna get into iMac and eMac repairs? those are fun, or replacing the LCD in a cinema display... glued on sides and a one piece aluminum case? WTF and the newest MacBookPro's the battery is built in. Can't wait for them to start going bad. The hinges in the 1st gen AIR's are starting to go already. I swear I'm going to open a Mac shop. Take apart a Quad XEON MAC Pro yet? LOL have fun.

Sorry to get off topic, its just I used to think 760's and 770's were a PITA to replace things like the CPU but they are easy compared to most current macs.

My first ThinkPad was a hand me down 760E when I was working for IBM about 10 years ago. Brick of a laptop but performance was decent when MWave wasn't blue screening! Moved locations and went back to a desktop (NetVista X41) then left IBM. My new employers had just switched to IBM so I got a shiny new T42 which was my daily machine until about 12 months ago, when I switched to a T60.

First Desktop - IBM PS/2 Model 80-111 which came from a mate's dad's work that had just gone into recievership. Full tower, 386-DX 20 (I think) upgraded to 8Mb RAM (via the MCA bus) with an 80MB ESDI hard drive.

At home I'm a Mac User, currently a unibody MacBook having upgraded from an original MacBook Pro. Best of both worlds

Not sure what the exact model of my PS/2 Mod 80 was but I had the HUGE 120MB SCSI drive and even the Microchannel soundblaster! I don't know if I ever got it past 4MB of ram though, I know my (jeeze cant remember model number) big brown Microchannel server had 32MB whohoo wayyyy back in the day I tried selling a lot of 50 Mod50z's on eBay and the guy wanted to know if i could just ship the AC power cords and clicky keyboards LOL

My first Thinkpad wasn't a Thinkpad. It was an Ambra with a 386SX and an non-TFT color screen, a 170 MB hard drive, and (I think) 64MB RAM.

Then it started getting flakey, so I bought a Thinkpad 760C; the THIN one. Probably the same thickness as an R-40, but much thinner than the other models of the day. After that I bought a pile of dead 760EL's and managed to make one of many (and that's when I discovered Bill and Thinkpads.com - great resource. Been using resurrected Thinkpads ever since. Mostly using help from the folks here to help me drag these things back into submission.

I am also a PS/2 person; started with a 60 and an 80. Eventually went to the next generation and had a 77 with 8MB RAM. Also got a 65-486 which I brought out to 16MB RAM. Even had sound with an m-ACPA. Finished out with a 9595 with the Pentium chip (error and all). I was even a Sysop for the CompuServe Thinkpads forum.

Well, unlike most of you, I came into the ThinkPad game pretty late...but I caught up pretty fast, so to say...

The first ThinkPad I ever used on a regular basis was a T20 that I had been assigned a decade ago. Still have it in my locker at work, still runs great within its capabilities. A timeless little machine.

My first personal ThinkPad was an A20m, bought used off of feebay that very same year, long gone...

And the rest is addiction, pure and simple...

My first Thinkpad was a TP500 subnotebook with 4 meg of Ram, 170 meg hdd, SL2 50mhz processor and a mono screen. After it got stolen, I used 701's until I went to a 240. From there, I went to an X23 (which I am using to type this), and an X31.

Thinkpads have served me well in the past 15 years that I have been using them. Mine have been all around the world with me, and have held up well.

My first Thinkpad (and first laptop) was a 770ED. Bought a new battery, maxed out the RAM, upgraded the processor to 400Mhz, installed a larger hard drive, and a PCMCIA wireless card. Sold it to fund buying my first A31. Still had the best keyboard of any Thinkpad I've used, but was painfully slow for 2007.

The first Thinkpad I ever used was one my father brought home from work in the late 90's, with Windows NT 4.0. Pretty sure it was a 770. Up until that point, I had only ever used Macs.

My first Thinkpad was T30...it wasn't my first notebook - there was not so long way to go to this machine.
Before this machine, I've used old 486 Toshiba Satellite, which I bought only for fun for $50 and Dell Latitude CPx (P3-600) at my work.
In 2004 I finished first year at univercity and needed a notebook for studying purposes...so I bought used Dell Latitude C810 - it was big beautiful and not weak machine with pleasant screen (15" 1400x1050) for me. But it was to heavy and have some terrible issues.
When I went to my dealer and said that I don't want this machine anymore, he show me very slightly used T30 and new Acer (I didn't remember model, so it wal 15" machine with desktop Celeron inside)...so it was not difficult decision - I love black brick design, so I just fell in love with this IBM brick

So I get it. It was P4m-1.8/256MB/40GB machine with XGA screen, ultranav and DVD-ROM drive. And have swedish localization
And 'he' was with me for three years, three years of very intensive and not so careful usage. In 2005 I've got married, and one year have spent with my wife in Siberia - in that year winter was very cold - minus 60 celcius degrees at some days, but everyday (except holydays ), I went (in such freezing cold car wouldn't start) to my work (I worked as system administrator in town's central drug store) - and my thinkpad survive it! This machine survived even then my wife ocsationally droped heavy knife (sword down!) on palmrest of opened notebook - just little crack on plastic remembered of this...
But three years after, at winter 2006, I sold my T30 - at that time, there was no need in notebook for me. So currently I regret of that...
Year after I bought my T61, but this is an another story...

P.S. Sorry if my english isn't good, but I hope it's not true...

a 500? I've have two 530CS's but dang can't say I ever saw a 500

The 500, was a gray-scale subnotebook with a VERY small screen and the 510 was the color version on the same chassis. I owned both; they were ThinkPads numbers 2 and 3 after my beloved 701c. I've owned most every model since with the exceptions of the 570 and 770. I really like the sub-notebooks, although I really don't use them as much. Besides the 701c, 500/510, I've also owned the 240x, X20, X30, X31, X40, X41.

As far as personal ownership is concerned, I'm up to the last of the IBM designed machines at the T43, R52 & X41. I do use an R60 at work which I didn't buy. I don't have anything against Lenovo per se, but the price of the post-T43 models just haven't fallen into my realm of acquisition yet. I truly covet the X300/301 despite the bad reviews on the screen, but it'll have to wait.

My first Thinkpad was a 770 series with the MMC-II PII CPU in it and that "wonderful" 4MB Trident video card. It came with a docking station and worked just fine. I did replace the LCD in it with a shiny new for like $20 from e-bay, I also replaced the KB as it was very used. I picked this machine up from a friend for $200 around 2001 or so.

A year after that I got a T23 which is still one of my favorite models of Thinkpads. Thin, light, reasonably powerful and beautiful. Mine was the SXGA+ version with wifi.

I sold the T23 (sadly) to replace it with the T41P in my signature. Man I loved that machine. I upgraded the ram to $2GB, added a 250GB HD, an ultrabay HD , ultrabay battery, and a neoprene sleeve. Sadly I had to sell that machine after I lost my job so I could pay some bills.

Some time after that I bought a used T42 from Craigslist which still works wonderfully today. I gave it to one of my friends when I got the T60, At the time I was the manager of a small ma an pop pc store and we had a T60 on the back shelf for over a year. I asked my boss about it and he said he'd done everything he could to fix it and the customer had bought a new laptop and left the old T60 at our store. My boss said if I could fix it's constant crashing blue screening (even on a fresh install of XP) then I had earned it. I replaced the battery under the lenovo battery replacement program and that solved all the problems. I think to micr controller in the bad battery was messing with the system because when the battery was in the system it was super unstable. However when running only on AC power the thing was stable as a rock. Go figure.

I recently felt the 'itch' again and traded that T60 to a forum member for the X41T that this message is being typed on.

In between owning Thinkpads I have owned several Powerbook G3 Pismo's, a Lombard, a few Ti's and a 1.67GHz Aluminum PBG4 - fastest ever built on a PPC CPU.

If I can't have a Mac I will have a Thinkpad and if I cant have a Thinkpad I will have a Mac. If I can't have either, then I will go without. I have done this in the past and this policy ensure that I have either or both.

I believe I paid $1000.00 for that TP500 in 1995. I had read that the mono screen took less power than the colored screen, thus giving better battery life. I don't know if this was true - two hours was about all it got when brand new.

I liked the size, although it was far thicker than later models. It weighed 4 lbs, which was considered light weight at the time. I used it to keep in contact through Compuserve from all around the world.

The very first time I used a ThinkPad was when I was about 13 and one of my dad's friends brought one over. It was a mint T2x machine. I instantly found the TrackPoint to be comfortable and a joy to use, and the whole machine was just so solid and well made. I knew right then I would be a ThinkPad guy forever, and I wanted to get one of my own ASAP. I proceeded to round up everything I could find (LEGOs, toy cars, etc) and list it for sale. I managed to make about $250, and started searching for a good first machine. I found a 770z that looked nice just within budget and took the plunge.

The 770z was advertised as having a 14.1" 1024x768 display, but to my surprise came with the special high resolution 13.7" 1280x1024 panel. It was a PII 366 with 192MB of RAM and a 20GB HDD. It had the best Trident 8MB GPU. It was in near mint condition, with the exception of the little battery status LCD above the keyboard being cracked, and the battery being dead. It ran Windows XP nicely and had zero issues during all the time I had it. I later sold it to upgrade to newer used machines, and eventually my brand new T42. Some 7 years later, I wish I still had my 770z, but it's all been great fun.

My first was also a TP500 in 1995. I retired my HP Omnibook (a little one) and "upgraded" to an IBM. I loved that machine, it was the first of many, then went from the 600's to T20, T21, T23 and so on. I wish I still had it, built like a tank but small for it's time and the keyboard was awesome, just like a selectric. I am sure I paid over $1000 for it.

Mike

my first ThinkPad was a TP 380Z. well actually, a stack of 7 partial 380Z units of which 5 were salvageable. in the summer of 2005 is when i got them, for free.

i had basically a lifetime supply of spare parts; needless to say i tried all sorts of hardware mods including a custom, external gel-cell battery pack that gave a good 10 hours of run time (but with no indication of how much power/time was left, and it had to be charged on its own charger) yeah i burned out 2 or 3 sub cards just by improperly attaching that monstrosity to the battery port...

hmm... the 96 meg memory limit started to get to me and eventually i ended up with first an original Apple iBook, and then a ThinkPad 600E that needed a hard drive... took out of said iBook... i am forever a thinkpadder!

upgraded to a T22 once, a 900MHz 256MB 40GB Combo 14 inch... i didn't like it so much. 'upgraded' back to my older and slower 600E. eventually i came across two 600X units, both SpeedStep models, one of which i still use daily.

later i got myself on eBay and started buying up 600s and T2x series and rebuilding them and selling local and on the 'net. made a good deal of money doing this which supported both the purchasing of my first car and the upgrading of my only remaining 600X. i'm a member of the 850 megahertz club, dropped $100 on that CPU about a year ago and never look back!

i have had an X41 Tablet which was a great little machine heavily held back by its use of a proprietary 1.8 inch hard drive. i did the 'iPod Video HD' mod on mine and that worked great till the FFC cable got into the habit of coming loose every 3 months or so. got a deal on an X60 nontablet and sold this one at the same time.

my X60 is the most awesome thing yet though. the only thing i'd like to do is get an X61 motherboard for it, for a C2D, the slightly newer Intel IGP, and that sweet 8 gig memory limit.

so i have always gotten my TPs used, and usually quite cheap. hey, when i have 3 or 4 grand to spend on a laptop it will surely be a brand new ThinkPad, highest specs possible. i keep dreaming of that day... maybe in a couple years

I don't remember the model of my first one...My second one was a 760 series and it worked fine. I loved the KB. Later as a manager I got a 701c and purchased it when I retired. It served me well for a very long time. It even made it to Mt. Everest basecamp on the Tibet side on the the back of my motorcycle. As a consultant I was given a several Dell laptops and everyone of them broke about every twelve months. My trusty ThinkPads continued to work just fine.

I have tried one other brand of laptop and returned it to the store. ThinkPads are all that I use and certainly can depend on them.

760XD.

God I loved that thing! My lone issue with it was, at that time, none of the Linux distros I had installed could utilize the audio subsystem.

I had that laptop with 96-100MB RAM (can't remember what it maxed out at), 6GB hard drive and Win98SE. Got it when we went through an old storage closet at the office and found a stack of 'em sitting there with plenty of accessories and spare parts. We cobbled some machines together and everyone on the helpdesk got one. Playing VCD's on it was great back then thanks to hardware accellerated MPEG decoding.

(edit) a quick glance at the thinkwiki and I see that there STILL isn't an MWave Linux driver.