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Title: Thinkapd x301 Restoration: Preamble
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Author: Alessandro Mauri
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# ThinkPad x301 Restoration Project: Preamble
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I had an unfortunate accident, well 3 to be precise, I bought 3 used ThinkPads
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x301 in working condition. Someone might say "jeez good for you" because those
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things are beautiful, old, and somewhat rare.
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## PHOTO HERE all three af them
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Well not so fast because, as I learned the hard way, the Lenovo ThinkPad x301
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has a particular quirk: It has what I think is the shittiest rubber coating
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among all ThinkPads.
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Three out of three of the laptops I bought had some issues with the coating,
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on the lid AND the palmrest which, in this particular model, is treated with the
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same coating as the lid. The problem is that this coating is now over 11-13
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years old (the x301 was in production from 2008 to 2010) and it shows.
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The problems I encountered are two:
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1. Stickyness of the rubber
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2. Almost impossible to clean
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I tried several methods of cleaning and surface restoration, I will briefly list
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them now.
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1. For the lid: Magic eraser and cream dubbin as suggested [here][lid1],
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[here][lid2] and in many more places
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2. Soapy water
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3. Just water on a tissue
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4. Denaturated alchol
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All of the above either yielded no results or made things worse. The first
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method with the magic eraser and cream worked to some extent but the rubber
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coating on the x301 is so _thin_ that I would have completely removed it before
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getting rid of the stickyness.
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The thinness of the coatings apparently was intentional as the main focus for
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the x300 and x301 was lightweight, so some corners were cut in terms of the
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number of coatings (I am **not** a reliable source).
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## PHOTO HERE zoom in on the lid
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As for the palm rest I think it is a lost cause, the coating is thin, old and
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has been subject to years of palm grease and sweat. Before cleaning it looked
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grimy at best and after it got sticky like old rubber (it is).
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Furthermore in two of them it actually started peeling (_lie_ one I got in very
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bad condition and it was already somewhat peeled).
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## PHOTO HERE the palm rest
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## So what will you do?
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Easy, I will take them apart, one by one, mix and match parts to make two decent
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x301s and completely restore them!
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One is going staright to Ebay and the other stays with me.
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In the next entries of this blog series I will show in detail the whole process,
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from thought to result, I will use this blog as a notepad for ideas and for
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mocking myself over stupid mistakes along the line.
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[lid1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hv9p32ImZxI
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[lid2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F50ya07onqo
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[sothin]:
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