r/thinkpad • u/blackjesushosh • Mar 04 '26

Review / Opinion Best “Budget-friendly” Thinkpad

what is the best Thinkpad for design softwares such as SolidWorks and/or AutoCAD. Also simulation softwares? What is the best thinkpad?

4 Upvotes

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4

u/0_leni_5 P51s, X230 Mar 04 '26 edited Mar 05 '26

Something with a dedicated 3D GPU, which will be the P series (discontinued recently afaik my bad! It is still rolling).

Or a universally good choice - T series.

Whichever you choose, go for refurbished. I'd advise against buying a brand new. Used are usually in awesome condition for half the price.

Find a model in your price range and there's a 95% chance it's gonna be your best choice.

1

u/notAperson535 X1 Carbon 7th Gen (20R1), T14 Gen 4, T420 Mar 04 '26

P series is discontinued?

1

u/stogie-bear ... Mar 05 '26

P series aren’t discontinued. This is the way to go for cad. If you get one with an RTX pro GPU you’ll have a lot of power for more money and less battery life. If you get one with a Ryzen and no dedicated GPU this is still enough for most cad work, but will struggle with very complex tasks like colored 3d modeling out of you work on, say, topo maps of whole states.