Maybe Matt the fact that Lenovo is trying to gain the acceptance of wider audience other than just notebook enthusiasts, is one of the key reasons that it no longer offer the standard aspect ratio LCD. To most novice they wouldn't know the pro and cons of widescreen and standard screen unless you show them, most of them probably wouldn't care either way, as the name, keen price and quality is what will drive them to thinkpad. While, the LCD supplier is pricing an equivalent widescreen unit maybe at 30% lower than a standard screen, at the same time you are trying to lower your manufacturing costs inorder to compete competitively with other laptop companies.....
It is not cheap to maintain a whole production process to manufacture the standard screen laptops, as nearly all of the parts are not interchangeable with the widescreen model. The chassis, motherboard, screen, casing, keyboards, pretty much everything other than harddrive and ultrabay has to be made specially for it.... do you know how expensive that is???? This works against the market mechanisms, how would they recuperate the costs??? Charging the same old prices that IBM use to charge???
One reason that i didn't buy Thinkpad as my first laptop, is due to the significantly higher capital costs, nearly 40% higher than an equivalent unit from HP/Compaq, etc.
You know why Toyota makes so much profit, while GM and Ford are struggling even though they produce more cars???? Its because that Toyota's car use basically all the same parts and same base throughout their range, which significantly drives down their costs. BMW in Australia currently offer 178 or so different model of cars, and right now they are thinking of reducing it to 58.
This decision by BMW to shrink the models offering, is due to the high costs of keeping an inventory of every model car in Australia, so the customer don't have to wait 3 months for a delivery from Thailand or European Union. As a compensation BMW offers trim level upgrade for no extra costs. This formula is basically what Lenovo is using, which is to consolidate their product line and reduce prices.
If market demand swayed towards 4:3 aspect ratio laptop, then Lenovo would most likely offer that. But current market demand is clearly against 4:3 aspect ratio laptop, so Lenovo is not going to produce something that only 5% of customers would think about wanting it. You are a minority, unless you can persuade the majority then there is nothing you or Lenovo can do.
Message Edited by wjli2 on 05-15-2008 01:09 PM
