Just a nit, but PowerPCs were not used in Thinkpads except for very limited production runs in the mid-1990s. The problem was that IBM didn't have an OS for the platform. They had AIX, but it didn't make sense on a laptop. The idea was that OS/2 would provide a PC desktop of their own, but it barely shipped for PowerPC before IBM pulled the plug.
However IBM did design and build x86 chips in the 1990s, and these were used in Thinkpads.
I think it's probably more accurate to say that a version(s) of AIX, Solaris, NT ( and I think a beta of OS/2) technically existed briefly for some models. While some commercial software might have been ported, I doubt it was ever officially supported. Except perhaps some AIX software? I assume it was binary compatible with PowerPC AIX.
Checking https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPARCstation_20 implies that that's a perfectly reasonable price for what it was? The more interesting question is (relative) sales volume I think.
> but PowerPCs were not used in Thinkpads except for very limited production runs in the mid-1990s. The problem was that IBM didn't have an OS for the platform
Doh. You're right!
> However IBM did design and build x86 chips in the 1990s, and these were used in Think-pads.
Yep! Those were fabbed by IBM Microelectronics, along with a lot of server SKUed x86 chips back in the 2000s.
However IBM did design and build x86 chips in the 1990s, and these were used in Thinkpads.