Warranty transfer

[DennisGordon]

A friend of mine is shopping for her first laptop. She's been considering the usual: HP, Dell, Toshiba. I showed her my new T43 and she really liked it, so I offered to shop around for her online. Since she is not a techie, warranty coverage is very important. Are the warranties on used T43/42s automatically transferable? Does Lenovo offer extended warranties for used notebooks?

[carbon_unit]

Yes, The warranty follows the machine, not the owner.
As long as it is still under warranty you can extend it.

[Ken Fox]

Yes, The warranty follows the machine, not the owner.
As long as it is still under warranty you can extend it.

and even when it is not under warranty, as long as Lenovo knows where to find you, they will try to sell you warranty extensions.

For most people it is a waste of money to pay anything extra for a warranty extension. I can't speak about the situation in any other countries, but in the USA most consumer credit cards (Visa/MC/Amex) have programs that extend the warranty for up to an additional year at no cost to the purchaser, so long as they used that card to purchase the (new) laptop, they are covered. Visa calls their program "Warranty Manager;" the others have their own names.

Warranty extensions are even less useful when you consider that the covered parts that are most likely to die are often not that expensive, such as hard disks. If you are going to upgrade these parts yourself then they are going to be covered under the upgrade provider's warranty, not by Lenovo (e.g. put a new Hard Disk into your Thinkpad, and the harddisk mfr. is the one you will seek out when it croaks, not Lenovo).

3 year (or longer) warranties are worthless if something happens to your laptop that is not covered, such as a liquid spill. Having spilled a glass of wine on an X31's screen once, I can attest to the fact that the remaining 20 month's worth of warranty on that machine was worth absolutely nothing.

Considering the relatively low cost of laptops these days, the rapid onset of obsolescence, and the possibility to sell your damaged or disabled laptop on ebay or elsewhere, recovering at least some of the loss, you are much better off considering the early death of your laptop as an upgrade opportunity rather than some sort of disaster. The two or three hundred dollars you might have put into an extended warranty would be better saved in your bank account for the purchase of your next system.

[bigtiger]

3 year (or longer) warranties are worthless if something happens to your laptop that is not covered, such as a liquid spill. Having spilled a glass of wine on an X31's screen once, I can attest to the fact that the remaining 20 month's worth of warranty on that machine was worth absolutely nothing.

Well, not IF you have Protection Warranty. Most of my recent Thinkpads comes with Protection Warranty. I think it is really worth it. Some people may hold different opinions.

[Ken Fox]

3 year (or longer) warranties are worthless if something happens to your laptop that is not covered, such as a liquid spill. Having spilled a glass of wine on an X31's screen once, I can attest to the fact that the remaining 20 month's worth of warranty on that machine was worth absolutely nothing.

Well, not IF you have Protection Warranty. Most of my recent Thinkpads comes with Protection Warranty. I think it is really worth it. Some people may hold different opinions.

the quote was actually MINE.

Your recent Thinkpads came with this damage warranty because you paid extra for it, presumably. On the two TPs I have on order I could have paid a couple hundred dollars each for this coverage but I declined. I've accidentally damaged one laptop in all my years of computing, and it was due to pure stupidity. Granted, I could exhibit such stupidity in the future however I think the greater likelihood is that I'd pay for the coverage and never use it.

Laptops are an asset that declines in value from the day that you open the shipping box. I'd rather put the same money into my next purchase than try to recoup a bit more on what undoubtedly will be a dated piece of equipment in the rare likelihood I'd ever try to collect on that type of coverage.

[carbon_unit]

For most people it is a waste of money to pay anything extra for a warranty extension. I can't speak about the situation in any other countries, but in the USA most consumer credit cards (Visa/MC/Amex) have programs that extend the warranty for up to an additional year at no cost to the purchaser, so long as they used that card to purchase the (new) laptop, they are covered. Visa calls their program "Warranty Manager;" the others have their own names.

That is fine when buying new but does it work when buying used?

Considering the relatively low cost of laptops these days, the rapid onset of obsolescence, and the possibility to sell your damaged or disabled laptop on ebay or elsewhere, recovering at least some of the loss,

Remind me not to buy any laptops from you.

[Ken Fox]

That is fine when buying new but does it work when buying used?


Remind me not to buy any laptops from you.

When you consider the cost of a warranty extension on a used laptop, the cost is even more unjustifiable. A used laptop needs to be bought from someone you trust, who will take it back if it doesn't work right for at least long enough to evaluate it. Whether you can do this from anyone you don't know in a venue like ebay, is an open question.

I sold the damaged laptop as a damaged laptop, complete with several pictures of the screen damage

[DennisGordon]

I bought my son the Northwestern U. Z61m because it came with the 3 year accidental damage warranty and on-site repair; something I consider useful given what could happen in a dorm (I dont' want to know). They had a fairly decent price on it back in Sept. $1800 - core duo /1.5G / 7200 100G HD / the rest of the good stuff and the warranty. Probably dropped since then. He needed a new mobo after 2 months, and they came out and replaced it for him onsite. So far so good...