Thinkpads Forum

In the past all of my PC purchases have been with onsite warranty coverage. I have never actually had a tech show up at my house for anything in the last decade, since I would just request parts and fix problems myself. I purchased my new T61 with the depot warranty since I work a lot during normal business hours. When my wife is home, she is usually busy with a pair of two year olds and does not like random people showing up that need to come inside.

Anyway, I had instant buyers remorse after saving money to get the depot warranty on my new T61. I envisioned some nightmare where my notebook takes weeks to fix and I am stuck without it. I had a warranty issue right off since my LCD front bezel was curved out in the middle on the bottom. Lenovo said the part was not something I could install myself and maintain my warranty, so I had to send it in...

8/27 - Call placed to Lenovo support around 8PM, they tell me to expect a prepaid box "soon" so I can return my T61 for warranty repair. Since I placed the call at 8PM, I figured this would take two days to show up.
8/28 - Empty box shows up at my house when no one is home and I find it when I get home. I call DHL and arrange for a pickup for early in the next day.
8/29 - I pack my T61 into the box Lenovo sent me and leave for work. DHL shows up at my house and picks up the T61 as expected.
8/30 - T61 delivered to EasyServ (Selectron) at 8AM, repaired sometime during the day, and and the notebook is sent out at 7PM.
8/31 - T61 delivered to my house at noon.


Not bad

Despite the horrible things I've heard about Solectron, I too was impressed when I had to send my X40 in for warranty repairs. The on-site tech had worked on it twice and could not repair it properly. Out of frustration I called IBM and asked that it be sent to depot for repairs. Four days later it was back and in perfect shape!

Oh, I was impressed too. The shipping box arrived asap - the pickup/delivery gal waited while I stuck it in and took it away. It was delivered to the depot the next day.

And then I waited.
And waited.
23 days after they got it, they shipped it back.

ocellaris, It's nice to have someone post about a good depot experience. Everyone with a bad experience will post about it, but only a few with a good experience make posts about it. Most just go on using their Thinkpads without a word.
ezlynx, sorry it was bad for you but that is not the norm.

Lots of dropped balls and it took much longer than it should have. When it was returned to me, I performed the same diagnostics they'd had me do the month before - and got the same failures that initiated their telling me I had to send it in for repair. After I told them I was getting the same failed info, they wanted me to send it in again. After using it successfully for a weekend, doing some research myself, and talking to the supervisor, it was finally determined the failed msbios standards test was not significant. Every technician who had talked to me (and there were several) indicated this was serious and I needed to send it in for repair.

So they learned something in the process. I'd asked for those lost 23 days to be added back on my warrantee. The supervisor I talked to forwarded the request, I got a call saying they'd email me a response, and I never heard from them again. I've been trying to get an answer for over a month, one way or the other.

I do like this T61. But sorting out the initial problems (started with BSOD) has been painful.

My experience is good and bad. The good part is that they had very quick turnaround. DHL picked up Tuesday morning, I got it back Thursday morning. The bad part is that they didn't fix the problem, just installed a BIOS upgrade. The [censored] noisy fan still runs all the time

jamesqf wrote:My experience is good and bad. The good part is that they had very quick turnaround. DHL picked up Tuesday morning, I got it back Thursday morning. The bad part is that they didn't fix the problem, just installed a BIOS upgrade. The [censored] noisy fan still runs all the time

well, based on OP's post, solectron is not a horrible repair depot after all. It's just based on your luck and who the person is, handling your laptop and the team. Maybe based on numerous complains about horrible solectron service, they started to improve on their service standards. Complains about them are all over the internet.. and compliments are rare..

EDIT: mistake about fan replacement

NS wrote:snip.......check the fan FRU number and ask IBM to send a replacement to you if your warranty is still on.

Sir, IBM does not send replacement for fans and since it's a CRU ID N, customers should not replace it, replacing it by yourself will void the warranty too.

jamesqf wrote:My experience is good and bad. The good part is that they had very quick turnaround. DHL picked up Tuesday morning, I got it back Thursday morning. The bad part is that they didn't fix the problem, just installed a BIOS upgrade. The [censored] noisy fan still runs all the time

Sir, you always have an option to take it in person to any IBM authorized Repair Center in your local area for full analysis.

Here is one in your area:

dba ComputerLand of Reno
5955 Tyrone
Reno, NV 89502
Tel: (585) 898 8420

ryengineer wrote:

NS wrote:

oops, my mistake.

I have actually let this info slip off my mind while watching youtube videos and surfing the forum at the same time. Sorry.

NS wrote:

ryengineer wrote:...you always have an option to take it in person to any IBM authorized Repair Center in your local area for full analysis.

I didn't know that, Thanks for the info.

In any case, I don't think replacing the fan would fix it - the new fan would still run. It's what's causing it to run: an overheating chip, bad contact to the heat pipe, or something.