Thinkpads Forum

This may be a rant as I have probably experienced the worst customer service known to man. First off, let me explain my situation. I received my T400 yesterday the 9th. Upon opening it, I was just ecstatic. The machine looked beautiful. Before turning it on, I had the wifi switch in the off position to make sure that I wouldn't be able to connect to the internet since I didn't have a virus program installed. I did the whole process of registering and setting up the computer but I noticed that it was taking an awful long time for the computer to do ANYTHING. So, I continued to go about installing NOD32 antivirus and then Mozilla. Again, taking a good 15 minutes to install Firefox and a good 45 minutes to install Nod32. Upon closer inspection, I noticed that the keyboard on the left hand side was raised a little when you have the computer at eye level....major keyboard flex. Still, the machine is slower than sin. My 5 year old T42 is putting this T400 to shame, and I even had it built with windows XP. So once everything is installed, I go ahead and do Windows update where it finds 52 needed updates. It takes 2 hours to download everything and after 3 hours of "installing" it gets stuck on installing the 32nd update. So i do Control-Alt-Delete where it take 3 minutes for the task manager to pop up. By now, I'm just furious and sad. So, after spending 2 hours on the phone and getting transferred to...no joke...15 different people, I finally convinced them that I just want my money back. They kept insisting that I needed to have the computer sent to service before they would let me return it, otherwise I will be held liable for a restocking fee and shipping on my dime. So, now I'm back to my MSI Wind Netbook and my old T42. Tomorrow, I think i'm going to take a trip to the mac store . Here are the basic specs of my T400:

*P9500
*2GB ram
*160GB 7200rpm HD
*Windows XP
*Discreet graphics
*Wifi 5300

I just don't know if I have the confidence and the patience to order another T400.

How sad that the T400 is getting such bad word of mouth these days!

Just curious but how much did the laptop cost?

I paid $1325 shipped using my American Express for a small discount. Removing some of the think vantage bloatware did absolutely nothing for performance.

Sorry to hear about the bad experience! Any idea what kind of replacement you're looking at next?

Probably look into a MacBook Pro 13" and load XP on the side for compatibility issues I may run into. I am a little hesitant to jump into the Mac pool, I just don't see anything else out there that really tickles my fancy. I know Mac has the upper hand on quality compared to many computer manufactures out there.

It seems like a simple issue of bloatware. Clean installation of the operating system usually solves such problems...

dr_st wrote:It seems like a simple issue of bloatware. Clean installation of the operating system usually solves such problems...

Well, it's probably only a matter of time before Lenovo's Department of Customer Service recommends a clean install to resolve everything, including excess flex in the keyboard.

stephens241 wrote:Lenovo's Department of Customer Service

Now that's a funny joke.
I just don't know how a computer company like Lenovo could royally fudge up a keyboard. When I first pulled it out of the box and had it running, there were 77 processes running in the background. After removing a bunch of stuff I got it down to 58. Like I said earlier, no increase in speed what so ever. I'm betting the hard drive was bad as the light never seemed to turn off.

Well, it's probably only a matter of time before Lenovo's Department of Customer Service recommends a clean install to resolve everything, including excess flex in the keyboard.

ha ha!

*hugs her R50's series laptops tighter!*

I will be helping a colleague set a T400 on Wednesday next. I highly doubt I will have these problems. I have never failed to make any T-series machine perform to spec or better (unless the machine is defective from a hardware perspective) so we shall see in due course.

.... JDH

stephens241 wrote:Lenovo's Department of Customer Service

Now that's a funny joke.

You should have seen the crazy things they made my tech-slow sister do when her T43 wouldn't connect to an wireless b network. Clean install, new HDD, rename drives (she had an H drive instead of C for some time), another clean install -- this went on for two months.

The problem: Windows Firewall.

CrazyJeeper wrote:This may be a rant...

You told us not so long ago that...

• I'm looking to replace my 15" T42 that has been slowing down to a crawl...

bill bolton wrote: You told us not so long ago that...

Hope you didn't take my most recent "rant" personally . For owning a T42 for 5 years says something about what IBM once was. I don't consider "I'm looking to replace an old computer" a rant. As we all know, Lenovo will never be like IBM and I'm just letting people know my experience with Lenovo's workmanship (or lack thereof) along with their customer service. I know I was probably one of the "few" people out there to get a lemon, but the dissatisfaction I received from Lenovo only added fuel to the fire for me to get my money back from them.

This does not sound normal, but I guess you know that. Must be a software or hardware problem with the machine. Checked for excessive CPU usage? Checked the hard disk for any SMART errors? If the disk was faulty, maybe it got a bad knock in transit, it might remain functional, but merely slow everything down. Happened to a colleague of mine (old laptop though).

I have a Macbook 13", unibody, not the latest, but the last generation without the Firewire. If you're planning to use the built-in keyboard and screen, I do not recommend it. Screen has poor contrast and viewing angles; also only glossy / reflective was available. Bright and colorful, but the negatives outweigh the positives for me. The keyboard is just plain horrible, shallow, slippery with a crap feel to it and the lack of Home / End / Page Up / Page Down, but most importantly the Delete key (you have to use Fn-Backspace) will have you re-learning your habits. Only the trackpad is good, as trackpads go it's very good, but for me the pointing stick is still better, particularly for dragging where you don't run out of space and don't trigger an accidental drag-lock, which happens quite frequently with the trackpad.

If you do get the Mac, any of boot-camp or virtualisation solutions (Parallels, VMware) are relatively painless for new installs. On the other hand, should you wish, like me, to Ghost your old Thinkpad image onto it, that's very cumbersome. I had multiple partitions and getting them into boot-camp seemed next to impossible. I haven't managed it. As for the virtualisation solutions, there are migration solutions, which I haven't tried. I probably should have. I went the Ghost route instead and found, once I got my Ghost image into a disk image that Parallels / VMWare would recognize (an excercise in itself) that only VMware runs DOS programs at an acceptable speed. Ghosting 60GB in Parallels would have taken about 3 1/2 days, while VMWare took about 2 hours or so.

When my Z61p arrived about 2.5 years ago, I was terrified how slow (in my perception) it was running, although it was a new unit with the cutting edge laptop hardware for that time. It took me a few weeks to find out (thanks to this forum) how a fresh install without all the Lenovo bloatware (IMHO) could make a whole lot of a difference! Now, reading your latest post, for that matter, removing some of the Lenovo applications wouldn´t help much. If you want to improve your "performance" experience of this lappy (and believe me it completely has the hardware potential to do so), you will really need to perform a clean install and then reinstall only those Lenovo applications you actually need.
However, taking the keyboard issue into consideration, maybe the lappy is worth a check through Lenovo support (provided it´s still under warranty cover).

Just my 0.02$

Marin

CrazyJeeper wrote:This may be a rant as I have probably experienced the worst customer service known to man.

If that's the worst customer service known to man, you really got to get out more.

I did customer service for 7 years...nuff said.

Which proves what? After a day your ready to send it back? I didn't seem like it, but did you contact technical support to see if there was anything to be done? Maybe there's a simple fix for your issue(s). I'd go through MSCONFIG and turn off anything that's starting with Windows that you don't wish. That's probably what's mucking things up. All the ThinkVantage Tools have their place, but no one uses them all. You should probably turn off the ones you're not using. Borrow or go to Pirate Bay to get a XP disc. A clean install will help speed things up greatly. Giving up on after a day seems a little shortsighted.

FragrantHead wrote:Must be a software or hardware problem with the machine.

In all fairness, what else could it be?
Sorry, I couldn't resist.

Well apart from the problem with the machine, it could been placebo effect...

Sold my T400 off yesterday too... It seems having 88 processes at the startup tends to slow ppl down a bit... If you get a Thinkpad running vista, you neither need to tweak the OS to death, or clean install. Afterwards its okay.

That the number of processes affects performance is a very popular myth. The number of processes affects memory, but has litttle impact on performance. I have 120 processes loaded and running in my Vista machine and it is as fast as greased lightning. One only has to understand what is being loaded at startup and then tuning those things. If something is never used, then by all means remove it.
... JDH

jdhurst wrote:That the number of processes affects performance is a very popular myth. The number of processes affects memory, but has litttle impact on performance. I have 120 processes loaded and running in my Vista machine and it is as fast as greased lightning. One only has to understand what is being loaded at startup and then tuning those things. If something is never used, then by all means remove it.
... JDH

If there is SSD, then there shouldn't be a problem.

Anyhow, there are powerhungry stuff like Norton, which came with the system - and the default power setting doesn't exactly take advantage of full C2D power.

t140568 wrote:In all fairness, what else could it be?

Yeah that's funny I guess. I think I was trying to say "It's a problem. It can't be normal." At the company I work for we have a saying: "It's not a bug, it's a feature." So when a customer rings with a problem we try to convince them that it's "as designed". Only kidding, but it's a running joke where I work. Probably what I had in the back of my mind.

FragrantHead wrote:I have a Macbook 13", unibody, not the latest, but the last generation without the Firewire. If you're planning to use the built-in keyboard and screen, I do not recommend it. Screen has poor contrast and viewing angles; also only glossy / reflective was available. Bright and colorful, but the negatives outweigh the positives for me. The keyboard is just plain horrible, shallow, slippery with a crap feel to it and the lack of Home / End / Page Up / Page Down, but most importantly the Delete key (you have to use Fn-Backspace) will have you re-learning your habits. Only the trackpad is good, as trackpads go it's very good, but for me the pointing stick is still better, particularly for dragging where you don't run out of space and don't trigger an accidental drag-lock, which happens quite frequently with the trackpad.

If you do get the Mac, any of boot-camp or virtualisation solutions (Parallels, VMware) are relatively painless for new installs. On the other hand, should you wish, like me, to Ghost your old Thinkpad image onto it, that's very cumbersome. I had multiple partitions and getting them into boot-camp seemed next to impossible. I haven't managed it. As for the virtualisation solutions, there are migration solutions, which I haven't tried. I probably should have. I went the Ghost route instead and found, once I got my Ghost image into a disk image that Parallels / VMWare would recognize (an excercise in itself) that only VMware runs DOS programs at an acceptable speed. Ghosting 60GB in Parallels would have taken about 3 1/2 days, while VMWare took about 2 hours or so.

Apple made significant screen changes in the last of the non-firewire MacBooks and the new MacBook Pro. My daughter has one of the very last non-Pro MacBooks and the screen is a night-and-day improvement over the washed-out panels that that model was initially shipped with. Her MacBook Screen isn't quite as nice as the MacBook Air's, but its very close.

The keyboards on MacBooks are also very, very good, just very different from a ThinkPad's. I've been a Mac and a ThinkPad user for many years and have watched as Mac laptop quality has improved significantly in the last two years. My Mac, a MacBook Air, shares the same keyboard with the MacBook Pro but has an older touchpad that supports all gestures, but still has a hardware button. I prefer my T400 for typing,but the MacBook is also very nice. My MacBook Air and my daughter's MacBook both have considerably better screen quality than my ThinkPad T400, which also has a fairly good screen.

The build quality on the current Macs is better, in my opinion, than on the current ThinkPads, but both are still excellent.

I also considered the last gen Macbook 13, fairly a while ago; in the shop, with its screen next to a Macbook Pro, was just incomparable; the Pro looked so much better, and not washed out. Though the other day, had another look at the new MBP 13's screen, and it was actually pretty decent.

You can't blame a laptop for being slow on a fresh-manufactured software installation, especially if it is vista. Every decent man do a proper install of his beloved OS and choose his own softwares to install. I don't say that being slow for a brand new computer is not a shortcoming, I say it is moronic to say so when it is the first time you boot it up.

You can't blame a laptop for being slow on a fresh-manufactured software installation, especially if it is vista. Every decent man do a proper install of his beloved OS and choose his own softwares to install. I don't say that being slow for a brand new computer is not a shortcoming, I say it is moronic to say so when it is the first time you boot it up.

@ artic_squirrel , we don't refer to others here as 'moronic'. If I see you do this again it will be my personal pleasure to see to it that you are banned. - harryc.

3. Ad hominem and personal attacks are not permitted. Criticize the ideas, not the people. An ad hominem attack is a logical fallacy describing the attempt to discredit an argument by merely attacking the credibility of the arguer. Excessive flaming will not be tolerated. Users who verbally assault the character or person of other posters on a regular basis will be banned. Moderator's judgment applies here. "You are wrong" is not a personal attack; "You wrong because you are an idiot" is.

It's like blaming the car manufacturer for your own poor driving skills. Is there any hardware issue? You know that you can always sort out the software by yourself.

Sorry to here of your experience. It's seems odd. Probably not normal. I recently bought a refurbished T400 with the T9400 processor. I did a clean install with Windows 7 RC and have been very pleased with the performance. I couldn't be happier with it.

I was thinking of writing my own story now, explaining how I have had no trouble at all with my T400, even when I was running Vista before installing W7.. but I'll just leave it at that.

I agree that the factory installation has some processes/programs which most people can do without, which may slow down the system noticably, but as this is a software issue, it should be easily remedied, especially by someone who is at home in tech-support.

As for the keyboard problem, it should not be a surprise that a T400 may exhibit keyboard flex, as many have posted about their plight on many a forum. I expect anyone, before buying something as expensive as a Thinkpad, to do some research on the model they are interested in - keyboard flex should have been one of the first possible issues that would have popped up on a simple google search.

Mentioning how long it took to download updates was not necessary, on dial-up it probably would have taken much longer, but that is not something that can be blamed on the laptop itself.

All in all, I am quite surprised that you are not more willing to make your laptop work as well as it works for others, who are satisfied with it. Obviously it is a laptop you want, so sorting out software issues and then contacting Lenovo about a solid-backed keyboard (or ordering one from e-bay), should be the first steps I'd take if I were you.

Good luck with whichever way you choose to go