[ltp] Re: lenovo support for linux

[Shannon McMackin]

Florian Manschwetus wrote:
> Today I've had a call from Peter Reinhart (Lenovo Germany)
> He told me that lenovo gives absolutely NO support for linux related 
> trouble with T60 or any other model which wasn't sold with linux 
> preloaded. Furthermore the won't give any support for any thinkpad model 
> used with a different OS than those available as preinstalled.
> 
> Furthermore he told me that my specific t60 is still not replaced in 
> complete, after 3 or 4 mainboard replacements, because the mainboard was 
> replaced every time for a different reason. Now the current smaller 
> problems will be repaired, than I could pick it up.
> Additionally my 3 year warranty was timed out during the time it was in 
> repair center, waiting for a decision from lenovo, he told me that he 
> will ask someone for some warranty extension, maybe there is a small 
> chance.
> 
> Nice outcome after four month and a lot of additional work on my side.
> And every time we have had progress it was based on my initiative.
> Yeah really that is for what I have paid 2000 euro (student promotion, 
> no idea what the real price would have been for this one).
> 
> So guys, no we are on our own, lenovo won't give us any help for 
> problems aren't reproducible with the PRELOADED windows, yes the 
> preloaded one this was pointed out from Peter Reinhart.
> 
> One really disappointed customer,
> Florian
> 
> p.s. currently I see now real chance to get back a trustworthy platform 
> for further work on the sys-kernel/thinkpad-sources stuff, sorry, but 
> until my TP runs fine again, I can't really test the patch composition, 
> so I won't set something online.
> 
Does that really surprise you?

I don't expect any hardware vendor to offer support on an OS they didn't 
ship pre-loaded on the machine.  It's a cost factor.  You may not like 
it, but that's how it is.  You can learn to mask your OS based on what 
you say to them on the phone.  This is what I've done, but all my 
problems have been mechanical on the ThinkPads I've used.

I work for IBM and I can't even open a ticket on a problem with my 
ThinkPad unless it's a clear-cut hardware problem.  Everything with 
Linux is a community-based support effort just like it is out in the 
real world.  Companies can't afford to hire the skills or train their 
employees in a support center on the variety of Linux distros out there.

I don't know what kind of issues led to the replacement of your planar 
every time, but it must have been drastic.  Unfortunately, if it was a 
systemic issue that wasn't easy to diagnose with Lenovo, then that's why 
your experience was poor.

I don't like it, you don't like it and nobody likes it.  It's just the 
way it is.  ThinkPads are one of the best laptops out there and if you 
want to use Linux, you're doing a lot of self-support...