My first and last Lenovo in 5 hours

I've read about their lousy tech support and arrogant attitude, but ordered one anyway. Oh well.

T61 with Win XP right out of the box. Wouldn't connect to my Linksys router that's worked fine with my existing Panasonic XP laptop.

Spent 2 hours on the phone with Linksys, trying different encryption, resetting, etc, including updating the router's internal software, all of it showing that it worked fine, and that the Lenovo would connect to an unsecured router but not to my secured router.

Called Lenovo. Got cut off twice, each time after waiting about 15 minutes. Third call, unintelligible rep said it was "due to the weather." But he connected me anyway and I got through.

Guy sounded like Chris Rock - patronized me and told me I didn't understand. WITHOUT TRYING ANYTHING, he said he'd send me a new wireless card, but he had to check with his supervisor. Came back on the line and said supervisor said not to send me a card because the T61 could connect to an unsecured router. My only option was to pay $99 for a "Live Expert." (Clearly I'd been talking to dead experts and live idiots up till now.)

Straight out of the box, I have to pay $99 to get this thing to work with an existing, proven router? No way.

I'm quite experienced with Windows notebooks and with XP. I've had 10 notebooks in the past 17 years. But I'm returning this thing. F***ing arrogant company. IBM's customer "support" was snotty back in 1997 when I had to use one at work. I thought things would be different now. Clearly they haven't learned anything.

I'll never buy something from a company that won't provide free help WITHIN THE FIRST FIVE HOURS OF OWNERSHIP.

 

You may not like the support and surely the customer service is crap but the X series is still best in class for now. Think hard about your decision. Barring major hardware problems, notebooks are basically user support machines. Fix software issues yourself. I think your problem may have been caused by ThinkVantage utilities because surely XP would work with your existing router. Why not fix it yourself by unintalling TV and seeing what would happen? BTW you are right in that only a fool would pay $99 for support. Maybe the best couse was to hang up and try another tech.

In my experience customer srevice is the worse for any large company or PC company I have ever experienced.

 

they make dell look like genuises which is pretty hard to do-fortunately, just like with dell, they will be brought to their knees soon and make an attempt to service their customers properly

 

No message. Deleted by myself.

 

Lenovo's been pretty helpful in my situations. But I guess I just got the lucky reps .

Sorry to hear about your bad experience.

 

Give it a shot with another wireless router. I've had slight connection issues with my Wireless B router but my Wireless G router works wonderfully. Not the answer you wanted from me but it's another option to delve.

Btw, what is your linksys wireless router anyways?

 

If it can work unsecured but not secured, it is probably user error on configuring the wireless part on the T61.

I know you said you have years of experience with computers in general, but even an *expert* can overlook something obvious. But that's not to say there's indeed nothing wrong with the hardware.

Take this instance of a cable company. Say, I get a STB or DVR box from my local cable provider and I connect it directly via component/s-video/composite/etc to the TV and there's a picture. Now, I say I connect it to my receiver first and then from the receiver to the TV. The results? No picture. So I call my local cable provider and what do you think he/she is going to say? If it works from STB/DVR to TV but not STB/DVR to Receiver to TV, I'm most likely going to be on my own. Say I call my receiver maker (Denon), they'll point right back at the cable provider (Comcast). Or maybe even the TV manuf (Sony). Worst! The company that actually made the component/s-video/composite wires.

I do have years of experience as well working with computers and networking, but on a recent trip to a relative's house, he didn't have Wifi. So, I was using wired connection for a few days. Then all of a sudden his router *broke* and he installed a new router with Wifi.

We tried it first without any security and my T61p could connect. Then we setup security on the router (WPA) and the T61p will not connect. I made sure to type in the password carefully multiple times and it won't connect. Wired connection remains to work. Tried various *things* on the T61p (Vista Home) and it still refuses to connect. Actually it would connect, but only give me local connection only. T61p can't get out on the internet.

I finally gave up, rebooted the machine and when it started up again, it works w/o any changes on router.

In all the years I've been working on computers, often time support will tell you to unplug and wait 15s before turning it on (in case of router), reboot machine w/ safe mode etc. but I know it is not necessary 99% of the time.

But this is the one time I was proven wrong. I did have to reboot and it is probably more coz' of a M$ quirk with Vista more so than anything.

Good luck returning it.

 

somehow I doubt chinese company investing $$ on customer service improvement...

 

Laptops are not consumer products.

 

First of all, thank you for the replies. In response to Renee's question "I honestly do not understand why this thread was started", here's the answer: I wanted hear what experienced Thinkpad owners might say about my experience, and to warn others of what they might have to deal with if they needed help. After a tough time, don't you ever want to compare notes and hear from others who might have some direct insight into the problem? Unfortunately, Renee was not one of those helpful people. She just made a snap judgment that I couldn't possibly know what I was talking about. Well, Miss Renee, if you have any thought on how I can fix it, please share. I assure you I will understand any sensible suggestion you offer. In the meantime, folks like watchtower7 and dimonay offered sympathy and a little hope that it could be better.

I'll admit that it was 2 AM and I felt f**... well, seriously wronged. My post might have looked amateurish, but I'm no amateur.

BaldwinHillsTrojan (Go USC! My brother's an alum.) - I will follow up on your idea that TV might be responsible. That software is new to me and unique to IBM, and of course there's no "How to Get Started" warning about unexpected proprietary utilities that might trip up a seasoned XP user who's doesn't expect to see it coming between him and his wireless. I was wondering about TV as its name popped up in my attempts to figure out what was going on, and sadly the Lenovo phone tech didn't address it at all - he didn't even tell me that it was part of the software "chain of command" for the wireless access.

klutchrider - my router is a G, same as yours. It's the ubiquitous LinkSys WRT54GC. I should have specified that.

hamproof - you said "If it can work unsecured but not secured, it is probably user error on configuring the wireless part on the T61." But the machine was straight out of the box! I hadn't configured anything yet! I appreciated the examples you gave - I too rely on "reboot" therapy all the time. In my case, on the long call with Linksys (who was FANTASTIC, by the way - I can't praise them enough for the intelligence, creativity, and clear diction of their three levels of techs who worked with me - they've made a friend for life) - we did the power down and wait thing several times - with the router, my DSL modem, my older working laptop and the new one. I'm convinced that everything that could be reset had ample time.

Anyhow, after some sleep, I'm going to try again in the light of day with (hopefully) another set of techs. The promise of this machine, which I customized and bought after much reading on this forum, is too great to give up so quickly.

Thanks for reading. I'll keep you posted ...

 

jb,


If you give it another shot, use the power of substitution....

...try another router

...try a wireless usb dongle w/non TV software

...try WEP if WPA does not work for you

Post your results.

 

I'm sure the OP will get it to work eventually and be happy with the Thinkpad.

I know I'm enjoying my first TP in its sexy black and thank god for the non-glossy screen (albeit it is the only option). The matte outer casing is great considering almost every HP I've seen is all too shiny.

Btw, when I said it is probably user error on configuration, I meant if it was unsecured, sure the WinXP picks up the signal and you double click to make the connection. If secured, you do have to select the encryption type, and whether to enter the password in ascii or hex.

I'm not saying your specific TP is not a dud, but like another poster says, try it with another router, or same router with different encryption. Heck, if you want, try it unsecured, but do not broadcast the SSID and enable MAC filtering for extra security. If all of them work except for when you enable security, I hate to say this, but it sounds like user error.

I generally do not call techsupport for anything. If you can afford a T61 over the everyday Dells and HPs, I'm sure you are paid a lot more than some tech support outfit wherever they are. Surely you are smarter.

But it is not an excuse for incompetent support even if many of us do not use them.

 

Well stated hamproof. I too love the matte screen and sexy black. And, all true about the configuration comments.

On customer service.....it must be difficult to provide customer support on a laptop from 6000 miles away. Heck, did you ever try to provide support for your wife's laptop from one room away from her laptop? For very specific support I recall a great scripted troubleshooting process by my internet provider for their modem/router......but for other than specific cases, the laptop contains many complex hardware/software components......quite hard to troubleshoot without putting your hands on the laptop....and without having better than a layman's knowledge.

In the end for Lenovo to compete, operate profitably and to reduce costs associated with returns and replacements, Lenovo will have an inducement to try and provide PCs that are layman proof. The TV wireless software, for example, probably needs some more work.

 

UPDATE! The problem may be solved, thanks to a very different good Lenovo tech, some more testing on my own, and that misterious way Windows has of fixing itself. A long story - I posted in a new thread with a more positive title at http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=204351