4/5 products will be repairable
the fifth would've been, had lenovo not filled it with a bunch of glue for a laugh
this post was submitted on 05 Oct 2023
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As if soldering RAM & SSD isn't enough, the chasis would be solid epoxy and there's no way you're taking out the battery or the keyboard, let alone the mainboard.
Congratulations, you're almost doing what you should've been doing in the first place.
I mean, given they sell Thinkpads, the bar is likely to be easier to reach for them. I do wonder by what metric of "repairable" they mean. The quote has him saying batteries and SSDs, but those are already fixable in most of their existing line up. It's the RAM (so many are soldered, even in the Thinkpad line) I'm mostly thinking about, and there's also the screen and keyboard, two other common failure points.
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I'm only here to say, why the fuck would you put wrenches in this pic? Imo Should be screw drivers
"By repairable we mean that you have to us a monthly subscription to get access to the tools needed or you can take it one of your very expensive authorized repair centers. We can't lose money because you decided to repair our products."
Idk, Lenovo's laptops have always been fairly easy to work on. The back panel on my legion is a little tough to get off but everything is easily accessible once it's removed. There was even an extra slot for an nvme drive so I have two hard drives now.
"Company follows law."
Well, yeah. They kinda have to by EU law in the future. But good to see they start the change now.
I love ThinkPads especially the "good old" ones. Especially for their accessibility of parts and easy repair/upgradability.
My personal laptop has been a Thinkpad since 2013 (Thinkpad Edge E135 > Thinkpad X220 > Thinkpad x260) and at work we are also given ThinkPads (currently running a T14 gen 3).
Most ThinkPads I encountered are also sturdy built and not Gleis together or some crap like that. However I recently had an issue with my x260's power button no longer working and to get it to work I had to replace the top bezels. Well maybe to put it more bluntly I had to get a replacemt bezel and put my Thinkpad into it since to replace the bezel I had to take out almost everything and then put it back in the reverse order. The mere fact that I managed to do it and there are officiall step by step instructions on how to (hmm) are a big upside of ThinkPads. But like others have said it used to be even better.
Well long story short: I've recently preordered a framework 13 amd while I honestly would have preferred a "Thinkpad black" Chassis framework just seems to have the right idea to me.
Framework is doing amazing work. Sure, their stuff isn't cheap, but you're basically voting with your wallet against the throwaway tech culture. It's like saying, "Hey, we'd rather pay a bit more for gear that's actually built to last, than for some flimsy junk that falls apart and costs a fortune to fix."
ThinkPads once were pretty easy to work on and repair, but then the whole soldering stuff to the system board and removing power bridge batteries happened.
If you look at something like a T430, it has access doors for everything on the bottom in addition to being built like a tank.
They better be repairable, 2-3 in 10 of them will need it out of the box. smh Lenovo i used to have better expectations of you.
For the curious: My work has us get batches of them, some have camera issues, others simply don't turn on.
I'm a bit surprised by this, looking at common recommandations for PC laptops Lenovo is mentioned 90% of the time then alternative manufacturers like frame.work. What would be your recommandation then?
Probably framework. I think they are reading the writing on the wall with all of the Thinkpad fans I know either having purchased one or on preorder for the new ones.
Thanks, I seriously considered getting one but their supply is still limited and I can't get one in my country :/
Yeah, they're still on backorder since everyone (understandably) lost their minds when they dropped the current gen models. Should be cleared up by early next year.
mmh imo all the main manifacturers cheaps us out in the laptop category (unless you go into the expensive side i guess). There's always some compromise somewhere :/
But to be fair, i'm not some reviewer and haven't seen all that the land of laptops has to offer. My advice would be to go looking at different youtube reviews on different channels too.
In my experience:
Microsoft devices while not too good on repairability (hard to open) are often solid and reliable, they tend to be able to keep up with the time. Ex: my surface pro 4 is still used and is surprisingly keeping up. I'd say the same on the surface laptop side. They are more work oriented and less for gaming sadly.
Asus has a nice gaming oriented catalog, but they feel cheap material wise. I've got the ROG Flow Z13 tablet and it's amazing the amount of power they managed to put in there, the casing is all metal so my previous statement doesn't apply to this one, but the screen is plastic(?) and has some damage already. I've use a Strix laptop a few times and that's where i found the quality lacking.
I used to think HP was a brand to avoid, but with the ones we ship out, they seem to be decent. I have yet to use it.
I had an Acer aspire that had a pentium in it, probably got it around 2008-10. Used to game on it until it overheated itself off, and rinse repeat many times. Great laptop for everyday use, suprisingly still running to this day. I'd recommend for people who dont want to get a chromebook, as some form of step up.
I've no experience with other brands.
Every time I've tried Acer or Asus I've had a deal breaker hardware issue immediately. I see people recommending them a lot but they must have QC consistency issues of some kind. Maybe I just had bad luck, but I always end up going back to Lenovo and I never have issues.
In my experience, HP machines are very good. At work we switched to Dells, and I absolutely hate them. I've encountered a lot of problems, bad drivers, puffed up battery, stupid Dell software (like the piece of shit WavesMax that comes with the audio driver and needs to run in the background, otherwise it won't switch from speakers to headphones when you plug them in; it also applies shitty audio effects on every every audio device. If you turn it off and switch the playback device, it turns back on).
Thanks for sharing your experiences! My girlfriend has to buy a laptop soon and that definitively helps!
I like to think that this means you take your device to a repair centre and they have you spin a big wheel to see if you get to have your device repaired.
I took apart a Thinkpad *20 series laptop including the main board and put it back together with not a single issue. I heard thingd went downhill from the *40 series onward and became unbearable for the Thinkpad enthusiasts since the *90 series.
Now they're saying this like they haven't fucked it up in the first place. What a joke.
A new model with a deep travel keyboard, please, Lenovo. Don't bother me until it's done.
4 repairable, one broken, 2 milion glued shut.
But they aren't repairable now because you keep setting your fucking wrenches on top of them
...what?
The picture from the linked article is a keyboard with wrenches on it lol
Ahhh gotcha.
For me I don't see it in the article (AdBlock I guess?) and on mobile I can barely make out the thumbnail
Huh. I don’t see it in the article either lol
What a crazy carousel. I still use the t430, which I would call repairable - I just hope that there will be a current motherboard with appropriate CPU For it
T480s user here. It's perfectly fine, too. I think it went downhill from the 90-series onwards.
I agree. it has the right balance and you still have a full RJ45 slot :) My only issue with is the loose USB-C ports, it's not firm like the Macbook or even Elitebook.
Don't buy Lenovo, unless you like your Chinese spy machines
Just uninstall Windows.
Can you give me some of the articles, studies, etc. which have convinced you of these laptops being chinease spyware?
I take it you don't remember the SuperFish scandal? Lenovo just settled the class action lawsuits not too long ago. I don't blame anyone for not trusting Lenovo after they sold PCs with built-in spyware that ran MITM attacks using self-signed certificates and hijacked their SSL/TLS connections. You really don't need a study for something that Lenovo admitting to doing.
I don't remember the superfish scandal, had never heard of it actually. Thank you telling me about it though, I was a child when this was a thing. Looks like it came out in 2015 and settled in 2017. That's not recent. Thank you again, I'm glad to know this, and won't think of Lenovo when suggesting laptops again.
I can understand the aggression you're giving me seeing as how you're being downvoted for something which may be a legitimate concern. I'm sorry for that, and would like to confirm I've not been participating. (Edit: sorry, you're not bigfig. This apology was to them) My thanks was honest. Though, I cannot see the link to it being a "chinease spyware" situation. Would you be able to provide links for that one? I see superfish is and was headquartered in california. What makes it chinease?
Edit: @[email protected] would you be able to advise? (BigFig)
For the lazy, here's some excerpts from a PCWORLD article:
According to the FTC, the software allowed VisualDiscovery to see all of a consumer’s sensitive personal information transmitted over the Internet, including log-in information, Social Security numbers, and more
In 2015, Lenovo CTO Peter Hortensius called the decision to use Superfish a “significant mistake.”
(Big whoopsy daisy, we sent all your personal information to an add company, we really ballsed this one up)
For 20 years, Lenovo will be required to put in place a “comprehensive software security program for most consumer software preloaded on its laptop,” subject to external audits, the FTC said. If Lenovo does put adware onto its laptops, it must “get consumers’ affirmative consent,” it added.
Wow, maybe that one shouldn't be limited to 20 years. Maybe that one shouldn't be limited to lenovo, huh
According to McSweeny, VisualDiscovery and its Superfish software “would alter the very Internet experience for which most consumers buy a computer,” she wrote.
I assume for the better right guys? right?
According to McSweeny, the Superfish software slowed Internet browsing, specifically downstream traffic by 25 percent and uploads by as much as 125 percent. In addition to simply slowing browser speeds, VisualDiscovery also used an insecure method to replace digital certificates, exposing users to risk and preventing their browsers from warning them that the website they were visiting could have been spoofed. And on every e-commerce site, VisualDiscovery’s software would display ads.
That ones fun
Here's the original article for the curious: https://www.pcworld.com/article/407332/lenovos-superfish-bloatware-scandal-reveals-a-sneaky-tactic-we-thought-microsoft-had-started.html
I was a child when this was a thing. Looks like it came out in 2015 and settled in 2017. That is not recent.
Bro you are fucking killing me right now
Please tell me he's a troll😭
My dude, that was 8 years ago. I am 23. There are people younger than you it's nothing to worry about. In high school I was not interested in pc companies, let alone privacy. This has since changed.
I was 15 when the news broke. I liked playing video games, pretending to be cool, and dnd.
You are a very strange person to believe me thanking this person for sharing their knowlage and changing my opinion accordingly is trolling. I'd think you were kidding if I hadn't come back to a new downvote on my two comments in this thread
All genuine people are old, bitter, and flame -happy. Ergo, anyone young or polite is a troll. Didn't you know that?
--signed, usenetGPT
Hey! You've just given me a d&d world-building idea...
Your party comes to two bridges, under one of which is a civil servant, and under the other, a troll.
"I have a polite conversation with the troll and ask him to let us pass"
he lets you pass
Yeah, use HP and Dell for American spying machines running Windows and Intel Management Engine!