I bought a recommended student Lenovo laptop for my grandkid, it broke down after a week and couldn't be repaired. OfficeWorks eventually replaced it with a comparable HP. My own top of the range Lenovo Yoga ran beautifully but died just after 3 years. I start to wonder is it just me or is the Lenovo PC quality no longer as good as it used to be? Has anyone noticed the same?
Has Lenovo PC Quality Gone Downhill?
BendBridge on 14/09/2023 - 11:05
Comments
ThinkPads are general reliable. There are 2 types of Yoga, ThinkPad Yoga and Yoga. ThinkPad Yoga is generally more reliable than Yoga. Watch out for ThinkBook, they are higher quality IdeaPad but they are NOT ThinkPad!
In General, 3 years+ is consider reliable for a laptop these days. Nothing last forever! :)
I have many instances of T/X series running for over a decade! And many of these were left in a third world country known for seasonal dust storms and unreliable electricidal supplies.
If I had a faulty laptop at 3 years I would be very unhappy. At 6 years I would grudgingly accept it, but I really expect 10+ years life for electronics, though batteries and disks/SSDs might not make it that long.
Got a working Asus n61jq from 2010, with some just it of warranty motherboard replacements, of course.
what about their budget desktops with not 1 BUT 3 liquid cooling systems? oofff
all 3 of my children have had/got lenovo laptop (E490's) for end of school/early uni. only one has been replaced at age of around 4 years (her choice, she bought the replacement)
my E1650 desktop thinkstation is around 7 odd years old, but has only been used for 4 years (it was an unused ex work PC), still works as expected
.
More detail on the 'it broke down after a week' please.
As above, the business and enterprise offerings are very reliable.
How did it break down after a week?
Just wouldn’t boot up.
"it broke down after a week and couldn't be repaired." quite sure Lenovo could repair it, but as it was purchased for school and ~ a week old, Officeworks used their discretion to replace it to keep the customer happy.
Breaking down so soon after initial use, could suggest there was a fatal flaw with one/more of the vary many components, but that's what warranties are for.
"Has Lenovo PC Quality Gone Downhill?" ???? no idea -re inference.
I used to build my own PC's since the late 80's and then I just bought them off the shelf. All PC's I used in the past never just "died", they were just too slow to do anything useful. But I have seen 3 Lenovo broke down because of hardware issues in the past year, hence I asked…
I start to wonder is it just me or is the Lenovo PC quality no longer as good as it used to be? Has anyone noticed the same?
Ex employee here, OP.
It's just you. Lenovo computers are generally fine. I'm using a Legion myself.
As above, enterprise and business offerings were highly desired amongst potential clients when I was still there.
Were you involved with the laptop side of the business at all? If so, I'm wondering about the Yoga sub-branding, especially as how it's partially crossed over with the Thinkpad range.
The first Yoga I had was the worse computer I've ever had the misfortune to spend money on.
Do you have an idea as to whether the Yoga/Thinkpad crossovers are built and designed to straight 'Thinkpad' standards or is there a compromise?
Were you involved with the laptop side of the business at all?
Nope. ANZ ops are all mainly focused on sales and after-sales services.
I did deal with product specialists who would be able to answer your question but I was not one of them.
@tallkid123 I have seen a strange problem on my neighbour's Lenovo perhaps you can shed some lights.
Symptoms: unable to login to the PC with correct PIN and password. After a few days, the same PIN worked. This situation occurred a few times in the past 6 months and each time it appeared to "heal" itself after a week or so.
Response from Lenovo support: I posted the issue online and a Lenovo support suggested it was an issue with the password file. But it never was.Have you seen similar issues while working for Lenovo?
Has it ever been "uphill"?
Yes, when they purchased the Thinkpad division from IBM.
I remain a cautious fan of Lenovo, but the usb-c power issue they had was pretty bad:
https://www.tomsguide.com/news/nearly-all-thinkpads-have-def…I don’t think they handled it well, and spent a long time denying there was a problem.
Since then, i have seen the same type of failure on a system that is newer than the ones on the affected list."Couldn't be repaired" Every component in a laptop can be replaced to get it back to working order. "Recommended" by who?
Recommended by OfficeWorks. Sure every component can be replaced but at what cost? Since it's within the first month of the purchase, they simply replaced it with a new machine.
recommended by the finance department - it's never about whether or not it can be fixed, but what is the cheapest route to a resolution
I bought a recommended student Lenovo laptop for my grandkid, it broke down after a week and couldn't be repaired
Couldn't be repaired is a strange one, as everything is replaceable in them. What was the fault? There isn't much in them these days, a motherboard or a screen, those two items cover 90% of the unit.
But cheap Lenovo is cheap, costly Lenovo is bit better..
I've had an Ideapad s540 for 2 years now, been using it every day, no problems. Dropped it a few times. The only minor issue was when there were biscuit crumbs in the keyboard, fixed it with a big shake. The previous low end Lenovo I've had was pretty good too. It lasted longer than other laptops that I've had.
Bought a new base model Thinkpad (~ $700) around 5 years ago for uni. Still going strong.
Yes! The quality has gone down in my view. Had 3 devices with WiFi Card failures, all bought over a 3 year period and different models, I DO NOT recommend Lenovo based on this.
That makes two of us😀
I have a Lenovo in which 5 of the keys in different parts of the keyboard stopped working after 2 years, which was some sort of software or hardware glitch, not due to dust or anything being spilled on the keyboard. On the other hand I have a Dell that is 11 years old and going strong so I'm more likely to buy Dell in the future.
Have 2 Lenovo laptops at the moment.
1 x Lenovo E330 (3rd Gen intel) - absolutely love this laptop. After all these years battery life is still great, boots fast, works so well for a 2 core CPU.
1 x Lenovo Ideapad 17 - (6th Gen CPU), still going strong, but had a few issue along the way. Keyboard has been crap since new, when you really need to hit the keys firm to register. Issues with the WiFi adapter, since replace. Cooling is great, but from time to time it produces this loud grinding noise coming from the cooler.
Screen stuffed (green tint fault) up a couple months after warranty expired, and had to be replaced. All in all I have had this Laptop for a tad over 7 years, & its still working, but although not ruling out ever buying another Lenovo, would think twice about another it in the future.Their Chromebooks are absolute garbage. The hinges are only supported on one side just to save a fraction of a cent on having two pins… And this is a screen that is supposed to rotate 360 degrees.
Some of their models are put together with Low Temperature Solder to reduce environmental impact during reflow. I guess there's an offset reliability then.
Lenovo budget options are garbage. Their enterprise laptops and premium laptops seem good (T series and Yoga).