Terrible Lenovo Support

Question

I purchased an Ideabook U410 laptop “manufacturer refurbished with Lenovo warranty” in April 2013.  Six months later it stopped working.  The computer will not load Windows 7 (it sits at the Windows 7 start up screen), start up repair doesn't work, starting in "last known good configuration" doesn't work, it will not start in safe mode, etc.
The computer won’t boot off the “Factory Default Recovery Disks.” Seems clearly to be a hard drive problem.
The worst part however is the treatment received from Lenovo support.  They said I had to buy another set of recovery disks from them for $89 and to try to boot from those disks before I could even deal with hardware support.
Paid for the disks on October 17th and was told they should arrive within 5 days (by October 22nd).
In the meantime Lenovo support promised a tech would call me to discuss the problem and my concerns that it was really a hard drive problem.  Three times Lenovo support promised me a call, and three times no one called.  I sat at home waiting a day and a half for nothing.
It only got worse after that.  Called Lenovo support on October 22nd to ask why the disks hadn’t arrived, and was told, first, that I hadn’t ordered them.  Next, when I referred to my credit card confirmation of the charge, and Lenovo’s confirmation code, the supervisor at Lenovo support finally told me their tech forgot to put in the order (even though they confirmed he charged my credit card at the time.)
To make matters worse, the supervisor said neither he nor anyone at Lenovo support was authorized to expedite the shipment they had admittedly failed to make when the disks were ordered.
In contrast, and by coincidence, I had a problem with my Dell desktop.  I called them and the part was delivered in one day, I was up and running in less than 48 hours, and I’m in Honolulu

Answer 1

I can't say I've experienced the same Lenovo support, but I have opted to NOT use the Lenovo support method of restoring my Z565 once I replace the hard drive. I know, I know, I can create backups from the drive... except for the fact that it won't run long enough to do that.
1. I was told that I cannot use a drive over 500GB... No reason was offered, the support person I was speaking with just couldn't find a reason on her flash cards. I want to install a 1TB and see no reason why it shouldn't be possible.
2. Not impressed with the support person's apparent inability to offer replacement OS discs without the additional Lenovo required support. I am absolutley NOT a fan of not having driver/OS discs for the eventual death of a hard drive and lacking the ability to restore the machine without extrordinary measures using another computer to go online and get the drivers, copy to a thumb drive, ect... Just give me the darn discs.
3. They apparently do not keep good records. I was repeatedly told I have a 250GB HDD, I KNOW I have a 320GB drive. Considering they were referencing information from my serial number, one would think they should know what drive they put in it.
While I would like to maintain the OKR and recovery partitions, I'm willing to give them up.
In a similar fashion, I have a Dell M710 that had a similar drive failure, but after 5 years of ownership and no extended warranty. They were willing to send the OS recovery discs for the cost of shipping (under $5)
Think my next laptop purchase will be a Lenovo?
I Series 1200 - 2 / Transnote - 1 / 600E's - 8 / 600X - 2 / A21e -2 / T21 - 1 / T30 - 1 / T60 - 2 / Z565 - 1 and more models from various manufacturers than there is space to list.