Very disapointed in Lenovo's service on my T430 machine type 2342CTO with Windows Pro 7 64 bit

Question

I have been a ThinkPad user since the first model 700.  I have always liked them and when I have had to use other laptops I found them inferior.  However one thing my team has been telling me in the past year or two is that they do not want to purchase anymore Lenovo ThinkPad's.  They have told me that the service and support has been greatly degraded.  I was hesitant to agree with them until my present experience.  We purchase all of our ThinkPad's with a 4 year on-site warranty.  We have people who are in the field and when their computer goes down we need to get it back up and running ASAP.  
Three weeks ago my hard drive started to give me some problems and  one day after shutting down the computer a message came up that it needed to run Checkdisk which it did.  I was able to keep it going and I did have a backup.   I contacted  the 800 number to talk with a service person and they ordered up service for the replacement of the hard drive and also to replace the fan and sent me the system disks for the T430.  Two days later the insight service person showed up with the parts.  The disks showed up as well via UPS.  The service person replaced the fan and the HDD.  There were 4 DVD's for the system disks.  He started the rebuild and asked if I could finish it and I said I could with no problem.  He left.  I continued the process.  After the 3rd DVD it asked to put in the 4th and when I did a message said that this was the wrong DVD.  I tried all the other 3 with the same response.  I tried building it from scratch again and the same problem.  I called support again and the guy I spoke with thought that I must have a bad DVD and he would send out another set.  That set of 4 DVD’s arrived the next day which I was very thankful for.  He told me that they could only guaranty 2 days.  I thought OK we should be up and running shortly.  The same problem occurred again.  Bear in mind that both sets of these DVD's were all labeled for the ThinkPad T430 machine type 2342 which was my laptop and for Windows Pro 7, 64 bit.  I called Lenovo and this time the tech I spoke with said that there was another set of Disks for my machine that should have been sent.  Of course I was frustrated but there was not a lot I could do about that and I asked if they could make sure that they were overnighted to me so that I would be sure to get them on the next day which was Thursday.  He told me that he could not do that, that they could only guaranty 2 day. I called the next morning to get the tracking number which they gave me and it was supposed to be delivered on Friday which I was very thankful for.  That was Good Friday.  However UPS had some severe weather at their hub in Kentucky and everything was delayed and the disks did not show up until Monday.  I had now been down a whole week from my first call the Monday before. 
The new set of disks was 3 DVD’s labeled for the T430, Machine type 2342 and Windows Pro 7, 64 bit.  I started the build process.  It continued to work but I made a mistake in the order of disks so I thought that these disks have a problem too.  I called Lenovo and they said that I should just send the system in for depot repair.  I said that will take at least until probably Thursday.  The guy I was speaking to said that I should have it back by Wednesday.  I asked if there was any way that I could send it to them directly that day.  He said no I could not, I had to wait for a box.  I asked if there was anyway to expedite the process and he spoke to his manager and his manager said that the level of service that was on the machine would not allow for any faster service.  The also told me that my service contract would allow me to take it to an authorized Lenovo service center around me.  I said to him that they probably have a queue as well and that I will have to wait for that.  As an aside note we did try service like this with one of our other ThinkPad’s that had a problem and the place messed up the system and we ended up at the end of the day having to send it to their depot for repair.  I hung up and though let me try these disks one more time.  I did and I saw my mistake and the system loaded up the DVD’s properly.  I was getting excited that I could be up and running shortly.  However my excitement was short lived.  Once it started to reboot and expand the installation the drive failed and said that it had to run Checkdisk.  It did and once again there were all kinds of orphaned files etc.  I had to reboot and run it from the DVD’s again and I went through the whole process once again.  The system went into a complete failure and would not do anything.  I called back support with my case # and gave them this information.  The box came the next day and I packed it up and sent it off.  I then started tracking it and it arrived on Wednesday as expected.  Then I wanted to go to the site and track the progress of the repair.  The document you have to fill out and send back with the system gives information on where to go on the web to track the process.  My shows that it arrived on Wednesday 4/8 as expected.  The first message shows “Machine being repaired” at 08:52.  Then I checked later in the early evening hoping to see shipped back to customer.  However what I did see was the following message “Hold for Parts – Service call is on hold until parts arrive”.  Then I kept tracking it and saw another entry on 4/10 at 02:01:54 which was the same “Hold for Parts – Service call is on hold until parts arrive”.  That was of course Friday.  I called the service and they told me that they were waiting on parts which they could not tell me what parts and that there was nothing that they could do.  I then asked if there was anyway to expadite this and the girl I spoke to said that she would seek to accelerate this to another level and that I would get a call from Lenovo in the next 2 to 3 business days!  I said to her that you really mean that that is accelerating it and she said yes.  Yesterday I received a call from an automated attendant, not a real person who told me that they were waiting on parts for my computer and that it could be “5 to 7 business days before they receive the part”.  I could not believe this.  I called again today 4/15 and asked if anyone could tell me the status because the website told me very little.  I told the girl that I was speaking to that I had received this automated attendant telling me that a part would take 5 to 7 business days more.  I asked her if Lenovo kept parts and she said yes but that this part was not in stock.  I asked her what the part was and she was able to find that it was the main system board that had to be replaced.  I said you have already had the unit for 1 week now at depot repair and never mind the fact that I have been without my computer for 2.5 weeks.  She told me that there was nothing she could do and that I had to wait on the part.  That is where this case sits at present.
I am very very unimpressed with Lenovo’s service.  And furthermore there is no one to talk to about it at Lenovo who gives a care.  I really did not know where to air my grievances with how this case is being handled.  I thought maybe the forum would be a place.  At least others will learn of my dilemma and maybe others have experienced the same thing.
I still like my ThinkPad but the service of Lenovo has become very poor at best.  The guy that is my technical manager has had a poor experience of late ordering up some other Lenovo products and he does not want to purchase anymore and these were for new product.  They sent the laptop with the wrong software loaded and then said no problem we will send you a new set of disks to load.  He refused and said you have to fix this because it was Lenovo’s mistake.  It takes time to load software and time is money.  I believe we will be leaving the Lenovo field if things continue.  I hope and trust that others will not experience the same treatment as I/we have.  I wonder if Lenovo will even respond to this post.

Answer 1

I had a real problem with wireless performance on multiple ThinkPads with Win7 until I realized there is a new (or maybe changed implementation) power setting in Win7 which was affecting it.
If you go into Control Panel -> Power Options and click "Change plan settings" for your current power plan.
On the next screen click on "Change advanced power settings"
On the next screen expand "Wireless Adapter Settings" and then "Power Saving Mode"
Make sure it is set to Maximum Performance.
Not sure if this will help your particular problem but hope it does.