This is the kind of kind of response and customer service we all had been waiting for.
I like my laptop but I hate VIsta, which is why I waited for Win 7 to come out. I will have to wait a little longer for my Win 7 but atleast I know I will get it within a month.
Also, thank you for extending our warranty. It tells me that Lenovo cares about me as their customer.
This update and email turned the 'Dont ever buy a Lenovo product" recommendations to "Lenovo makes quality products." recommendations!
By providing a way for Lenovo's customers to keep their laptops and still be able to reimage them with a recovery DVD is a very amicable solution, and providing an expedited option for customers who can't wait for the DVD is a very good alternative solution to this fiasco.
For those who think four weeks is too long to wait, consider that this image will have to be assembled and TESTED before it is sent out. As these notebooks would not normally come with a recovery DVD this is the solution that I personally prefer.
I am especially happy with the warranty extension as well, and I'm glad that Lenovo went this route.
The members on Slickdeals also seem to be as pleased with this solution as I am, and I am happy to say that Lenovo has done the right thing in my estimation and that I would indeed recommend this notebook and Lenovo to friends, family, and colleagues.
Thank you Lenovo for standing up and providing a resolution that most people should be able to accept. Obviously there will still be people that will remain unhappy, but there is always a core contingent that will never be satisfied with anything other than a redo, and in real life time only moves in one direction.
I am typing on my Y550 right now, and I have to say that with the exception of Vista, I am quite happy with this product. It is fast, stylish, and I absolutely LOVE the keyboard. I would even go so far as to say that this is quite possibly the best laptop keyboard I have ever used, and I've used plenty.
I really appreciate everyone sticking with us for these last few days. We listened to a lot suggestions posed here and have worked through a few internal challenges and believe we have a solid plan. We would like it to move faster and will work to improve the schedule wherever possible.
I'd like to clarify a few points. We will send everyone the new recovery media whether or not they also elect to send their system off for re-imaging as covered in option #2 of the recovery plan. We will try to improve the four week schedule, but we wanted to provide a realistic outlook. This version of media is not typically available for IdeaPad, as it rebuilds both the hidden OKR partition as well as putting on the expected image content on C:.
The normal service recovery disks only rebuild the C: drive, so if used on these systems it would install Win 7, but if the OKR function were then used it would return to Vista, which is why we are creating these new recovery disks.
I expect the boxes to show up Monday and Tuesday for most customers - if you don't want to send your system off and just want to wait on the recovery media that is OK as well, just hold onto the box and no further action is required.
On the warranty extensions - these won't happen overnight. To minimize churn, we will allow a reasonable interval of time for people to send off their systems for the re-imaging, and for those who elected to return for a refund to be processed as all of our customes receive their email notifications and make their decisions. We will go through the list again and then will send to the warranty entitlement team. There is a bit of added complexity in that some members may have different warranty options already vs the base warranty, so we will need to analyze each system serial and the ordered warranty option to ensure we apply the proper extension. I'm explaining this so that we all understand that it will be a process and will take a bit of time to execute.
Kumicho,
We did a stop ship earlier this week and confirmed that all on hand stock was captured and will be re-imaged properly. New builds for unfulfilled orders will ship with the correct, verified Win 7 images, so your open order should be fine.
tsakhan,
Alas, the hosted image solution isn't an option right now - that would have been a great way to have addressed this issue overall. But, we might have some other alternatives for you that would allow you have Windows 7 earlier, but would mean you would have to download the appropriate drivers from our support site, and the OKR function would not be able to restore to Windows 7 until the new recovery media is created and ships to you.
I'll see what we can do - I'm happy to help, but want to encourage use of the main options so we can ensure a consistent experience.
Once again, thank you all for you for working with us.
Best regards,
Mark
____________________________________________ Regards/Cordialement/Cordiali saluti/Mit freundlichen Grüßen/Saludos/ Mark Hopkins Project Manager, Social Media
Should I be concerned if I haven't received the email yet? Do we have to call customer service to let them know our laptops arrived with Vista? Mark said they would email the affected customers proactively, and I'm part of that group that ordered on (I think) October 28th under that nice deal on the Y-550.
I got this e-mail and I am completely disappointed by this "solution", which took three days to come up with and involved higher level management.
First, even after suggested resque efforts we still will end up not with the product we ordered but with some makeshift substitute full of potential problems, not mentioning all the hassle. Second, extended warranty is not a big compensation, really - I expect my computer to be good enough to last for couple of years by itself. At least, that was the case with my Dell comps. Third, the return option should be addressed in more details in this e-mail than '...we will expedite these requests and waive all restocking fees". E.g. how expedite will be this "expedite request"? How many days exactly before I get my money back? No hidden fees for sure?
It says "For inquiries, please contact us at 1-877-453-6686", but this is techsupport and they know nothing about expedite returns. Why their phone number was provided then?
Well. enough said, I am going back to Dell. I just hope Lenovo will free me from its services no later than Xmas. Thanks, Mark!
What do you mean, makeshift substitute? They are going to put the full Win. 7 image, including Enhanced Experience, on your laptop, just as it was supposed to come with. The only downside I see in the end is the time you will be without the laptop. I think they are finally doing a good job of solving this problem. Yes, it took too long, and never should have happened in the first place, but they ARE taking care of it.
They are even giving us the disks so that we can do it ourselves if we choose. I like this option, because I just want the disk to hang onto. I'm not crazy about the Lenovo bloatware (do a search...thats the biggest complaint when any site has tested their PCs) so now I have a nice, clean Win 7 install. I'll have the disk in case I ever want or need to use it later.
Also, the disk will ensure that if you choose to upgrade your hard drive in the future, you just have to pop the disk in and everything in installed like factory. As originally ordered, our laptops came with no disks, so if we ever had to swap out the hard drives, we would be on our own.
And I'm extremely happy to be getting a 2nd year of warranty. I have no idea how Lenovo warranty service is, hopefully better than HP, where I had to pay for replacement parts myself, and when other things went wrong I just skipped warranty alltogether because it was such a hassle. These are laptops...delicate, and very sensitive to damage. Chances are you WILL use that 2nd year of warranty. I had 4 items fail on my HP in the first year- DVD drive (twice), keyboard, card reader, and memory. Because of their crappy service the card reader never got fixed, they supplied a DVD drive after 3 months, and I ended up paying for a 2nd DVD drive, keyboard, and memory myself because it was so hard to get them to take care of anything.
There ARE worse companies than Lenovo. Just by the fact they are stepping up to the plate and taking care of our problem shows they are better than HP. I'll still have to think hard about whether I'd buy another, now only due to the very slow shipping. But at least I would consider them.
Should I be concerned if I haven't received the email yet?
Well, considering that it was just sent out tonight, I wouldn't be concerned quite yet. E-mail is not always delivered instantaneously. Check tomorrow or Sunday, and be sure to check your spam folder in case it got flagged incorrectly.
I do not work for Lenovo. Follow the forum on Twitter If you need help, post your question in the forum, and include your system type, model number and OS. Do not post your serial number. I do NOT respond to PM or e-mail requests for individual tech support.
