Greetings all,

This community looks great and I can definitely feel a helpful vibe here! Having that said, it is unfortunate that the undertone of my first message here is one of concern.

My beloved T41 finally met it's maker last Sunday; its years of service served me well - so much so, that I would not think of owning another laptop without the Thinkpad name. The drive was in tact and I keep good regular backups, so there wasn't any data loss,  just an old friend put to rest.

Since I run a few highly visible blogging sites full time and do Linux consulting, I'm on the road more than I'm home, meeting with advertisers and doing on-site IT consulting. When my T41 died over the weekend, I quickly acknowledged the fact that I need a replacement and quick (my netbook doesn't cut it on the road).

Being that I'm sold on the Thinkpad quality, I navigated to the Lenovo website to find a worthy replacement.  after spec'ing the lineup out, I found the W510 to suit my needs perfectly. I researched the model, third party reviews, and began to price out a model with options on the main Lenovo website -- where I hit Problem #1, a 3 week build time: there was no way that I could wait three weeks.

Running through the gauntlet of online stores that carried the W510, and came close to adding it to the cart...


Amazon? No, I have had bad dealings with Amazon's shipping times in the past.

eBay? No way - too big of a crap shoot.

Craigslist? None listed


I begin to start closing the obscene amount of browser tabs I had open, and find a thread on a notebook forum and learned of Lenovo Outlet. Yes, I thought to myself, this might not be a bad idea, remembering a purchase I made for a few servers last year from Dell's outlet store, where the warranty on the refurbished R805's were very decent as were the condition of the servers.

Scanning through the Outlet listings, I find my perfect match - a W510 with an HD+ screen (the HD+ resolution was even a plus for me, versus the FHD since I value my eyesight :). Going through the checkout, I opt for the fastest shipping available: 2-3 business days .. ok, I can live with that. I think to myself that I'm getting the product I want, without having to wait for the build time.

A lighter checking account later, I call it a night thinking that I made the right decision and that I would be back in business by mid-week. I half expected to see an invoice in my inbox by morning, and a tracking number in my inbox that afternoon. This is where Problem #2 has come about.

With no updates to my order status page, no email invoice, a dent in my checking account,  and an "Est. Shipping Date" of 09/17/10, I start realizing that I quite possibly made a bad decision. Fueling my angst, I start to read the "horror" stories of other Lenovo Outlet customers, I start to freak out. Truly, I was under the impression that the item was in fact, in stock and that it would most likely ship in the next business day or two.

I'm sure that some of you here have purchased from Lenovo Outlet before, so I ask you this question: in your opinion, am I pretty much screwed in getting this notebook in a timely fashion?

.

EDIT: seeing as others have posted their order #, mine = 2FL6D7