On 11/02/2013 02:53 PM Ken Heard wrote:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 In May 2008 I purchased new and started using a Lenovo R61 Think Pad. Originally I installed Lenny on it and subsequently upgraded it to Squeeze. Starting from 2013-01-01 various things started going wrong. For example I began to get segmentation fault errors for packages that I had used successfully before that date. Some of other problems where intermittent sound, and failure to detect the printer, even manually. At first I thought these were software faults and sought help from this list. Finally I decided to spend $100 for diagnostic tests. The diagnosis was a failed main board, but the hard drive and the memory modules were okay. The cost of repairs would approximate the cost of a new laptop. Is it normal for any laptop to fail in fewer than five years, or is such a failure rate unique to Lenovo's laptops? Regards, Ken Heard -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.10 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAlJ1SjoACgkQlNlJzOkJmTc6VgCggZKp2e30QS0fKTtayl//j9x8 HLEAn1S0w3IcH8NXCY+0/GZ/t0GrYG4A =lLag -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
Ken,It surprised me that I had quite a few problems early on with a Dell laptop I bought near the end of 2004. Within a hundred days there was a failure in the mainboard and it had to be replaced. (The warrantee provided parts and labor for just the first 90 days.) Over the next three years there were other problems. Fortunately, I paid for extended warrantees for the first three years because every year I had to have something fixed which would have cost something like double what the extended warrantee cost me each year. After three years they wouldn't even sell me another extended warrantee. So it's quite apparent that Dell doesn't think their stuff is sturdy enough to last more than three years.
Since then, however, I've had just four problems. One is that I've worn the characters off of several of the keys on the keyboard; you'd think this could have been manufactured better. And the keyboard was already replaced once before (during the extended warrantee period.
The second problem was that the touchpad... pretty much the same as the keyboard: I just wore out the surface of it.
I don't know when the third problem started. Earlier this year I discovered that my 1.5GHz CPU was always running at 0.6GHz. It's a "stepping CPU", which means that it can run at different speeds depending upon conditions and preference. I liked this feature at first because running at slower speeds meant (supposedly) the system would consume less electricity. But the CPU runs slower also when its temperature gets too high. Well, perhaps the code that handles this is messed up, but this machine runs at 600 MHz even when the temperature is reasonably low (like now: 55C), even when it's plugged into the mains/wall (like it is now), and even when the load average is over 4 (as it is now). Under these conditions the CPU should be running faster (and it did during the first year). So the way I see it, I paid for a laptop with a 1.5GHz CPU, but got one with a 600MHz processor.
** To see what speed your processor is running at, do "cat /proc/cpuinfo" or check out "cpuspeed".
The fourth problem just started earlier this year: first one part of the display became too bright, then the lid became floppy, wouldn't stay in position, and would either fall completely open or else onto the keyboard. Then the screen started going black after a few minutes. Then after a few seconds.
** Normally I'm not at all an advocate of extended warrantees. People smarter than I am have determined that, financially speaking, they're not worth it. But as it played out for me in this instance, the extended warrantees did save me some money. But that might speak more to the shoddy design and/or manufacturing of laptops or this particular laptop than it does to the value of an extended warrantee.
Some people might say that it's pretty good to be able to still use a laptop almost nine years after it was bought new. Others, myself among them would say this is an example of diminished expectations and that something falling apart or breaking down sooner than it should is another way to accomplish planned obsolescence.