5 ms·

Well, when a Lenovo rep says: "This system has a Signature Edition of Windows 10 Home installed. It is locked per our agreement with Microsoft," it doesn't exac

by __jal 10y ago

Well, when a Lenovo rep says: "This system has a Signature Edition of Windows 10 Home installed. It is locked per our agreement with Microsoft," it doesn't exactly require a bomb-throwing partisan to reach the conclusion.

vonmoltke 10y ago
That statement is not by a "Lenovo rep" but by a "Lenovo Product Expert" at Best Buy. If I am not mistaken, those "experts" work for Best Buy, not the company whose products they are experts in.
- Jtsummers 10y ago
  Sometimes they do work for the company whose products they are "experts" in. Best Buy gets a "free" employee (the hardware company pays the salary), and the company gets a dedicated person in a store for their products. They're still more Best Buy employee than <company> employee.
raesene9 10y ago
But the idea that a random customer service rep. would have information about something that was not a public position of either Lenovo or Microsoft, to me, seemed unlikely.
- captainmuon 10y ago
  What if Lenovo and MS have an agreement what to preinstall on those Laptops - which is very common. Furthermore, Lenovo agreed not to offer ways to install specific other software - no bundled Antivirus CD, no downloadable Lenovo Picks app - and maybe or maybe not - don't prepare customer support to answer "how to install Linux". The customer rep gets a cryptic sticker on his desk: "Models 1234S, 3333S: Signature Windows Disk ONLY". If a customer calls asking for a restoration media, they get the correct one. If they call asking for Linux, sorry it is not supported according to my sticker. I'm just making this up of course, but it is not entirely unplausible to me. In fact I find it more plausible then just an accident. Why would a customer rep just make stuff like that up?
  - raesene9 10y ago
    customer support person made stuff up 'cause he wanted to seem to know the answer, so he could close the call and get on with his job? Or Lenovo and MS have a vast conspiracy to use disk drivers to block linux install.. which is more likely.... you decide.
    - farcical_tinpot 10y ago
      They are using disk drivers to restrict what gets installed - not just Linux both other Windows - Windows 7 or future versions of Windows which they want to build hardware obsolescence into and force you into throwing good hardware away. That's very likely.
    - __jal 10y ago
      > Or Lenovo and MS have a vast conspiracy to use disk drivers to block linux install.. That's not a vast conspiracy. That would be a pretty quotidian conspiracy. In fact, it would look a lot like the "Winmodems[1]" that were a thing before (and maybe around?) the turn of the century. Those existed because they made machines marginally cheaper by emulating the modem in software. Which only worked on Windows and caused much gnashing of teeth back when. I believe Winmodems came to be solely because of cost savings. I also believe that the fact that it was functional exclusively on Win was a second-order effect that approximately nobody in Redmond took issue with. ...As an aside, I'm going to assume consistency on the part of all those who are being snide about customer support folks, and assume you make a point of never calling customer support (I'm not referring to the parent poster here). After all, you can't trust anything those idiots say, so why would you bother? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Softmodem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Softmodem
      - raesene9 10y ago
        Sure I remember the old winmodem days well, but that was a well known (and very frustrating) problem, which was a stated position of the companies in question. the customer support bit and wanting to move to the next call is based on my own experience of working in support many years ago, there was a strong temptation to tell the user something to get onto the next call as that was usually your performance metric....
- michaelmrose 10y ago
  Ive frequently as a complete peon been privileged to know non public info about the inner workings and policies that was not only non public but that I was forbidden to share with the world as a matter of course. Far from being unusual this is the norm. We aren't talking about deep dark secrets we are talking about normal privileged company information. The strange thing in fact is not the employee knowing things not shared with the world its the employee actually disclosing it.
  - raesene9 10y ago
    Well we'd be talking about a secret conspiracy (secret as it's not publicly known) by one of the largest companies in the world (Microsoft) to block installation of Linux on Lenovo's systems. For the CS rep. to know this, all Lenovo CS rep's would have to know. And not one of them leaked this juicy info. to the press or reddit or anywhere else.... Just doesn't strike me as a likely course of events.
- farcical_tinpot 10y ago
  Why wouldn't they? You find out all sorts of things when you work for a company, strangely enough.
  - raesene9 10y ago
    what and then blow your companies secret position on a response to a user query, knowing that if found it would very likely endanger your continued employment with that company.... You honestly think that's more likely than, someone made a mistake or said something to close a support call???
    - farcical_tinpot 10y ago
      The statement is there in black and white and it is as crystal clear and unequivocal as you can get.

by __jal 10y ago

vonmoltke 10y ago

That statement is not by a "Lenovo rep" but by a "Lenovo Product Expert" at Best Buy. If I am not mistaken, those "experts" work for Best Buy, not the company whose products they are experts in.

Jtsummers 10y ago
Sometimes they do work for the company whose products they are "experts" in. Best Buy gets a "free" employee (the hardware company pays the salary), and the company gets a dedicated person in a store for their products. They're still more Best Buy employee than <company> employee.

raesene9 10y ago

But the idea that a random customer service rep. would have information about something that was not a public position of either Lenovo or Microsoft, to me, seemed unlikely.

captainmuon 10y ago
What if Lenovo and MS have an agreement what to preinstall on those Laptops - which is very common. Furthermore, Lenovo agreed not to offer ways to install specific other software - no bundled Antivirus CD, no downloadable Lenovo Picks app - and maybe or maybe not - don't prepare customer support to answer "how to install Linux". The customer rep gets a cryptic sticker on his desk: "Models 1234S, 3333S: Signature Windows Disk ONLY". If a customer calls asking for a restoration media, they get the correct one. If they call asking for Linux, sorry it is not supported according to my sticker. I'm just making this up of course, but it is not entirely unplausible to me. In fact I find it more plausible then just an accident. Why would a customer rep just make stuff like that up?
- raesene9 10y ago
  customer support person made stuff up 'cause he wanted to seem to know the answer, so he could close the call and get on with his job? Or Lenovo and MS have a vast conspiracy to use disk drivers to block linux install.. which is more likely.... you decide.
  - farcical_tinpot 10y ago
    They are using disk drivers to restrict what gets installed - not just Linux both other Windows - Windows 7 or future versions of Windows which they want to build hardware obsolescence into and force you into throwing good hardware away. That's very likely.
  - __jal 10y ago
    > Or Lenovo and MS have a vast conspiracy to use disk drivers to block linux install.. That's not a vast conspiracy. That would be a pretty quotidian conspiracy. In fact, it would look a lot like the "Winmodems[1]" that were a thing before (and maybe around?) the turn of the century. Those existed because they made machines marginally cheaper by emulating the modem in software. Which only worked on Windows and caused much gnashing of teeth back when. I believe Winmodems came to be solely because of cost savings. I also believe that the fact that it was functional exclusively on Win was a second-order effect that approximately nobody in Redmond took issue with. ...As an aside, I'm going to assume consistency on the part of all those who are being snide about customer support folks, and assume you make a point of never calling customer support (I'm not referring to the parent poster here). After all, you can't trust anything those idiots say, so why would you bother? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Softmodem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Softmodem
    - raesene9 10y ago
      Sure I remember the old winmodem days well, but that was a well known (and very frustrating) problem, which was a stated position of the companies in question. the customer support bit and wanting to move to the next call is based on my own experience of working in support many years ago, there was a strong temptation to tell the user something to get onto the next call as that was usually your performance metric....
michaelmrose 10y ago
Ive frequently as a complete peon been privileged to know non public info about the inner workings and policies that was not only non public but that I was forbidden to share with the world as a matter of course. Far from being unusual this is the norm. We aren't talking about deep dark secrets we are talking about normal privileged company information. The strange thing in fact is not the employee knowing things not shared with the world its the employee actually disclosing it.
- raesene9 10y ago
  Well we'd be talking about a secret conspiracy (secret as it's not publicly known) by one of the largest companies in the world (Microsoft) to block installation of Linux on Lenovo's systems. For the CS rep. to know this, all Lenovo CS rep's would have to know. And not one of them leaked this juicy info. to the press or reddit or anywhere else.... Just doesn't strike me as a likely course of events.
farcical_tinpot 10y ago
Why wouldn't they? You find out all sorts of things when you work for a company, strangely enough.
- raesene9 10y ago
  what and then blow your companies secret position on a response to a user query, knowing that if found it would very likely endanger your continued employment with that company.... You honestly think that's more likely than, someone made a mistake or said something to close a support call???
  - farcical_tinpot 10y ago
    The statement is there in black and white and it is as crystal clear and unequivocal as you can get.