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April 21, 2004
My experience with IBM Thinkpad Support--Thumb up or down?
As you have been aware that I have recently upgraded our in-home wireless to 802.11g from 802.11b. Of course, I naturally wanted to upgrade the internal mini-PCI card (Intel Pro 802.11b) in my Thinkpad 41p rather than to add a CardBus wireless card (which I have done with my wife's Thinkpad T30). IBM now sells several variations of the PCI cards for 802.11g, but I got the 802.11a/b/g combination card. I figured I can't go wrong with the dual band, tri-mode card. Those of you who are a bit more budget conscious, IBM now offers 802.11 b/g card for about $40 cheaper.
Anyway, I got the card and installed in my Thinkpad. Unlike the older T series, where the card can be installed from the bottom of the case, the new Thinkpad now requires the removal of the keyboard and the palm rest in order to access the card slot. Anyway, after removing about ten screws and both keyboard and palm rest, I was in business. The whole installation took me about 10 minutes, but I was extremely careful not to make any mistakes. If you have done this before, the whole process should take less than 5 minutes.
Anyway, the problem happened when I was only able to connect to my Belkin g-router at 24Mbps. No matter what I did, I couldn't get anything higher. Even when I was right next to the router, Access Connection (IBM software) was showing 24Mbps or 18Mbps. So, I thought this might be the internal limitation of the card. However, to make sure, I called the IBM tech support to confirm. Well, the adventure began right afterward.
I filed an on-line service call at the IBM support site (this is something new), and the updates showed that they had called me twice, but my caller ID had no record of their calls. So, I called the tech support to speak to a real-live person.
The first person I talked to said he couldn't tell for sure because there are so many variables that come into play. I said, with the different adapter (Belkin CardBus card), I was getting 54Mbps in my Thinkpad, but not with this card. He said he couldn't help me at all since the card seems to be working. So, after a few hours, I called in again and talked to the second person. This person wasn't much help either. She didn't really know much of the wireless configuration (In fact, I had to explain a few things to her), and she said that the wireless expert was not in that day, and she would call me back when she had a chance to talk with that person. Well, that was a week ago, and I am still waiting for the phone call from her.
Anyway, when I didn't hear back from her in two days, I called again. This time the person couldn't understand why it was happening. At least he offered to send me a replacement card after talking to me for an 1/2 hour. Another funny thing is that IBM seems to have two different part number for the identical item (one is used by sales/marketing for new parts, and the other by service for replacement parts). So, it took us more than 10 minutes to track down the right part as well.
To make a long story short, the replacement part arrived the next day (I have to commend IBM for expeditious service--this is the second replacement parts I have received in the past few years, and both came the next day). I debated whether to go through the hassle and install the new card, but I decided I had nothing to lose. Well, lo and behold, after spending 5 minutes installing the card, I turned back on the system (crossing my fingers). The connection speed was 54Mbps. Hooray! Looks like the earlier card was defective after all.
It has been a few days since I replaced the part, and I have been consistently getting 48 to 54Mbps connection. So, I'm a happy camper, but I wish and I hope I never have to deal with the tech support again with any company in the future. So, thumb up or down? It's neither. The problem was solved, but the experience wasn't all too stellar in my book.