It happens every day. A customer calls into our help centers and finds out that his system needs a repair that is not covered by warranty. Perhaps the warranty has expired. Perhaps the system sustained accidental damage and was not covered under our Accidental Damage Protection Service. In any case, the customer is faced with buying a replacement part and is told how much that part + labor (if Lenovo is performing the work) will cost. The next reaction is predictable and follow’s Kubler-Ross’ famous five steps. You must have put the wrong part number in. Check again. Why does this part cost so much? You guys are ripping me off Please oh please make an exception for me! I should have never bought this crummy model Fine. Take my credit card and send me the part. While we can’t act as your psychiatrist, we can at least help you understand why spare parts may cost more than something generic you can find on Amazon. When you buy parts from Lenovo, you’re buying an original, genuine part that has been regression tested with your particular model of machine. This testing is performed during our initial development and continues through the life of the system as we receive warranty parts back and test for ongoing defects. We guarantee that the replacement part you...
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Lenovo ThinkStations Transform Special Effects in Transformers 3
Kerry Troester is a marketing manager for Lenovo’s ThinkStation workstations. With a passion for both art and technology, Kerry enjoys seeing the two blend together in animated film. Both my parents are artists, so I grew up surrounding by creativity and color. That’s why I enjoy seeing how Lenovo ThinkStation customers push the limits of our computers - creating cutting-edge animation and games. I have been lucky enough to work with Allen Bolden, founder of Bit Theory, to learn how they used Lenovo ThinkStations to create many of the great effects shown in this summer’s blockbuster, Transformers 3. Bit Theory is a Lenovo ThinkStation customer that uses our C20 and D20 workstations. As background, Bit Theory is a leading visual effects company based in southern California. Bit Theory creates high-end computer generated (CG) images and animations using a proprietary CG animation software engine known as “Athena” to develop animation used in video and film productions. Allen developed Athena to automate key parts of the animation and rendering process that are labor, hardware, software, and capital intensive. Bit Theory was one of the companies that worked on the production of Transformers 3 primarily around the conversion of the 2D movie to a 3D format. It seems like nearly every movie has a 3D version these...
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Think - Innovate - Evolve. What better evocative words than these to epitomize the history of the ThinkPad and other Lenovo Think-branded products? If you have experienced many of the memorable ThinkPads like the 701c "butterfly" with it's unique expanding keyboard, the X41t, our first convertible tablet, or the massive W701ds dual screen laptop, you know about Think innovation. But, the world is a big place, and while many people know our story, there are still many who don't know about the heritage and evolution of Think. This week, we launchedThinkingNeverStops to share the history of Think innovation and evolution, and to engage customers via polls and open-ended discussion to hear their ideas and opinions on the kind of innovation they want to see in future generations. What do you think will be the next big area for innovation? Please take a few mins to stop in and share your thoughts ... I hope to see you there!
