04.04.2007 12:13

One of the rather stupid things I did in the last two and a half month (sic!) was to buy a laptop. Well that is not so stupid as such, but the point is that Wo convinced me that it is much more rational to buy a used three year old former top end machine, rather than a up-to-date one (which is overprized and in the end you don't really need it, but of course you have the technology geek thrill) or a cheap new bargain laptop (which I never really considered because I kind of started to like IBM Thinkpads). When it comes to rationality it's a good thing to believe Wo, and hey, after all he is right in principle.
So I decided to buy a Thinkpad T40p for around 750 Euros on ebay. And that is where the misery started. I tried two merchants (that's already one too many!): I got the first device from Magic Devices in Munich. The screen was faulty (it had a white spot the size of a thumb), and one of the 'enter keys' at the touchpad was broken. Of course on ebay they had claimed that the device was in perfect conditions. I sent it back. They offered me a new one instead, which I refused because I didn't trust them anymore. If one computer has such obvious shortcomings, and they still ship it, it means that they either want to fool you or they have not looked at it at all, so why should they look at another one? That's what I thought. So I preferred to try out another shop: Luxnote. I got their notebook and guess what? Well the screen was imperfect (there was a dark shadow at the bottom) and one USB port was broken. And it was broken in such a way that you could notice just from looking at it, you did not even have try it. The guy from Luxnote proposed to pay me back 50 Euros, but who wants a laptop with a faulty screen? I would never have bought it, if had said in the description that these things were broken. So I sent it back again. This time I agreed, as they proposed to send me another one instead. Because, hey, why should any second hand notebook retailer look at his devices before he ships them? That's a completely silly idea, if you come to think of it. I made him promise that it would be ok this time. Which of course he did. In dubio pro reo, you see as long as you have not looked at the computer why should anything be broken, see?
So I got the replacement, and wow, a nice screen, working USB ports, but when I configured my internet connection, I noticed that linux could only detect one network interface, but there should have been an Ethernet and a Wireless card. I updated the BIOS, I made sure wireless was enabled in the BIOS, I run the IBM System update under Windows. Nothing. No trace of a WLAN interface nor in Windows nor in linux. So I complained with the guy. I told him, what I had done. The answer was "you have to install the driver." Fine, but which one? I asked him for the specification of the card in order to find the right one. No answer. Of course. Why should he know what's in there.
In the end I opened the laptop, and as I already suspected there was simply no Mini PCI Wlan card. I wrote again and he promised to send me one. He promised to send me one and yesterday it arrived finally, of course it's not as good as in the original specification, but hey, who can expect to get what he was promised.

These people seem really to sell any crap that comes into their hands and then hope that the customer finds it too complicated to complain or is too stupid to find out. What would you get for a Thinkpad with a bad screen and only one USB port, if you announce it as such? Not much, certainly not 700 Euros, so he would make a very good deal if somebody accepts his generous 50 Euros discount. I just don't understand why they don't check a machine they get, before they sell it? And then state honestly what's in there? This sending laptops forth and back and complaining every second day is just ennoying.
And imagine it wasn't me but somebody like my parents who freak out when a new icon appears on there Desktop, you cannot expect them to open a laptop to find out what's in there.
These days, I read an article in a Linux magazine (don't remember which one) where they tested second hand laptop shops and their experience matched pretty much mine.

But hey, I should be grateful for their rubbish. I will never get rid off windows in a more elegant way: During my search for a WLAN adapter I installed a driver from Broadcom hoping it would work on the "card". The installer didn't find a certain file and hanged with an error message, whenever you click away this error message, it pops up again after two seconds. No way of killing the process with a task manager or so. So after a while I opted for a power cut. But the driver had found the time to install a link in the windows boot scripts, so now when I boot windows I get this lovely error message popping up forever and booting is stalled. That's what you call quality software. On the other hand I cannot mount the windows drive writable in linux and delete the link, because it complains about some other corrupted stuff due to the power cut and asks me to boot windows first and check the disk. (Not even forced mount works). Nice. But well, who wants windows anyway?
And finally you see, I would never have had the pleasure to meet Frau Müller who was hiding in the PC Card slot. I am still wondering whether this laptop is actually trying to tell me that it wants to be called "Frau Müller. But I have my standards, it has already been baptized "Frau Malzahn". On the other hand at Augsburg University there is a Frau Müller working in office 2088. So it must have been her computer. Thanks a lot Frau Müller!