Tell HN: Lenovo advices to Google for replacement battery
After reading lots of praise on HN about Lenovo laptops, especially with regards to Linux compatibility, at my business we have bought into the Lenovo ecosystem.
Now, one of the laptops (a 3 year old Thinkpad X1-Extreme, ~$3K MSRP) has a bad battery. Normally not a problem since it is a replaceable part. But we could no longer find the battery (or any of it's recommended replacements) for sale on the Lenovo 'genuine' parts store.
After calling with Lenovo sales, we got the answer "we don't sell those anymore", and the advice was to Google the part number of the battery to find a third party replacement.
Honestly, I am dumbfounded by this response. These are supposed to be 'enterprise grade' computers. We bought them with extended warranty (batteries are excluded from extended warranty though). The last thing I want is a knock-off no-brand battery that can explode at any moment.
So in our (admittedly N=1) experience, a Lenovo laptop is a ticking time bomb. If the battery goes bad, you are SOL and you'll either have to invest in a brand new machine, or take a risk with aftermarket batteries.