Lenovo Customer Service

Hi,

I own a W701 laptop, which is a pretty beefy machine. However over the 2 years of owning it I had intermittent problems with it, where the machine will just freeze up. After several Motherboard replacements and Graphic Card replacement, the issue still exist. I then replaced the stock Samsung drive with Intel 520 SSD’s, and rebuilt the machine, however the intermittent crashes still occurred.

I escalated the issue with Lenovo Customer Service as this machine is critical for my work as a software consultant, and the parts for W701 are being very hard to get here in Australia.

To cut a long story short, Lenovo replaced my laptop with a W520 which I am extremely happy with, and is rock solid stable. I would like to say that I was impressed with their support regarding my issue and even though it took a while to organise the replacement as it needs to be approved by finance, and the machine was a CTO build.

The W520 is an awesome machine:

Below are the specs

Notice the core speed is variable. Also, the battery life is amazing, I can work for 5 hours with no issues, and the CPU can work at around 24 Watts when configured for battery mode.

Windows Experience Index

Windows experience index is at 6.9, this is due to the graphics being benchmarked against the built in integrated Intel graphics, however, it is easy to switch it to the NVidia card when I demand it.

 

I am sure I can get a better index, if I disable the integrated graphics card, however, I like it on, to preserve power and don’t really need the NVIDA card, unless I am playing a game.

The Hard Disk is extremely fast, I replaced it with an Intel 520 SSD:

Make sure you NEVER defrag a machine with SSD drives, also use the inbuilt SSD tools =D

Processor

I have this processor running at over 3.38Ghz when demanding applications are in use. (Turbo Mode).

Here is the clock speed when running Prime95

 

Processors Information
Processor 1	ID = 0
Number of cores	4 (max 8)
Number of threads	8 (max 16)
Name	Intel Core i7 Extreme 2960XM
Codename	Sandy Bridge
Specification	Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-2960XM CPU @ 2.70GHz
Package (platform ID)	Socket 988B rPGA (0×4)
CPUID	6.A.7
Extended CPUID	6.2A
Core Stepping	D2
Technology	32 nm
TDP Limit	55 Watts
Core Speed	797.4 MHz
Multiplier x FSB	8.0 x 99.7 MHz
Stock frequency	2700 MHz
Instructions sets	MMX, SSE, SSE2, SSE3, SSSE3, SSE4.1, SSE4.2, EM64T, VT-x, AES, AVX
L1 Data cache	4 x 32 KBytes, 8-way set associative, 64-byte line size
L1 Instruction cache	4 x 32 KBytes, 8-way set associative, 64-byte line size
L2 cache	4 x 256 KBytes, 8-way set associative, 64-byte line size
L3 cache	8 MBytes, 16-way set associative, 64-byte line size
FID/VID Control	yes
Turbo Mode	supported, enabled
Max non-turbo ratio	27x
Max turbo ratio	37x
Max efficiency ratio	8x
Min Power	0 Watts
O/C bins	unlimited

M-SATA SSD

The W520 also support M-SATA SSD, which is where the built in broadband module is located (behind the batter). These SSD’s are super tiny, you could basically run this machine with TWO SSD’s and still keep the optical bay! Yes!

I recommend MemoryRight for M-SATA.

http://thessdreview.com/our-reviews/memoright-ms-701-240gb-msata-ssd-review/

Summary

If you need a machine that can have 2 hard drives, awesome raw power and still keep a optical drive, not to mention LONG battery life, then the W520 is the machine to get!