Lenovo: The Crapware Con

Posted on 29 Oct 2009 at 14:25

Lenovo must supply its PC technicians with shovels; there were no fewer than 37 services and 35 applications running when the laptop booted.

But while plenty of manufacturers cram their laptops with pointless software, Lenovo bucks this trend with applications that could make a difference day-to-day.

Most of the apps are part of Lenovo’s ThinkVantage productivity suite for business users. You’re given tools to manage wireless and wired internet connections, archive your PC, and reams of security options and user authentication tools. There’s even an option to protect your hard disk if your laptop takes a tumble.

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The Productivity Center offers multimedia options and deeper configuration settings, along with McAfee Security Center and Roxio Creator.

While this impressive roster of software uses only a comparatively frugal 819MB of hard disk space, the ThinkPad’s memory footprint is the worst on test – at 1.38GB, it’s far higher than its nearest rival, the Dell Inspiron 1525, which used 1.18GB.

The impact on boot time was minimal, but ThinkPad owners will have to pay a heavy price in terms of performance for the decent software that comes with their PC.