My Vista experience on my Thinkpad X41 Tablet been a rather large disappointment: wireless constantly needs to be re-configured, start times are atrocious, the interface is extremely unresponsive, bugs and crashing, etc. Today I got handed my latest disappointment today when I got back my thinkpad from servicing – I have to re-activate windows in 3 days or my computer will stop working, and Microsoft thinks my key is being used on another system. Wonderful. My user experience is as follows:
- Windows Activation interface - 4 options - tells me my key is invalid. I press the ‘Contact Microsoft to help resolve this problem’ option
- Windows Help and Support interface - 4 option categories (ask my friends, ask the windows community, search the knowledge base, or contact Microsoft) - chose contact Microsoft.
- Vista Solution Center website - 12 option categories, each with 10+ options. No forwarding of my particular issue (key in use by another system), just a generic screen with ‘top issues’.
- Vista Solution Center product activation section - 8 options - I am not receiving an error messages thus none pertaining to my problem.
- Vista Solution Center contacts section - 5 options - ‘Contact a support professional’ selected.
- Help and Support website - 10 options - presents the 10 Vista SKUs. No knowledge of my system requirements. Vista Business All-languages non-64 bit edition is selected
- Help and Support for Windows Vista Business website - 3 option categories (email, chat, phone). On quick glance, I see dollar figures associated with such services. Trade-off presented: once you contact support, you begin your allocated 90 days of support. Invalid option presented: my software must be activated to get support. I choose to call.
- Phone product support system - Many options, 3 choices, 2 times having to describe problem to separate techs who did not forward info, 10 minutes of waiting, 48 numbers recited to a customer support representative, and 48 numbers read back to me. Problem solved.
In total I had to consider at least 41 options and spend 25 minutes resolving this problem. What is additionally frustrating was that this was an anti-piracy measure, though given the levels of piracy out there I understand their position and need to put some protective measures in place. But this was just unreasonable, and punishing a customer for purchasing their product.