Refurbished Thinkpad T480

I just wanted a machine to mess around with, test things, break things. Build and deconstruct — that’s how you learn. Basically, a computer for quiet evenings. Why not go for a refurbished one? I’d never tried that before, so I started browsing around. I quickly settled on Lenovo’s ThinkPad line: quality machines, easy to upgrade — RAM, drives, even the battery or screen. I didn’t need much power; I mostly wanted to test different tiling window managers at first. Even for RAM, 8 GB would be plenty.

The Purchase

Then I found a gem: a ThinkPad T480, i5-8250U, 8 GB RAM, 256 GB SSD, a 14-inch 1920×1080 screen, and an Ethernet port — no Wi-Fi compatibility headaches to deal with or custom ISOs to build. And the price? Only €230. I hesitated… but not for long. Actually, I cracked pretty fast and ordered the beast. It was October 12.

The Beginning

Two days later, the package arrived. No fancy packaging — just a box, the laptop, and a charger. I plugged it in, then spent way too much time trying to boot the NixOS ISO (don’t forget to disable Secure Boot and the other fun stuff). I installed NixOS in LUKS mode via the live USB, from the terminal instead of Calamares. After the base install (without X), I did a bunch of tweaks and finally launched X with bspwm in the early afternoon.

That’s when something felt off — especially when I opened Firefox. A quick hwinfo –monitor later, and… the screen was running at 1366×768. What an idiot — I’d forgotten to double-check that detail in the specs before buying.

Doubts and Confusion

Still, I went back to BackMarket’s site to look at the product page — it clearly said 1920×1080. So what now? Send it back or keep it? I checked around and found that a 1080p panel costs about €60. So I wrote them a nice message, attached a screenshot of hwinfo –monitor, and offered two options: either refund me the price of the panel so I could replace it myself, or take the machine back.

They replied with a ridiculous compensation offer: €23. My guess? That’s probably their entire margin on a €230 sale. They also offered a return, with two possible outcomes: – the refurbisher has a proper model in stock and ships it; – or they don’t, and I get a full refund, plus a 5% discount on a replacement order (half their margin?).

Except… I then got another message telling me to return the item immediately. So, was option 1 canceled? I didn’t quite get it.

I decided to sleep on it, but when I powered on the ThinkPad the next morning, the screen looked truly awful. I had to head to work, so I planned to drop it off the next day — October 14. The locker refused the barcode (lots of beep-beep-beep, zero results), so I took it to the post office instead.

The Long Wait

The refurbisher received the parcel on October 17. They warned me it might take several days to process. Four days later, they offered a replacement — same model, but with 16 GB RAM instead of 8. I replied that if the screen was truly 1080p, I’d take it. BackMarket confirmed they’d forward my response… then silence.

Three more days passed. It had been a full week since the refurbisher got the laptop, and I still knew nothing.

Knock, Knock

Around 1:30 PM on October 24, someone knocked on my door — a very pleasant delivery woman asking for a code. I told her I wasn’t expecting anything and hadn’t received a code. She said a signature would do. And there it was: the ThinkPad. I booted it right up and dove into the BIOS to check the specs. Everything matched — especially the 1080p display — and as a bonus, 16 GB of RAM. And honestly, the screen difference was night and day!

The Outcome

I still reported the delivery, since no one on their side seemed to know it had shipped. My first refurbished purchase left me with mixed feelings. Would I do it again? Honestly… I’m not sure.