The Ultimate Spill Test
Before reading any further — DO NOT TRY ANYTHING YOU READ HERE YOURSELF. Not only will you void your warranty, but you could cause harm to you, to others, and most definitely to your equipment. Just because we happened to get one result and were able to pull this off safely does not mean that you can expect the same. If you want to be stupid, do it on your own time, but don’t claim you got the idea here.
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One of the most interesting things I’ve gotten to do so far this year is consult for the water spot for a recent ad campaign.
Warren, our chief photo expert, (not his official title) was working with our advertising agency to coordinate the filming of this spot. He called me one afternoon some months back and said “We’ve got this idea. We’re going to drop a running ThinkPad into a NASA test tank and see what happens. Er…except…we don’t know what is going to happen. What could happen?”
What a GREAT question.
He instantly had my attention. While I talk about spill tests all of the time, this was taking it to the extreme. I never had thought about what would happen if someone just decided to dunk their machine. He and I began to talk through the possibilities.
We knew the system was going to be toast. (Yes, that is a technical term). The only question was how long it was going to last. I wish I had remembered my guess as to how long it would keep running, because it would have been interesting to compare my guess against reality later.
Knowing that the system was going to die, the team also had some safety concerns. After all, they were dunking an electrical appliance into water. This is something that even a 5 year-old knows is a bad idea.
The worst case of what could have happened is that the Lithium-Ion battery itself could have been severely damaged and that water would get inside when the system was submerged. Any chemist out there knows that Lithium + Water = a reaction. However, the likelihood of this reaction occurring was pretty low for several reasons. The first is that the lithium in standard batteries is far from pure. It has many other chemicals mixed in which made it unlikely that it would react with water. The second reason is that unless the battery pack were obviously cracked or purposely damaged, it is sealed and water would not have gotten inside anyway.
The next concern was possible electrocution of the divers. (The space suit was likely to keep the astronaut safe no matter what happened.) First, we were not going to immerse a plugged in system. That probably would have caused major problems.
So with the idea that the system would be self-contained and running on battery power, Warren and I talked what kind of damage the voltages inside a running system could pose. Most of the system components like the memory or hard disk drive run on less than 10 volts. As anyone who has put a 9 volt battery on their tongue can attest, while you can feel a tingle, this is hardly life threatening.
One possible concern was the display voltage regulator. In order to power the display and light the florescent tubes, the voltage is ramped up by a special inverter card in the display. However, even though this voltage is higher than the rest of the system, it really wouldn’t be enough. There aren’t enough amps of electricity delivered at any given time by a properly discharging battery and the current itself wouldn’t be concentrated on a wire, but rather radiated in all directions inside the tank. The battery itself has a safety circuit that detects all sorts of conditions like rapid discharging or cell discharging imbalance (and a whole host of other issues) and preventively shuts down in case these fault conditions happen.
One other thing. Water itself is actually a relatively poor conductor of electricity. We briefly flirted around about whether dropping the system into salt water would have changed anything. I don’t believe it would have. In any case, the NASA tank is a fresh water tank, so it really was a moot point.
As a final chuckle, we laughed about the team’s worrying about what would happen. They talked about dropping a system into a bathtub the night before to try it out, but no one wanted to stick their hand in the tub. They went back and forth saying You do it. No, YOU do it. I’m not sure that they ever did the test, but just went ahead and showed up at NASA and dropped the system into the tank. The result is what you see here.
Oh, and the system lasted for 3 seconds. Longer than I think I would have expected it to.
June 21st, 2007 at 11:10 am
Maybe the next spot could be for “dishwasher safe”?
Are Computer Keyboards Dishwasher Safe?
by Nell Boyce
Studies show that computer keyboards have more bacteria than toilet seats. But it’s hard to clean all those keys. So some people advocate an extreme solution: Throw your keyboard in your dishwasher.
http://www.npr.org/templates/s.....d=11029793
June 21st, 2007 at 11:21 am
Ummm, errr. Kinda like dropping a watermelon off a tall building and saying, “What do you think is going to happen??”
You could have just dropped the Thinkpad in the bathtub. Would have saved a lot of trouble… same result.
June 21st, 2007 at 12:23 pm
And your point is?
June 21st, 2007 at 1:11 pm
[...] Inside the Box » Blog Archive » Best Engineered Campaign – The Ultimate Spill Test [...]
June 21st, 2007 at 2:36 pm
“Water itself is actually a relatively poor conductor of water. “
You probably meant “of electricity”, right?
June 21st, 2007 at 4:41 pm
Dont you guys at Lenovo have something more productive to do with your time ?
June 21st, 2007 at 6:42 pm
Please fire whoever came up with this silly promotion and hire some logistics people so you can get the systems that you do sell out on time!
June 21st, 2007 at 6:56 pm
In the “Crash Test” spot (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iw78gcU713g) does the Thinkpad really survive? Around 0:55-0:57 in the video the laptop does appear to be on and working. I’m not sure if you (Matt) can find out, but if you could, I’d like to know the answer.
Thanks.
June 21st, 2007 at 7:39 pm
Matt,
How about an update on the status of the free stylus that we were supposed to receive after filling out the survey? Many of us have waited months and you have not responded to many requests for some updated information on this.
June 21st, 2007 at 9:29 pm
Michael – I am told that the laptop survived.
D – Thank you. I obviously need to fire my editor (me). I corrected it in the post aboe.
June 21st, 2007 at 9:48 pm
Don’t expect to impress me if the machine just survives 3 seconds… but I do like that someone is trying
June 21st, 2007 at 11:11 pm
@madcow101333
I was wondering the same thing. Matt, I am sure a lot of people, including me, have been waiting for the stylus that lenovo promised us. I have yet to heard anything about it. It would be nice to hear any updates about it.
June 21st, 2007 at 11:13 pm
So, what’s the point of it? Looks like you are having a lot of unnecessary activities down there?
June 22nd, 2007 at 11:40 am
Why not poor hot cofee on the keyboard and try typing with it. its would make sense to everyone.. As in my case rolling rock on my HP..
June 22nd, 2007 at 3:55 pm
You could just have tried it with more realistic condition like what others have said here.
Mmm, the engineers keep busy looking for creative ways to destroy the notebook.
And the remaining stock keep taken by those with crazy idea about how to conduct test to it.
No wonder Lenovo always have problem to keep their delivery on time.
June 22nd, 2007 at 4:32 pm
I think this sounds like an excellent new job description, for which I would like to apply. I will travel the United States using the new Thinkpad T61 you send me, on the beach, by the pool, and while fishing.
June 22nd, 2007 at 5:13 pm
Hey, Matt: Congratulations. While you guys are putting up this kind of trivial stuff online (It lasted 3 1/2 seconds in a swimming pool!!! Who cares?) and trying to move leather bound notebooks for the corporate jet sets (Really smart idea: Any computer-challenged CEO who’s going to spring for this probably has his own IT staff,) I’ve just spent the past three hours waiting for somebody – anybody – to answer the phone at your order center.
I’m trying to buy a Thinkpad. But it doesn’t seem possible, as I’ve now waited a total of 130 minutes, on hold, between two different attempts to talk to somebody.
My advice: Get the guys out of the pool. Call the other blogger back from the racetrack. Tell the design department to stop fooling around with the Cordoba edition. Stop wasting valuable corporate resources with these dumb motorcycle/swimming pool stunts – that are patently irrelevant, pretty much unimpressive, and don’t have anything to do with the real world. (As somebody else pointed out, if you’d dropped a steaming cup of coffee in the computer, I’d be a hell of a lot more impressed.)
Figure out where the 15.4 screens are, and – ahem – try focusing on the consumer.
June 22nd, 2007 at 6:58 pm
Ho-hum.
June 23rd, 2007 at 9:24 am
Sorry, I don’t understand your philosophy.
What do you want to show with such baubles?
If we have a damage by water next time, we can refer to this campaign and get a replacement?
You make such stupid test, but specify the T61 with max air temp of 35° C? Where are you living?
June 23rd, 2007 at 3:57 pm
So what part of the stunt shows that the laptop is best engineered?
You drop a laptop in water and it breaks, and?
I emailed you guys at sales a week ago and have yet to get any feedback.
Like many others have said what’s the point of all the stupid things Lenovo are doing such as the blogger at the race tracks and, and some leather bound reserve edition of the ThinkPad, this has gotta to be a new low for corporate bull crap that’s totally unnecessary and detracts from normal operations.
I love Lenovo as a company that had the nerve to compete on a global stage from China, but you guys desperately need to sort of your priorities and fix all the things that have gone wrong at Lenovo and stop going on tangents that no one cares about.
In case you guys haven’t noticed people rarely comment on any of those useless race track and leather notebook blogs and there’s over 1000 comment on the order delays. Hire some executives that knows what they are doing and fire your eggheads please.
June 23rd, 2007 at 5:56 pm
Put your attention to customers. It is more important.
While you can do such this stupid test, do you ever think how long you can hear customers voice and response. Now accroding to my observation, Lenovo’s reaction is weekly based. And another more serious problem. Most people just want to hide the truth.
June 23rd, 2007 at 7:00 pm
Now if you were blogging about something like this new Toshiba Portege R500 Ultraportable, then you could make the case for “Best Engineering Campaign”.
http://www.notebookreview.com/.....ewsID=3769
Don’t get me wrong, I believe that ThinkPads are well-engineered. But the moves to bigger (thicker and wider), heavier, uglier (battery sticking out the back), and lower quality (ws) displays, are not the sort of engineering developements that Loyal ThinkPad users are accustomed to. The roll cage is the only major improvement I see in the models since Lenovo bought the ThinkPad line. The upgraded CPU’s, chipsets and the like are only expected, and are offered by all the notebook manufacturers.
Really, the only things that give me pause with the Toshiba Portege R500 Ultraportable I linked to above are the lack of a TrackPoint (major importance) and my dislike of widescreen displays.
June 23rd, 2007 at 10:47 pm
Here is what I should have included in my last post regarding the Toshiba Portege R500 Ultraportable – it’s specs.
Toshiba Press Release wrote:
“Toshiba’s Portégé R500 Series is the world’s thinnest notebook series with an integrated optical disk drive; the world’s first notebook to include a 7mm optical drive; the world’s first widescreen 12.1-inch indoor/outdoor transreflective backlit LED screen; and the world’s longest battery life in a widescreen 12.1-inch notebook.
The inclusion of an integrated 7mm DVD-SuperMulti drive into a system measuring as thin as 0.77-inches and weighing 2.4-pounds eliminates the bulk and inconvenience of carrying external drives and cables, making it Toshiba’s ultimate ultraportable mobile computing solution.”
http://www.toshibadirect.com/t.....oid=385254
Innovations like these are worth blogging about: LED display, 2-spindle ultraportable with DVD multiburner, ~3/4″ thick at 2.4 lbs.
Let’s see Lenovo bragging about their ThinkPads with these kinds of innovations (even if someone else beat them to the punch)!
June 24th, 2007 at 12:35 am
Nobody cares. Move your swimming pool stuntboy to the order center. Lenovo is a joke.
June 26th, 2007 at 3:24 am
I got to agree with the overall sentiment that this campaign is ridiculous, it seems like self indulgent nonsense constructed by an overly zealous advertising agency. Rather than showing the real benefits of a ThinkPad such as the fact that it is highly spill resistant, you have chosen to put it in an impractical situation with a disclaimer saying ‘not actually waterproof’ – it just defies logic. While I would still choose a ThinkPad (mainly due to keyboard/trackpoint now though I must admit) over anything else, I think their could be some dispute over your best engineered claim given that companies like panasonic (who don’t outsource) have a lower failure rate.
June 26th, 2007 at 7:47 am
So the system lasted three seconds. Longer than expected. What difference does it make?
How long would a laptop from competition survive? Shorter than a Thinkpad?
What difference does it make?
The “test” makes absolutely no sense at all.
Next one could be throwing the Thinkpad from the 10th floor and then raving about that it broke into let’s say 20 parts, not 30 as expected… So what?
June 26th, 2007 at 10:10 am
I must have missed the periods in the paragraph above but what was the point. To show that lenovo laptops run for 3 seconds after being submerged?
Not impressed!
June 26th, 2007 at 1:27 pm
saw the ad on tv. AWESOME to see. haha.
GREAT marketing tool.
Another note.
No one CARES about the V200!
Skip the launch and move on to the T61p please!!! Kumbaya! Talk about disappointing!
V200=ghetto
T61 comes out
X61 comes out
V200 comes out
What gives?!
T61p should have come out long before ghetto v200 laptop came out!
June 26th, 2007 at 2:53 pm
Well, I would have been much more interested in some real facts and valuable insights about the new X-Series, instead of questionable marketing campain videos.
June 26th, 2007 at 10:30 pm
Even though your new ad campaign looks inovative, and you might have a more generic audience in your mind, it makes people feel that you think they are stupid.
June 26th, 2007 at 11:45 pm
Best Engineered Campaign?! What a joke. The machine lasted for 3 seconds. What kind of best engineering is that? Would have been something if it lasted for like 3 minutes, long enough to shut it down or save the files you’re working on. This video is just a sick joke. Lenovo is wasting time and money with this when they should be concentrating on delivering our damn computers!
June 27th, 2007 at 12:45 am
You know, the really insane thing here is that you obviously thought this was a really cool idea. And what’s worse is that the guy who came up with this is bragging on his blog how great it is. I can’t believe it didn’t occur to anybody at Lenovo that this proves absolutely nothing — because ultimately the product did not survive. The only thing that I can think of is that you’re trying to say your customers are morons (dropping the thing in a swimming pool, running over it with a motorcycle), or (and this has got to be the only logical explanation) you’re secretly trying to sell Panasonic ToughBooks. Be that as it may, as I’m sure you’re aware this campaign is getting savaged on the various Thinkpad programs, I find it interesting that you haven’t replied to a single one of these comments. If anybody from Lenovo is actually looking at these comments, I think the implications of this are pretty clear: Over a thousand comments on your production problems, and almost none on any other other blogs – except for what someone above called “The Cordoba Edition” which was also greeted with pure derision. Any comment?
June 27th, 2007 at 12:47 am
Correction: I meant to say that the campaign is getting savaged on the various Thinkpad forums, not programs.
June 27th, 2007 at 10:36 pm
Lenovo really needs to cut the fluff and get back to the basics of delivering a quality product in a timely manner.
Just the fact that the Lenovo blog consists of only one section (out of four !) that deals with design and support of the mainstream product is a serious indication that priorities are screwed up.
Matt–this isn’t intended to be a personal attack. In fact, I have sympathized with much that you have written.
July 2nd, 2007 at 12:27 am
I think that this promotion IS focused on the customer. The engineers of the ThinkPad line probably do have some of the more stringent testing in the industry and it wise to use an abstract of this to increase the popularity of your product line. Believe me, the more computers they sell the more weight they will have in influencing corporate to spend on their product delivery to customers. They make great machines, please accept the fact that one may have to wait a month or two to get a special product.
July 2nd, 2007 at 7:36 am
I fully agree with Dan S. Please get back to the focus on technical quality of products.
Dunno where to ask so I’ll try i here: Can we get ThinkPad X series (non-tablet) with better display resolution than XGA, please ? The display (both quality and resolution) is the weakest part of current X models. Watch the competition
BTW I’m not advocating for wide-screen X models. Thanks.
July 2nd, 2007 at 8:09 am
[...] what do you get when you pit a Lenovo/IBM Thinkpad against a NASA astronaut training tank? [...]
July 6th, 2007 at 9:34 am
Why not have a test of something you may not expect the laptop to survive but does? And maybe show how a competitor’s notebook doesn’t survive the same thing. Kind of a waste showing how the laptop can be destroyed.
July 7th, 2007 at 5:34 pm
I have to agree, I think that this would have been better if they say completely submerged it, for a second, pulled it out and showed it still working. Like the one person posted about dropping it from the 10th floor and counting the pieces, it breaks either way so I don’t get it..
July 10th, 2007 at 10:09 am
I might be the only one who’s thinking this… but if you have so many laptops lying around that you’ve decided to haphazardly throw them into water tanks, I’ll gladly take them off your hands. I’m sure I would be able to find a use for them. Haha!
August 3rd, 2007 at 10:28 am
This company IS a joke. I have been waiting 6 weeks for my laptop and now the estimated shipping date has changed AGAIN (note 4th time) to August 22nd. Thanks Lenovo for your excellent customer service and your awesome ability to piss off potential customers. This order could have had a possibility of 50-75 laptops if the laptop I ordered actually shipped. I will go with Gateway ultr-portables since they actually ship thiers.
August 8th, 2007 at 10:15 am
I agree with Julio (http://www.lenovoblogs.com/ins.....ment-16234).
Please fire your marketers and focus on product/service quality and meeting demand in a timely manner. Advertisement in America used to inform the consumer of a product’s name, function and price. Now every ad simply boils down to some absurd situation which can be summed up by the phrase “OH SNAP!!!”
August 27th, 2007 at 6:06 pm
Why not donate a notebook to a charity, instead of submerging it in a pointless stunt?
Its not like you even did it scientifically, no results of post mortem examination reported. No way of seeing where the water got in, and how fast.
Its just a waste of a laptop, and time.
December 1st, 2007 at 9:52 am
Maybe it might even work after being put in water – like my mobile phone did
(I put it in destillated water after it fall in my.. toilet, then I have let it dry – and it worked \o/ )
September 24th, 2008 at 5:38 am
[...] behind-the-scenes background at the Lenovo blog. The system lasted three seconds. However no one was electrocuted in the [...]