Do anyone related to tech really use out-of-the box software?

I'm always installing a Linux distro of my choice or a clean fresh windows image if i need it

Lenovo products have been known to come with rootkits to prevent a fresh Windows install from clearing the malware.

Immediately boot into my Linux distro of choice and wipe the MBR & Partion table with gdisk.

OSX seems fine out of box.

> out-of-the box

the box has a false bottom

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_Management_Mode https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Management_Engine

If you don't live in China then buy a Huawei.

You can assume it's compromised, but China won't share what they get with your government.

Those are not Lenovo-specific backdoors, though

To my knowledge it has not affected the Thinkpad line.

But would you really trust the same company? This is the company that put their malware into the BIOS so that even if you reinstalled OS, the BIOS would go into your hard drive and reinstall itself.

I would. The OEM bundle reinstall practice you mention is standard Windows functionality, not some scheme they came up with nor BIOS related. Most popular manufacturers use it, it's just that for the crapware funded models, the crapware is part of the OEM bundle.

Even if scummy, I think the root kit thing was blown out of proportion. It was surely a slip up by people who don't care on a product line that's on a completely different league than the high end for home users, let alone the business line. Hanlon's razor clearly applies from where I see it.