I have had the same problem lately, exactly as you described. 1.-I also think IT is dreaming, but we have to have the problem in perspective, most of the IT managers have come from administrative /or small companies where rarely there is a need to them to manage and handle an PC for testing, most of the experiences of the guys ut there are mainly related to Databases /OS management and control and very few of them with application development, and in the few latter cases is a lot more likely they will be doing administrative/financial related development and not Hardware/Software Testing development. 2.-There is also a cultural problem, the IT engineer's trend is to believe they know more about PCs just because they know a lot of software and communication equipment, although rarely they can explain in detail the interaction of the different parts of the system, you cannot blame them for that attitude, read any IT oriented newspaper and they KNOW they are wiser than an guy with an EE degree. 3.-I won't blame any company for the hardware and the support they provide, in companies I have been we had agreements alike in the past, the trend is also to minimize cost and a lot of times at the expense of support or features in the preconfigured PCs. I have to migrate all my applications every 7/8 months so the new computers get installed, the problem as you know is OS support and lack of ISA slots in older applications systems, which now is a good excuse to acquire the same equipment in different form factor (USB instead of ISA). 3.- My recommendation is that you provide an study of the replacement cost and maintenance cost increases for the cases you are interested in, as soon as your management realizes there is a financial advantage (disadvantage) they may support your decision.
4.-I use the %ell computers and I do not think they are as bad as you stated is just the nature of your agreement what makes it worst. My MX$ 0.02 Thanks DC -----Original Message----- From: Uwe Frenz [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, May 14, 2004 2:36 AM To: Boyd, David Cc: list LV-Info Subject: Re Corporate PC purchases for factory test, your experiences please Dave, you wrote on Thu, 13 May 2004 08:40:47 -0400: > ... Long story short, at least one of these has > turned out to be unreliable for long term use, so now I'm given the nod > to buy something akin to the standard-issue current workstation. > > ... The IT line is, 'If it plugs > into the network, it must include these licenses'. Plus, W2K is no > longer an option, so it comes with WinXPPro, and if you reload the OS, > you're unsupported. > > I'm just curious ... Are you free to buy your own > hardware if it goes on the corporate network, or do you get what's > offered? (Usually, I'm more concerned with things like how many open > PCI slots the thing has...) Dave, a couple of comments. 1. Your IT is dreaming. Period. If you ever have bought a modern PC-based equipment (maybe a gas chromatograph, a mass spectrometer or even a medical device), you do not get the option to choose what HW and SW to buy and operate that machine and system with. It is part of the device and you have to get it completely or get nothing. And you'd loose a lot of functionality if you'd deny LAN access for this control PC. 2. Modern PCs and especially those from '(H)ell' here in Germany tend to have a worsened reliability, caused by the immense cost pressure. A big multimedia supply chain here in Germany had the advertising slogan 'Geiz ist geil!' - 'Stinginess is whizzy!'. So I'd prefer to try to get this old machine repaired rather than buying a new one. If however I'd buy a new one I'd make sure it gets all support thats offered. 3. You may, however, buy a little switch and use this to prevent a logical connection between the PC in question and your corporate LAN. So it is'nt on the network or at least IT can't see it. You can use your WS to access data on that PC and even use it as a kind of logical gateway (if it's behind the very same switch, of course). 4. We here at getemed have the experience that XP can be as a good base for LV than 2k was. BUT: you have to regularely apply all security fixes and update your virus patterns and run a firewall that opens just what is essentially to your app. So a lot of work for a single person. Thats why my laptop (running XP) does not go into the 'wild' internet others that protected by our ITs infrastructure. Period! Just my € 0.02! Greetings from Germany! -- Uwe Frenz ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Dr. Uwe Frenz Entwicklung getemed Medizin- und Informationtechnik AG Oderstr. 59 D-14513 Teltow Tel. +49 3328 39 42 0 Fax +49 3328 39 42 99 [EMAIL PROTECTED] WWW.Getemed.de This e-mail and any attachments may contain confidential and privileged information. If you are not the intended recipient, please notify the sender immediately by return e-mail, delete this e-mail and destroy any copies. Any dissemination or use of this information by a person other than the intended recipient is unauthorized and may be illegal.
