Hi Shay, We owe Aeris, so maybe I can provide some experience. The external loader is absolutely outstanding and adds flexibility to the experiment - no need to stop the experiment to load/unload samples as with Miniflex, D2 or TDM-20. Overnight/weekend measurements of up to six samples - very nice. This instrument is very good for high sample throughput. They use a set of pre-defined measurement programs to do this, and that has both positive and negative aspects. On the positive side, if the measurements are more or less routine, there is no need to set every parameter every time - you just select a program. The negative side is the lack of flexibility - the need to use an external PC to prepare programs. Also, a small thing, when selecting a step size larger than the pixel size, the detector doesn't bin, but skips channels. No idea why. This leads to a more serious problem - all telemetry is effectively hidden from the user. Cabinet temperature, coolant flow, fan speed, tube temperature, etc. - Everything is locked behind engineer level access, requiring a dongle or temporary access with a two-hour, one-time key. I really don't like the idea of important parameters being hidden. They also lock everything on the internal PC, saying it is for stability. Anyway, the virtual keyboard disappears from time to time, which makes me wonder. What they don't tell you is that the internal PC is actually locked up with Sentinel protection plus Windows 10 AppLocker and DeviceGuard, which means you can't install XRDMP creator (the software used to create measurement programs) on it. I also don't understand why they keep the tube so hot. On our instrument, the tube temperature is kept between 38 and 40 ºC. On the large instruments, the water temperature in the chillers is usually 20 degrees lower, which makes me wonder why it is so hot in Aeris. The Spellman generator is a special order from Panalytical. We have already replaced one because the first one delivered died a few days after the instrument was installed. The second one lasted about 4 years and now needs to be replaced (no chance as Panalytical left Russia). We also had (and still have) a very annoying bug with axis initialization, and I think the company is still fighting it. For some reason, the tube axis would not initialize during instrument startup. There have been several fixes with each release, including the sample loading arm. We didn't have any problems with the arm, but I would ask them some questions.
Feel free to ask me more, if you have additional questions. Kind regards, Eduard From: Shay Tirosh Sent: Wednesday, June 14, 2023 9:50 AM To: rietveld_l@ill.fr Subject: recommended questions to XRD supplier. Dear Rietvelds, We are currently exploring the possibility of acquiring a new benchtop XRD instrument, specifically the Benchtop XRD from Malvern-Pananalytical. We have scheduled a Zoom meeting with the supplier to discuss this further. Before the meeting takes place, I would like to prepare by gathering relevant information. Could you please provide some recommended questions that we can ask the supplier? We aim to gain a comprehensive understanding of the instrument and compare its performance to other options available. Feel free to suggest and comment. Thank you for your assistance. Best regards, Shay -- Dr. Shay Tirosh Materials Scientist. With focusing on Photovoltaics, Electrochemistry, Thin film coatings, and nanotechnology. Mobile: +972-(0)54-8834533 Email: stiro...@gmail.com -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Please do NOT attach files to the whole list <alan.he...@neutronoptics.com> Send commands to <lists...@ill.fr> eg: HELP as the subject with no body text The Rietveld_L list archive is on http://www.mail-archive.com/rietveld_l@ill.fr/ ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Please do NOT attach files to the whole list <alan.he...@neutronoptics.com> Send commands to <lists...@ill.fr> eg: HELP as the subject with no body text The Rietveld_L list archive is on http://www.mail-archive.com/rietveld_l@ill.fr/ ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
