Xref: utzoo comp.misc:2111 comp.terminals:631
Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!littlei!omepd!mipos3!cadev4!mfineman
From: mfineman@cadev4.intel.com (Mark Fineman)
Newsgroups: comp.misc,comp.terminals
Subject: Re: Does Turning off PC's everyday do any real damage?
Message-ID: <1874@mipos3.intel.com>
Date: 14 Mar 88 21:49:00 GMT
References: <1727@ssc-vax.UUCP> <3174@phri.UUCP>
Sender: nobody@mipos3.intel.com
Reply-To: mfineman@cadev4.UUCP (Mark Fineman)
Organization: Corporate CAD, INTeL Corporation, Santa Clara, CA
Lines: 48


 I have had 7 out out 120 terminals smoke (yes - literally smoke)
 in the last year.  I also had 2 terminal servers (out of about
 30) smoke on attempt to install in the last year.

 From long experience in the computer and electronics
 industry I have seen many cases of improper circuit protection
 devices.  I've even had two home TV's catch fire, but these were in
 in 1951 and 1958 respectively, so I don't count them now.

 I had a case recently where the field service guy said I should
 leave a particular model of his company's terminals (admitedly
 7 years old) on since "the power supply was flakey" - right!

 I have maintenance agreements for all terminals, PC's, printers,
 terminal servers, etc.

 I have my laser printers and terminal servers in a room with
 automatic sprinklers.

 I have about 10 GPX's in office areas.  I keep these on all of
 the time.  I have not had any problems with them, but they
 still worry me.  I try to get people to turn off the color monitors,
 since these are the things that worry me most.

 I tell everybody to turn off all monitors at night.

 I have had numerous falures of disks and computers after power
 shutdowns, so I don't bug people to turn off PCs, only their
 monitors.

 Summary:
  1. Get service contracts on everything
  2. Do good backups
  3. Have good procedures for bringing up new terminals,
     PC's, disks, backups.
  4. Turn everything off when both not needed and not attended.
 This gives you a predictable failure rate and no catastrophies -
 One PC failure everyother week out of 100 PC's is painless to
 recover from, one fire in 5 years wiping out 20 PC's and 20
 offices would be very painful to recover from.
(408) 765-4277; MS SC3-17, 3065 Bowers Ave, Santa Clara, CA 95050

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