🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <921128392@ritz.mordor.com>, ritz@ritz.mordor.com (Christopher Mauritz) writes:
>Anthony J Stieber (anthony@csd4.csd.uwm.edu) wrote:
>: In article <921124514@ritz.mordor.com> ritz@ritz.mordor.com (Christopher Mauritz) writes:
>: 
>: >it, if I had a choice on two systems, one from a mail order
>: >company and one from IBM, and they were priced closely, I
>: >would buy big blue every time.
>: 
>: I sure wouldn't.  I've been screwed over too many times with strange
>: IBM proprietary hardware and their crummy designs.  Even at a low
>: price, I don't consider IBM hardware worth it most of the time.
>
>Well, I guess as one gets older support is more important. :-)
>IBM may not be cutting edge, but they (in most cases) will doggedly
>support their hardware even when it becomes apparent that it is
>far out of date.  Also, there isn't much fear of Big Blue going bust
>anytime soon.

Well, in my experience with IBM, the support is only as good as the warranty. 
I've seen PS/2 systems with nothing wrong other than a bad serial port (that
CANNOT be disabled).  IBM's offered solution?  $900 motherboard replacement
(this was on a model 55...basically a 386SX-16).  $900 for a 386SX-16 
motherboard replacement?  For nothing more than a bad serial port?  

Suffice it to say, with similar problems over the next few months, the company
I was working for at the time switched happily to clone hardware, for which
problems can be more easily isolated and corrected cheaply with replacements of
the offending part, unlike IBM's "all-or-nothing" motherboard designs.  When
something goes wrong out of warranty with anything on IBM's motherboard, 
whether it be integrated VGA, serial, parallel....you can kiss your budget 
goodbye.   

And recently, a 70MB IBM hard drive failed.  Cost : about $700 to replace from
IBM parts.  No other drive would fit IBM's proprietary interface.  

Call that a good deal?

NOT.

Alex