[BBLISA] local vendors for Intel servers?

[Nick G]

The problem here was that they were the only vendor who were doing 
Socket 478 boards with an ISA bus for a desktop system at a reasonable 
price; I really didn't have anywhere else to go. I could have gotten 
server-class boards, but that's only if I were building phone servers. 
The big boys, like Dell / HP / etc, and even vendors like Tiger Direct 
(shudder) were either unable to supply the part I needed or unwilling to 
manufacture the machine. Only PC4E was - and for that, I am grateful.

In this case, perhaps my disappointment *was* unfounded - it should be 
directed at Itox* (makers of the motherboard), as opposed to PC4E. As I 
said, their customer support has been, in my experience, prompt and 
courteous. It's just that the motherboard they chose might have been a 
poor choice.

- n

* - for the record, I had never even HEARD of Itox (http://www.itox.com) 
until I cracked the case of one of these machines after we got it and 
googled the model number imprinted on the board.


Douglas Alan wrote:

>Nick Giannotti <nick.giannotti at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>  
>
>>Chalk me up as another one who has had bad luck with PCFE: I bought a
>>dozen machines from them (I needed Socket 478 boards with an ISA Bus
>>on them) and I've had more than 25% of the up and die, due to the
>>motherboards conking out.
>>    
>>
>
>  
>
>>I will say that their customer service is good, but their product is,
>>from my experience, unreliable.
>>    
>>
>
>PC4E is best if you want to specify a system down to the motherboard,
>and they'll build it for you.  The system will only be as reliable as
>the motherboard you chose, however, so it pays to do some research into
>how well-regarded the motherboard in question is.  PC4E is not big
>enough, to do their own statistical and engineering analysis of the
>failure rates of all the various components they might sell you, though
>I'm pretty sure that they will tend to stay away from brands that have
>proven to be routinely problematic.
>
>If you want, instead, to purchase a system where the aforementioned
>failure rate analysis has been allegedly done, but which offers you many
>fewer configuration options, Dell, HP, Sun, Apple etc., seem more like the
>places to go.
>
>|>oug
>
>  
>

-- 
 - n 

How can I feel abandoned, even with the world around me? 
How can I bite the hand that feeds the strangers all around me? 
How can I know so many, never really knowing anyone? 
If I seem superhuman, I have been misunderstood...."

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