RE: Selecting a business partner for an upgrade -- MIDRANGE-L

Brian, you can order an 810 now without LPAR consideration BUT it is the wrong thing to do. Unless you like to gamble or have allocated resources improperly( fairly good chance of that happening). Anyone knowing you are going to LPAR near term should not even order the system without LPAR and its hardware considerations.

Do yourself a favor and consider LPAR now. You might not have to buy all the hardware immediately but you could implement a small primary and a secondary partition that is real production quality.

We have found at least one case were LPAR intentions were ignored, and a year later the BP was wondering how with in budget & available resources they were going to make it happen. It is more then just a feature code- it takes planning and knowledge of hardware and business.

Hope that helps.

Glenn
Glenn Ericson - in NYC

OS Solutions International
36 Mill Plain Rd., Danbury, CT 06811
NYC Phone (718)898-9805  Fax 718 446 1150
Conn Phone (203)744-7854  Fax 203 790 6056
<http://www.os-solutions.com>http://www.os-solutions.com
mailto:gericson@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

At 08:24 AM 1/13/2004 -0600, Burns, Bryan wrote:

Thanks, this is very helpful.

Regarding LPAR however, what do you mean by "hardware work"?  I thought LPAR
was all software.  We are just kicking around the LPAR idea and will
probably upgrade to an 810 without making a decision on LPARing.  Can't we
just LPAR at anytime?

Regarding out of state business partners, I would think there would be
enough BP's in Chicagoland that we would not have to pay expenses for an out
of state BP.  Our company is by no means stingy (makes for a nice culture)
but I would always look locally before getting involved in paying expenses
to any BP or consultant.  This is just my opinion though, our director makes
all the decisions anyway. I just like to sound intelligent when I talk to
him.

-----Original Message-----
From: Jones, John (US) [mailto:John.Jones@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Thursday, January 08, 2004 11:16 AM
To: Midrange Systems Technical Discussion
Subject: RE: Selecting a business partner for an upgrade


First of all, pricing will not be the same from BP to BP.  Some will
want the sale and will be more aggressive in discounting.  I commonly
hear everything from 0% off to 20% off without even trying.  Some will
discount even more to win your business on the hope of earning more
money later.  Some will discount hardware by 1 percentage and software
by another.  Ditto for maintenance.

That said, you want to go with a BP who has experience with what you're
intending to do.  LPAR is common enough nowadays but make sure their
person is certified or get customer references.  SAN on 400 is still
pretty uncommon so again look for a BP with experience.

Finally, there's nothing wrong with using an out of state BP.  But if
you are bundling LPAR setup, which can include on-site hardware work,
into the purchase, be warned that an out of state BP may incur (and pass
along) T&E charges.

I've used 2 BPs here in Chicagoland and a third out of California.  Each
one has offered a 'unique' experience.

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