RE: System i5 first boot

John, I don't think anybody is saying the HMC is a bad decision.  Just that
it's not a slam-dunk either.  For $1300, you get remote access to your
machine.  Interestingly enough, this is something we never had before and
yet we got by.  I'm just interested to know how often this particular
feature gets used.

For me, the answer would be "never".  As Rob points out, I have a SOHO
configuration, but even so I'm on the road a lot and the issue of access
never comes up.  I've also got a lot of clients, and to my knowledge none of
them are using HMC (with the possible exception of Rob).  On the other end
of the spectrum, at SSA we always had at least one operator 24x7 so that
wasn't an issue.

Here's an interesting twist: does the presence of an HMC now mean that you
get to do backups from home when you would have had to drive in to work?
Back in the day, if I had to drive in to work to do something like an
overnight mass compile, I got paid for it.  With an HMC, it seems like you
can tell people to do things at 3AM without having to pay them for it.

Not sure this is a good thing...

Joe

From: Jones, John (US)

Windows PC: $500ish (could be less, could be a lot more).  Twinax card:
Haven't used them in at least a decade; the closest thing I see online
after a brief search is a PCCard for notebooks at $370.  pcAnywhere
license for host & remote: $100.  Anti-Virus software at $30.  So you're
at $1000 street price or thereabouts.  That's marginally cheaper than
the $1300 mentioned below for an HMC.  KVM and LAN connections are the
same for either setup so I omitted those costs.  Cheaper if you use
used/low-end stuff but do you really want to cheap-out when it comes to
controlling your main production server?  Is the 4-year old used PC
going to be reliable over the useful life of the i5?