Re: Alternative to IBMi hardware maintenance

Agreed they tend to price x% of IBM but we've got customers with some truly ancient hardware out there (Model 300!!) and they don't gouge although I no longer call it cheap.

As for replacement SSDs that's not a real fear on a POWER5 (or that model 300) since there are none there. I've not heard of a shortage of 4326 or 4327s for example the most popular drives in the Power5 space. Heck I have 200 of them here in the Frankenlab, need any??? LOL!

Remember the third party providers DO get a lot of parts from IBM Boulder especially things like SSDs.

- Larry "DrFranken" Bolhuis

www.Frankeni.com
www.iDevCloud.com - Personal Development IBM i timeshare service.
www.iInTheCloud.com - Commercial IBM i Cloud Hosting.

On 10/3/2018 10:21 AM, Rob Berendt wrote:

Some people say that IBM drastically ups their maintenance charges to make
upgrades to new hardware look attractive.
An argument against that may be that the upcharge may be due to shortages
of replacement parts. People really do not want used SSD's for
replacement parts and manufacturers quickly drop making old models when
new ones come out.

But, anyway, I always find the third parties seem to charge x% of IBM's
maintenance. If IBM raises their rates to double then the third parties
raise theirs and still take x% of the new rate. They don't try to explain
either as they just want you to focus on that they are cheaper than IBM.
So, the third parties may look attractive now, but when IBM stops
supporting the hardware what will they jump their rates to? Will they
feel they've got you by the throat? Will they be all confused as x% of
nothing doesn't pay the bills?


Rob Berendt