Subject: Summary: SG maintenance suppliers

From: [email-masked] (M. Nicklaus)
Date: Fri, 19 Aug 94 12:30:49 -0400

Dear Net-Workers,

A week ago I posted the following

QUESTION:
=========
> Like many of you out there, we are running our computational chemistry
> software on Silicon Graphics workstations.  Since the Technical Support
> we have received from SG over the years has been slow, cumbersome and
> bureaucratic at times (even when on a Maintenance Contract), we are 
> looking for alternatives.  Two third-party suppliers of maintenance for
> SG systems that we have heard of (no endorsement implied) are Great
> Eastern Technologies and Halifax.
>    We'd like to ask everyone about their experience with those two, or
> any other, companies supplying hardware and/or software maintenance for
> SG systems.  Specifically, we would like to know:
> - What were the response times?
> - How useful were the answers given (for phone support)?
> - How unbureaucratic was the access to tech. support?
> - Was the on-site support (if included) satisfactory?
> - How would you rate the value of the service compared to the one 
>   provided by SG?

   I am summarizing below all the answers I received.  I am also appending
a list of possible third-party maintenance suppliers whose names and phone
numbers I obtained through phone calls etc.  No endorsement whatsoever is
implied, nor is any guarantee that these companies are really supplying the 
service you are looking for or whether they do so in your area.  You will
have to call them to find out.  If you wish, you may send me feedback on 
those questions and I will eventually post an updated list.
   From the answers received it appears that a great deal of interest 
exists in alternative sources for maintenance of SG systems.  However, much
less _assessment_ of the quality of such sources was reported.  This leads
me to a follow-up question:  Does anyone know of other forums where this
topic may have been discussed already, and/or of any such discussion?
I will summarize for the Net if I get useful responses.
   Thanks to all who answered.

 Marc C. Nicklaus                        Lab. of Medicinal Chemistry
 e-mail: [email-masked]               National Cancer Institute, NIH
 Phone:  (301) 402-3111                  Bldg 37, Rm 5B29
 Fax:    (301) 496-5839                  BETHESDA, MD 20892-4255

======================================================================

ANSWERS:
========

From: [email-masked] (Sandor Lovas)

We are facing with similar problems, I would appreciate it if you were
send responses what yuo will get on this matter.

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From: "DR. LIOTTA" <[email-masked]>

We have also been disallusioned with SG support and would like to hear more 
about these alternative maintenance suppliers.
V. Cornel (Emory University) 

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From: "Charles Manly" <[email-masked]>

I would be very interested in what you find out.

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From: [email-masked] (Craig W. Burkhart)

I will add another iron in the fire for you. We have contracted out
Honeywell for our SGI systems (hardware only). We have found them
to be uniformly excellent in all categories that you are interested in.
We still must deal with SGI for operating system stuff. I'm sure
that there must be a Honeywell office around your area.

I agree with your estimation of SGI. With them, it always seems
like they are doing YOU a favor. No thanks! And to boot,
Honeywell is about 35% cheaper on hardware maintenance costs.

So, compared with SGI, it was (and is) no contest. Honeywell
wins hands-down.

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From: [email-masked] (Marty Gallagher)

Please let me know what you find out about these other service
suppliers.

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From: Pisanty Baruch Alejandro-FQ <[email-masked]>

we have had no experience with such outside providers since they have 
apparently not started business in Mexico yet. May I ask you for 
summaries of what you find out?

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From: tj ODonnell <[email-masked]>

Please sned me a summary of your responses if you do not
post them to the net.  I sent a business reply card
to Eastern about 18 months ago and never heard back.

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From: "Brian Karlak" <[email-masked]>

I am interested in the replies you recieve about the 3rd party service
providers for SGI.  Please e-mail me a summary or post to the Net.

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From: Leonore A Findsen <[email-masked]>

I would like a summary of your responses if you don't send it to the net. 
I hopefully will be getting a SGI Indy soon and am not close to any SGI
service so everything would have to be done via phone. 

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From: [email-masked]  Robert Fraczkiewicz

Yes, please Marc, post the summary to the net. IMHO there is a great
interest among computational chemists about SGI services.

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From: [email-masked] (Rachelle J. Bienstock)

I would appreciate if you could forward any recommendations or information
which you receive concerning third-party maintence suppliers for the SGI.
My maintence contract with SGI is up shortly and due to their inadequate
support I am uncertain as to whether I want to continue with them.  Are
these other suppliers more cost competitive than SGI?

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From: [email-masked]  Raymond N. Dominey

I would like to see the responses that you receive to your recently posted
question.  We have recently obtained SGI's in our department and I am 
very interested in the alternative supports mechanisms available.

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From: "E. Lewars" <[email-masked]>

I would very much appreciate it if you would let me know what you learn
about the service provided by any 3rd-party suppliers of maintenance for 
SGI computers, including how to contact them.  How do I reach Great Eastern
Technologies and Halifax?

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From: [email-masked] (Soaring Bear)

        We've got 3 SGI's under maintenance and while they've
been very quick sometimes, other times very slow.   I'd like
to see summary please.

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From: [email-masked]  Dr. Yate-Ching Yuan C/O Thomas James

I am a sysem manager at Tom's group. I have a similar complain about SGI 
Technical Support system. Please let me know your summary so I 
could probably start thinking about alternative way.

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From: [email-masked]   John Reissner

As somebody contemplating work-station purchases
for course instruction-- yes! Let us know what you find.

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From: [email-masked] (Ghislain Deslongchamps)

        I think you will find that many people are interested in
considering alternatives to SGI's maintenance service.  I have had nothing
but bad experiences with their service and am sure that I am not alone.
Please post your findings to the CCL.

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List of POTENTIAL SG maintenance suppliers:
===========================================

SGI
1-800-800-4744

Great Eastern Technology, Inc.
1-800-875-0025
(617) 937-0300
Fax: (617) 937-8333
[email-masked], [email-masked]

Halifax Corp.
(703) 750-2202
Mark W. Mastro
(703) 658-9387
Fax: (703) 658-2576

Honeywell
????

ECS Technologies, Inc.
Eric Glover
(410) 242-2200

CompPro Systems
Ron Richardson
(410) 788-5126

Alpha Network Technologies
Barry Miller
(301) 948-0191

Falcon Microsystems
Mike Clark
(301) 386-1984

Technology Logistics
1-800-322-4141

Apex Computer
206-867-1900