Re: (ASCEND) Max 4000 Power Supply

[Jim Logan <jim@top.net>]

At 04:37 PM 2/4/2000 -0600, you wrote:
>          Reply to:   Re: (ASCEND) Max 4000 Power Supply
>The maintenace agreement we have with Ascend/Lucent covers any hardware 
>failures as well as gives us priority status when call tech support

Have they lowered the costs of that Maint Agreement, to something more 
reasonable than it was in the past?  Last I checked the Maint Agreements 
were more costly than what I could buy a replacement unit for various ISP 
lists?  Livingston is the only company I knew that had reasonable maint 
agreements (I consider reasonable as 10% or less of current resell 
value).  Cisco, is sort of reasonable, and I've even had them recommend a 
contract 'after' a failure as cheaper than replacement.  No other company 
(that I'm aware of) will offer you that.

As far as I'm concerned, none of the vendors look at how much the equipment 
has depreciated, very rapidly in the last few years, in making any decision 
as to what they value their contract costs at.

The "priority" status on calling in is definitely starting to look better 
and better... Last time I called in on their Toll Free line for $3/min tech 
support, I was on hold (non-charged) for 2 hours before getting a 
tech.  One would think at $180/hour they could stick a few more techs on 
that line!!

Funny thing was, knowing there is a problem with their NINDY Procedure with 
the newer pipeline units (above 722xxx), they still have never answered my 
question on a "good procedure" that works, rather than trashing out serial 
number on the unit, and thus forcing you to call tech support to get the 
hash codes sent to you to restore the unit.

Personally I think they "know" they have a problem with the Power Supplies 
(and fans) on the 4xxx series boxes, particularly the 4004, but have never 
wanted to admit it.  Out of three of those boxes we had, 2 failed very 
similar to what was described in the original posting. I'm also pretty sure 
that it is serial number dependant, meaning they later upgraded the power 
supply to something a bit more tolerant, but (to the best of my knowledge) 
never offered this upgrade to pre existing customers.  A good manufacturer 
might have thought about doing something about that, rather than charging 
$1800+ to get a working box back in a week or more to the owner.


>Paul M. Ledbetter wrote:
> >Insurance does not cover failures, only warranties cover that and this 
> box >is 3 years old.
> >
> >Do you have Insurance on your 3 year old boxes???
> >
> >At 10:03 AM 2/5/00 +1300, Lennon wrote:
> >>I think these days anyone who can afford a max box can also afford 
> Insurance
> >>for
> >>their office/equipment. :-)
> >>
> >>Thanks
> >>Craig Whitmore
> >>iGRIN Internet
> >>

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