From...

February 12, 1999
Web posted at: 6:36 p.m. EST (2336 GMT)

by Deborah Radcliff

(IDG) -- When Jason Foster took over systems development at ASD Catalogs last year, he inherited a mishmash of more than 200 clone PCs. Since then, he has hassled with inconsistent componentry, poor serviceability and frequent system crashes, all of which take a serious toll on productivity.

"Order fulfillment and payment verification locked up at least once a day," says Foster, director of systems development at the Garland, Texas-based order-fulfillment company, which processes 2,000 orders daily for retail catalog and Web merchandisers. "Anytime developers doing Internet multimedia and high-end database work have to deal with the network, we're locking up three to five times a day."

Next month, Foster will replace the company's 230 PCs and six developer workstations. Should he buy business PCs for upward of $1,700, loaded with features he won't need? Or should he purchase considerably less expensive consumer PCs?

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The plummeting prices of PCs are putting many information technology managers into Foster's shoes. If you multiply the price differential between a typical corporate configuration and a dirt-cheap consumer box by hundreds or thousands of end users, pretty soon you're talking about real money. But shorter product life cycles, inconsistent componentry and difficulties in upgrades are common in such machines.

Chris Goodhue, an analyst at Stamford, Conn.-based Gartner Group Inc., has an unequivocal answer for Foster: "Any organization looking to improve manageability and contain total cost of ownership as their business grows should not consider the consumer PC."

Foster is still mulling his options. But he says he worries that in the long run, going with the consumer machines could land him right back where he started.

Strict diet

Foster and other IT buyers have learned from mistakes made during the early days of client/server, when unwieldy combinations of brand-name and unbranded PCs were common. Nowadays, they're demanding life-cycle standardization so they can swap computers and componentry without changing the look and feel of the user interfaces.

"I want consistency over time -- the same processor, disk drive assemblies, BIOS, memory modules, graphics cards," says Al Hershey, a partner and buyer for the Office of Architecture and Standards at Ernst & Young LLP in New York.

Hershey oversees the purchase each month of about 2,000 IBM and Dell Computer Corp. desktops and notebooks as part of an ongoing replenishment of the organization's 65,000 computers. He says that four years ago, he haggled with Dell until it agreed to build its business line with standardized components and with Ernst & Young's custom software installed.

Dell and other vendors such as IBM are getting the message. According to Goodhue, such vendors charge a premium on higher-end business computers. In return, they agree to "make fewer, or no, changes that would affect the software image and more consistent componentry," he says. Without offering any guarantees, Dell tries to stick to standard componentry for 12 to 14 months -- and at customer request, may lengthen that time, says Dell spokesman Ken Bissel.

"Does it cost a little more? Yes. But the cost to own the machine is actually much less because my service costs, problem resolution, help desk costs and spare parts are all much lower," Hershey says.

Life-cycle standardization makes repairs a breeze, adds Dave Kozlowski, assistant vice president of technical operations at American Credit Indemnity (ACI), a Baltimore-based business capital insurance agency. He talked Dell into stocking standard components long enough to last through ACI's two-and-a-half-year machine life cycle. "I can stock standard supplies and parts. And I don't have to worry about specialized skills or who's mucking around with what type of system," he says.

Sub-$1,000 consumer PCs are a different story. Makers usually buy processors, hard drives, modems, sound cards and other components based on availability or cost, not consistency from system to system. Even larger vendors such as Dell, Compaq Computer Corp., Hewlett-Packard Co. and IBM swap components on their consumer lines too often for comfort, Hershey says.

The Dell Dimension consumer line, which ships with the biggest hard drive, fastest video card and other hot new components, is appropriate only for environments that don't require consistency, Bissel says. And because Compaq's consumer Presario and Prosignia lines for small to midsize businesses are built on the latest componentry, "an XYZ graphics card bought today might not be inside our computers in six weeks," says Compaq spokesman Arch Currid.

In the case of clones, you won't even recognize the name on many of those components. Name-brand vendors also use non-Intel Corp. processors, such as those from Cyrix Corp. and Advanced Micro Devices Inc., on their consumer lines. That's a concern for some customers. Foster says he believes the use of components from small or lesser-known vendors contributed to the frequent lockups on his consumer PCs.

Late last year, Kozlowski took a good look at consumer PCs when preparing to replace ACI's 300 desktops. He decided against buying consumer machines because he foresaw problems with parts replacement, repairs and upgrades. "If I buy a home-use machine, I may get a better deal. But three months later, the vendor may switch what's on the inside in order to keep pricing as low as possible," he says.

"For another $1,000, you get a [400-MHz Pentium] that's upgradable," he explains. "For the cheaper machines, you get smaller processors and less memory. What are you going to do with the machine in a year? Upgrade? Probably not."

Consumer PCs also are loaded with hardware -- sound cards, speakers, CD-ROMS, video cards and modems -- that most businesses don't want.

"If you're buying 2,500 PCs for your business, you'll put a premium on componentry and a single software image but less premium on performance or features," Goodhue says.

Suitable for some

Sometimes, however, strong multimedia capabilities are a must. Consider the needs of a Web development or graphical design shop.

"We've got graphics departments that do video production," Hershey says. "I want to maximize the productivity of those people, so it makes sense to buy a machine with all the fancy multimedia capabilities."

Jay Thornton, sales supervisor at CompuSmart, a Nepean, Ontario, computer store, says half of his consumer PC buyers come from small businesses with fewer than 12 machines.

"It's easier and faster for them to walk into our shop and pick up a couple of $1,200 PCs and slap some network cards in," he says. Network cards tack only $85 onto each consumer machine, he says, and the computers are ready that day.

But just adding a network card doesn't necessarily make a computer network-ready.

"There's other things vendors need to do to ensure product readiness for commercial applications: quality assurance, network testing and developing the best service, support and warranty programs," Goodhue says. "This is what business users look for."

Two key reasons ACI decided on Dell's OptiFlex business line is a single point of contact for repairs and the product's extended, three-year warranty, which cost $20 per machine. "It's worth every cent," Kozlowski says.

Most business machines ship with built-in network cards and plug-ins to leading network management consoles such as IBM/Tivoli, HP OpenView or Computer Associates International Inc.'s Unicenter. "We're not sure we want to go with a consumer PC that's not network-ready [even though] the direction of our systems development effort is browser-based computing, which would run on a fairly limited-client footprint," Foster says.

Not only are IT departments avoiding the temptation of cheaper PCs, they're also pushing vendors to stabilize their business lines, grant longer warranties and provide better service.

"Don't skimp on the hardware. Buy for your business need, not what you can afford," Kozlowski says. "In the long run, if it doesn't crash and you get full production days out of the machine, you've got your money's worth."

Radcliff (derad@aol.com) is a freelance writer in Northern California.