[3047] in SIPB-AFS-requests
NECX issues, disk query
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (John Hawkinson)
Wed Jul 8 09:07:54 1998
Date: Wed, 8 Jul 1998 09:06:31 -0400
To: ghudson@MIT.EDU
Cc: sipb-afsreq@MIT.EDU
From: John Hawkinson <jhawk@MIT.EDU>
(abusing server-maintainer overlap)
So, I continue to be dissatisfied with some of the way NECX
purchasing works. You may have clarified some of this for me in
the past, so I apologize if I'm making you reiterate.
It appears that, by default, we don't get the necessary tracking
number in order to pursue order issues with NECX. Packing lists
don't seem to come with the necessary tracking information to get
NECX to tell one anything.
Can you please ensure that you get that information from whoever
(Jennifer Crockett? Kathleen Moriarity?) whenever you place
an order? Could you also get it for the outstanding orders?
If you would prefer, let me know who I should ask and I'll ask them.
I am rather displeased with the fact that the NECX packing lists (one
for each of three boxes) we received for the news Ultra60
had a single line item, "Computer parts" (or suchlike). This makes
it impossible to verify the entire order was received. I think we
need to communicate to someone (either at MIT or NECX) that this sort
of thing is unacceptable. I'm somewhat at a loss as to how to do this,
and am reluctant to call up random people at the MCC, especially
wihtout the aforementioned tracking information.
Do you know what technical support services NECX provides? Again,
I don't want to call them up without an order number.
I'm pretty unhappy with the Seagate medalist pro disks
we got for AFS. I suggest in the future that we not
purchase any more entry-level disks. Aside from missing
some random features present in higher-end disks (like SMART,
theoretically providing predictive failure indications),
they seem to have way too many errors. These are the defect
numbers for the 4 disks being tested in the office,
extracted with the Sun format program ("defect" submenu):
selecting c1t0d0
defect> primary
Extracting primary defect list...Extraction complete.
Defect List has a total of 1165 defects.
defect> grown
Extracting grown defects list...Extraction complete.
Defect List has a total of 18 defects.
selecting c1t1d0
defect> primary
Extracting primary defect list...Extraction complete.
Defect List has a total of 216 defects.
defect> grown
Extracting grown defects list...Extraction complete.
Defect List has a total of 49 defects.
selecting c1t2d0
defect> primary
Extracting primary defect list...Extraction complete.
Defect List has a total of 726 defects.
defect> grown
Extracting grown defects list...Extraction complete.
Defect List has a total of 0 defects.
selecting c1t3d0
defect> primary
Extracting primary defect list...Extraction complete.
Defect List has a total of 220 defects.
defect> grown
Extracting grown defects list...Extraction complete.
Defect List has a total of 0 defects.
I'm at a loss to say how many is too many, but
I think this is getting there. It's disturbing that
running surface analysis was necessary to obtain
all the defects in the "grown" list, since one might
expect disks to come clean from the manufacturer.
I'd like to pursue this issue with NECX tech support
(if it exists), or Seagate tech support, otherwise.
Again, I'm at a loss as to how to procede.
NECX's web page suggests that there is a thiry-day
limitation on returns, even those of defective
products. I'm unclear on whether I'm misinterpreting
this or not.
Thanks.
--jhawk
