I think that a good line of approach would be something like...
"It's all very well to declare the capabilities of the IBM AS400 with
grand numbers and capabilities. For sure I could just as easily recite
outstanding performance figures for the HP3000 together with how big and
how fast the machine can go. It's unlikely that we can show either
machine to be a slow dinosaur. However, there are issues here far more
important than debating these numbers...
1. Suitability of Application to the Business needs. How adaptable
is the manufacturing application to changing business requirements. You
can then state how configurable ASK is etc.
2. Show a 5 year cost of ownership. Include figures for Power
consumption, Air Conditioning requirements, Support contracts, training
of Computer staff, number of computer staff needed to run machine.
Include costs for user training to use ASK. Try to cover everything - do
a thorough job.
3. Ease and cost of upgrading hardware and software. Show the cost
of adding another 4Gb disk space, 512Mb memory etc. Cost of engineer to
fit these.
4. Try to describe some of the tools available for putting on the
front of ASK to enable a windows interface (Safari?) to show that the
HP3000 is not just a dumb terminal server, but that it is a machine with
a future.
Using this more intelligent approach rather than the 'throwing of
stones' approach which seems to be being used by your counterpart will
show you in a better light. Because you would be recognising the
importance of the business issues here, you would hope that management
will pay more credence to your views.
With reference to some other mails on the list, are you a Cognos site?
As an aside, in my experience most ASK sites are also Cognos Powerhouse
sites (one reason being the prevalence of REAL data types in ASK). If
you are using this, find out the cost of user licensing for a larger
machine before making too many statements to management - because the
cost could be big. However, I'm sure if you speak to the Cognos rep and
explain the situation - that unless they can do a good deal on a new
license, they will lose the business because your company will be
ditching the HP3000 - that should encourage them to do a deal.
Many thanks
David
-----Original Message-----
From: Kim Williams [SMTP:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 24 September 1998 18:40
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re[2]: Information on HP vs IBM
* Please Note : This message was received from the Internet *
_____________________________________________________________
Joe,
We run ASK on a 937LX with a 22Gb hard drive and 480 Mb of
memory. We do
about 1500 invoice lines a month, the other company does about
twice as
many (and we both do all the manufacturing associated with the
invoicing).
Our system with just us on it is fine but I know we would have
to upgrade
to triple the volume of transactions.
Here is the email I received (in part) about the godlike
capabilities of
the AS400:
"... has 40 GB of disk and 512 MB of memory. It can support up
to 1024 MB
of memory, 996.4 GM of disk, 2400 workstations, 96 communication
lines and
8 LAN ports. It is at the BOTTOM of the current AS400 systems
available.
We can grow from single processors to 12 way processors. The
summary
comparisons I know of today speak to the ease of hardware and
software
upgrades on the AS400, and the independence of OS/400 operating
system from
it's underlying hardware. The AS400 has a superior DB2
relational database
with a single database management system, no Oracle, no
Informix, no KSAM,
no Sybase, allowing for third party packages to more easily join
the data.
This provides the ability to choose "Best of Class" software
when needed
instead of relying on a single software solution."
I'm not trying to cut this guy down. He probably has a warm
fuzzy feeling
about the system he has worked with his whole career and is
probably
feeling very threatened right now since initially we were
winning.
Can someone tell me the lowest HP that most closely meets the
above
criteria? Or maybe give me a nicely worded response?
Kim Williams
[log in to unmask]
BTW, I subscribe in digest so I apologize for any delays in
response.
______________________________ Reply Separator
_________________________________
Subject: RE: Information on HP vs IBM
Author: Joe Geiser <[log in to unmask]> at internet
Date: 9/24/98 12:03 PM
Kim,
> Thanks for the responses. I was really hoping for
> "benchmarks" (there's
> that topic again). The company we recently consolidated with
> is convinced
> that our HP can't handle their volume of transactions.
What kind of volume are we talking about here? What model 3000
are you
running? Memory? Disk? This kind of information would be able
to shed
some light on the issue.
> If it were simply cost of ownership we would win hands down.
They pay
> $100,000 per month for their AS400!
You can get one hell of an upgrade for 100K, and a lot less too!
Best Regards,
Joe
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