General discussion
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Topic
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Who wants easy access PC cases anyway??
LockedI manage several customer contact centers that have around 1500 workstations in each. Recently as the major vendors were bidding for our PC refresh business they were all eager to point out how their cases included “Easy Access” thumb screws (gone are the 3-4 phillips head screws); easy to remove components (nice big green clips that flick with one thumb); all of which would make replacing parts fast and simple.
That’s true… but it also makes it fast & simple to steal components. Especially RAM and HDDs that are no longer (in the case of HDDs) fastened to the chassis with screws.
When I asked the vendors if their focus on easy access & remove was in recognition that their PCs had to be regularly serviced and components replaced… they quickly backed away. So if routine failure and replacement was not a driver, then what…?? Well.. You see.. We listened.. We thought..
Aside from my home PC (which is opened up probably every other month), I never want to see the PCs in our centers opened up. We don’t upgrade the HDDs regularly. We aren’t always installing additional RAM or higher spec CPUs.
So it leaves me to conclude that this easy access feature is just and attempt to ‘show value’ (that isn’t provided.
True, most Cases now have a standard case-lock ring. After the loss of >10 HDDs, >15 RAM sticks & 5 CPUs (in one month) we’ve now installed combination padlocks. We’re now looking at replacing this with a single master key lock as the (evil) staff quickly worked out how to pick the combination on these simple combo locks (and we lost more hardware).
So to all the people out there responsible for PC purhcases… if you don’t tend to be opening and removing equipment from your PC’s every other day… help fight back against the vendors. At least 3 screws used to take a minute or two to open a case. I can get ours opened and closed (SANS a RAM stick) in under 45 seconds. Yikes!!