Though it didn’t make many headlines, those in the IT Managed Services space relying on Cisco are acutely aware that their increasing lead times on products peaked in February.  While it’s true that in the past some resellers have had shortage issues, we don’t see that happen with large purchasing services that manage their volume and ensure product is in stock and shipped quickly.  However, as of last week we were actually quoted 4 months for a firewall from a multi-billion dollar partner.  We were able to go to another partner for the same equipment.  However some of Cisco’s channel partners with reseller agreements or Managed Service Providers without diverse IT purchasing operations are feeling some pain.

After experiencing this, we stocked up on some ASA firewalls just to ensure that if something happened with a client’s network infrastructure we could address the issue expediently.  The only article I found referencing this (from the UK interestingly enough) has some jabs from Watchguard expecting sales to pick up due to Cisco’s inability to deliver.

Last year Dell had the same issue, struggling with some assembly engineering problems on new products.  It was taking 4 months to get a laptop and indeed a large number of clients gave other vendors a try.  If the incumbent vendor performed well, they didn’t switch back.  As a managed services provider focused on quality we aren’t prepared to  consider a switch from Cisco for network infrastructure projects, but we will be watching the situation closely.

Just about every one of us has been disappointed by a laptop at some point either personally or on the job.  In Decemeber 2008, against my advice, my father bought my mother a (new at the time) Dell Studio laptop with a fingerprint reader and a backlit keyboard, fancy stuff.  I bought my wife a simple Dell Inspiron with a good mid-line spec but no unnecessary features.  Just over a year later my mother’s backlit keyboard and fingerprint reader have required servicing, and two months ago the hard drive failed.  She (nearly) lost her data.

The simple Inspiron I got my wife is running strong.  Lucky for my mother, her son works in IT and she was able to recover her data without paying $500-$1000 dollars.

These are the kinds of experiences that cause people to swear off certain manufacturers altogether, in the hopes of avoiding a repeat.  In some cases this is a valid approach, in others maybe not.  Either way you aren’t alone.

An analysis of 30,000 new laptops from SquareTrade has found that in the first three years of ownership, nearly a third of laptops (31 percent) will fail.

SquareTrade has more detailed information (the full PDF of the company’s study is available here) on the research on its website.   I will list some highlights but must mention that while this is very good information, it is not the only information and SquareTrade is not necessarily the authority.

> 20.4 percent of failures are due to hardware malfunctions. 10.6 percent are due to drops, spills, or other accidental damage.

> Netbooks have a roughly 20 percent higher failure rate due to hardware malfunctions than standard laptops.

> Most reliable brands : Toshiba and Asus, both with below a 16 percent failure rate due to hardware malfunction.

> Least reliable brands : Acer, Gateway and HP.   HP’s hardware malfunction rate is the worst in the analysis, 25.6 percent.

If you want to keep your notebook running for longer than a few years, you need to make a good selection and protect your equipment.   Heat and dust are your enemy, as are ill placed power cords (traffic areas) and curious toddlers.   For tips on making a laptop selection, come back in the future for my blog  on this topic.

Manufacturers: Vast Differences in Reliability