Re: equipment standard?

["Eric J. Ray" <ejray -at- OKWAY -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU>]

     I had a very similar problem a few years ago and choose
     the brute force method. Warning: Use of this technique
     with many bosses can be detrimental to your continued
     employment.

     Seriously, my boss is very understanding, but he just
     didn't get it on this one. I was waiting FOREVER for my
     computer to redraw the screen and do anything. I had a
     386dx16 with 5 meg of RAM (on a network) and was trying
     to run Pagemaker 4.0 and Designer 3.0, among other
     things. I did all the usual steps to optimize memory
     and resource allocation before I started complaining.

     After he told me for the nth time that I didn't have a
     problem, I carefully timed myself for a day. I watched
     the clock EVERY time I waited and totaled it up. I
     explained that it took 30 seconds to redraw the screen
     and that I had to change views 150 times in the course
     of making sure that the pages fit correctly, therefore
     I had spent 75 minutes just waiting for Pagemaker while
     doing one task. I ended up wasting over 2.5 hours that
     day (I conveniently worked exclusively in Pagemaker and
     Designer, not WP for DOS to make sure the stats were
     convincing).

     I ordered the new computer the next day.

     Eric
     ejray -at- okway -dot- okstate -dot- edu



______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________
Subject: equipment standard?
Author:  Bex <rebeccaf -at- compnews -dot- co -dot- uk> at SMTP
Date:    2/3/95 8:15 PM


I was wondering what kind of hardware most people on this list use.
I am having enormous trouble persuading my boss that the equipment I
have is not adequate for what he is expecting me to do.
I have a 486, 33MHz, 8Meg PC with 14" screen, which doesn't print and
gets very slow when I have more than one package open - which is often
necessary.

I need to create documents (paper and html), graphics, and to
run various packages such as Project.

I am the first and only technical writer that my company has had and
as far as I can tell my equipment is even worse than the secretaries'.
The rest of the company have Mac Quadras, Sparc Stations, ThinkPads and
other fancy get-ups, although a lot of production people use SE30 with
19" screens.

My boss doesn't want to be bothered with it and the technicians can't
buy anything without his say so.
I've had many technicians and self-appointed experts look at my
machine and they all agree that it has many natural inadequacies (small
screen, slow processor, etc.) and some pathological faults (it is the
only PC in the company that won't print).

I've been in this job since September (I transferred internally) and I
am getting very frustrated.

So, anyway, what do you use?  Am I really as badly off as I feel - or
have I been spoilt?  What should I say to my boss?

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