IT Support...

Freakbro

Freakbro

Freakbro

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I know a lot of you work in IT support in one form or another, so I just want to run this past you.

One of the places I work part-time uses an outsourced company for their IT support (Hardware/Software support)

We have about 8 PCs, running Win 7 32 bit, and 1 Server running Windows Server 2012 64 bit

I have just enquired with the IT support company about upgrading the PCs to 64 bit windows (as the lack of ram with 32bit is causing issues) and their reply was

If your computers have windows 32bit installed there is no way to update them to 64bit without completely reinstalling windows on each machine.

In reality this is not really practical in terms of work and cost, the only real option is to purchase new computers with a 64 bit OS already installed.
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Really? :confused:

Is it really more cost effective to buy 8 new work PCs than get someone to reinstall 8 workstations and set the domain logins up again etc.

That seems crazy if thats the case....
 
That is crazy. If the PCs are in any way recent (less than 10 years old) they will support x64 Windows. It is just a matter of re-installing them, re-joining them to the domain and adding the applications back.
I just did this for around 800 PCs in my company over the last 12 months. 32bit 7 to 64bit 10. OK, I have a fair amount of automation set up using MDT and SCCM but for a small number of PCs it's not a massive amount of work for someone who has half a clue.
 
Sounds like a small setup. The outsourced IT company, do they charge you per call?, allow you so many visits each year? They will probably charge you more per hour in labour than it would cost to replace the pc’s.

a lot of small businesses I go out to contract their IT support out to a one man band type company who then agree on so many support visits per week/month.
 
cyber69 said:
Sounds like a small setup. The outsourced IT company, do they charge you per call?, allow you so many visits each year? They will probably charge you more per hour in labour than it would cost to replace the pc’s.

a lot of small businesses I go out to contract their IT support out to a one man band type company who then agree on so many support visits per week/month.
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We pay an annual support cost - they do offsite backup of the server etc and dial in to fix anything

We got charged extra when they had to come out and install a wireless network in the new building
 
Get better IT support! Or tell them rather than ask them. You ask them if something is possible they’ll say no and offer a much more expensive long winded option.
Simply tell them what you want doing.
 
Thekwango said:
Get better IT support! Or tell them rather than ask them. You ask them if something is possible they’ll say no and offer a much more expensive long winded option.
Simply tell them what you want doing.
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I did! I said I wanted to upgrade the 8 pcs to Windows 64 bit, and that was their answer :p
 
Freakbro said:
We pay an annual support cost - they do offsite backup of the server etc and dial in to fix anything

We got charged extra when they had to come out and install a wireless network in the new building
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Thats how a lot of small businesses are supported these days. I visit a lot of academy schools and they have their IT support provided by a one man band type company, someone very knowledgeable but spread out thinly on all the contracts they support. Hence the limitation on support visits to site unless the company pays out something like £140 an hour typically.
 
I guess the call-out charge to do the work could be higher than the cost of buying new PCs if you are outsourced. I'm guessing you don't have Windows upgrades as part of your service agreement.
 
Rilot said:
I guess the call-out charge to do the work could be higher than the cost of buying new PCs if you are outsourced. I'm guessing you don't have Windows upgrades as part of your service agreement.
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I will see if someone can dig out the agreement and see what is covered

Thekwango said:
But I bet you put it in a nice, ‘is this possible’ type way to them. Never give them a get out!
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You may have got me there....:p
 
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he's said it isn't practical in terms of "work and cost" - well the work aspect is irrelevant to you as they're the ones doing it but why not question him on the cost of installing windows on these PCs, ask for a quote if that work isn't covered by your annual contract
 
dowie said:
he's said it isn't practical in terms of "work and cost" - well the work aspect is irrelevant to you as they're the ones doing it but why not question him on the cost of installing windows on these PCs, ask for a quote if that work isn't covered by your annual contract
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Ta, will do

Glanza said:
With that response I'd be looking at moving your support.
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Funnily enough, we are looking at doing that as well...
 
Only 8 PC's and 1 Server, sounds like a nice little support setup.

Strange how they're not quoting you for the work, and cost of extra RAM (to benefit 64bit platform)

Unless they charge that much, might as well just buy new! lol
 
How on earth did you end up with less than 2 year old PC's running 32 bit Windows 7?

I can sort of see their point (and yours also!) as they are low spec low cost machines. Keep in mind its end of support in 18 months for Windows 7.
 
The support bods are right in that you can't run an in place upgrade from 32-bit to 64-bit. Depends on how the environment is configured as to how much ballache it'll be re-installing Windows then the apps and all the settings that come with it manually.

I can kind of see the point they're making. You're looking at £120+ on a Windows license, and probably the same again in labour for each machine to get them upgraded and configured. Plus the downtime of losing the workstation. You could invest that £240 into new hardware that has Windows 10 64-bit already licensed and installed and incur less downtime.
 
Thekwango said:
Get better IT support! Or tell them rather than ask them. You ask them if something is possible they’ll say no and offer a much more expensive long winded option.
Simply tell them what you want doing.
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Maybe pay for better IT support, I'd hazard a guess as has been alluded to in many replies that it's just a certain amount of visits per week/month contract, surely they can't be expected to re-image/replace all 8 PCs and upgrade the server on that type of contract.

Also are all the software packages you run tested to work with 64bit Windows? You may have to rebuy some software licences for those as well, it's not a simple as "Let's chuck Window 64bit on those" when it comes to companies IT anymore.
 
If your feeling adventurous I believe there is hack to patch 32bit to allow for more memory. Not exactly what you would expect a business to be happy about but would save you some coin.
 
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