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Ordering new computer for a Unit

Posted: Wed Oct 10, 2012 8:00 pm
by lehrschallbrian
My unit's computer is a dinosaur. What is the procedure for requesting a new computer?When I say Dinosaur it takes almost 30 mins to boot up and get signed into MLS.

Posted: Wed Oct 10, 2012 8:39 pm
by jdlessley
Talk to your stake technology specialist (STS). The responsibility for managing the administrative computers belongs to the STS. He needs to make sure the FM budget includes the needed replacements. The planned replacement cycle is five years. But each FM Group has to work replacements into their budget planning. Normally the lead time for getting the replacements in the FM budget is the spring the year prior. So for a replacement to happen in 2013 the FM would put that in the plan during the planning that occurs in the spring of 2012. Some FM Groups do this without input from the stakes. Others won't do anything until prompted.

FM should have an emergency replacement plan for computers that fail. I doubt that a sluggish computer would be considered a failed computer though.

Posted: Wed Oct 10, 2012 8:51 pm
by russellhltn
The slow computer is likely due to Sophos updating itself. You may find a new computer isn't that much better once the same program are loaded on.

What you might want to do is check the Event Log and make sure there are no hard drive errors and then defragment the hard drive. From what I've seen, the slowness isn't the CPU utilization, but high hard utilization drive bringing everything to a snail's crawl.

Posted: Thu Oct 11, 2012 8:52 am
by gregwanderson
Our ward's computer was unacceptably slow earlier this year but, with updates to the remote management software and Sophos, it's a bit better. I was puzzled that it was so slow for the first ~20 minutes after boot up but it seemed to work normally after that. Does your dinosaur computer run normally after the initial, sluggish start?

As an experiment, I would unplug the ethernet cable, which will prevent Sophos from running an update immediately upon start-up. See if that also prevents the computer from being sluggish. Then, when you're finished with that quick task you wanted to do (and you don't need to use the computer again for a bit) plug the ethernet cable back in and let Sophos do its thing. Of course, if that quick task you wanted to do required Internet access then this isn't a great experiment.

As I said, the system is better now than it was a few months ago, so I don't feel inclined to unplug anything lately.

Posted: Wed Oct 17, 2012 9:33 am
by lehrschallbrian
Thanks for the advice. I did a defrag and a disk cleanup and removed old finance statements in MLS and that seems to have helped some.

Posted: Wed Oct 17, 2012 10:45 am
by russellhltn
In another thread, someone suggested using the BIOS settings to automatically power on the computer about a half hour early. That only leaves the Sundays when no one is there (like general conference) to shut it down.

Posted: Wed Oct 17, 2012 10:53 am
by lehrschallbrian
How would I do that?

Posted: Wed Oct 17, 2012 11:03 am
by russellhltn
Go into the BIOS and look around. See if you can find that feature. If you state what model computer you have, someone may have the details.