I know of a few cases where installation was delayed. The output of the
ESI and MALDI-TOF instruments has put a strain on the service engineers.
Last time I talked with our sales representative I was told there are more
people being trained. The merger with PE has definitely had an impact on
the company as a whole. It's a little early to tell in what way. As far
as PE goes, they were quite inadequate with service/technical assistance
for an HPLC problem one of a colleague of mine. How that follows into mass
spectrometry support is another story. PerSeptives instruments are very
good. The software is continuously enhanced to provide ease of use and the
user applications are nice. We have had great performance with very little
down time and our instrument is run 24 hours a day.
Regards,
Damon.
At 05:30 PM 5/13/98 -0400, you wrote:
>Hello all,
>
>We recently purchased a mass spec from PerSeptive Biosystems (now part
>of Perkin-Elmer) and we've
>been experiencing a great deal of trouble in getting the installation
>completed. Service at PE/PerSeptive
>seems to have gone into a meltdown. The system was shipped two days
>after the ABRF meeting, rather
>prematurely as the necessary electrical power modifications had not been
>completed. However, those
>modifications were completed within two weeks. The system has been
>happily pulling a vacuum since early
>April yet it is still not installed. The main computer failed, which
>contributed to the installation delay, but the
>computer was replaced over three weeks ago. We were told last week that
>someone would be in today to
>run specs and complete the install. No one telephoned throughout the
>morning. Finally, a service engineer
>called my supervisor's lab (the mass spec is over here, in my lab, in a
>different building) to ask if he could
>come by and "check out the situation" for the install to be done next
>week. I'm not at all convinced that
>anything will happen next week. Communication between PerSeptive
>service personnel and ourselves has
>been shaky at best--sometimes people call before arriving, sometimes
>they just show up. We are getting
>quite fed up with this situation and are curious if others have had
>problems with PerSeptive. All I know is
>that Applied Biosystems has never treated me this way; perhaps the
>merger will be a good thing for all
>concerned.
>
>Janice
>
>Janice Bleibaum
>Protein Sequencing Laboratory
>Roche Bioscience
>3401 Hillview Ave.
>Palo Alto CA 94304
>(650)852-1639
>(650)354-7554FAX
>janice.bleibaum@roche.com
>
>
>
>
>
Damon C. Barbacci
The Laboratory for Biological Mass Spectrometry
Department of Chemistry - MS 3255
Texas A&M University
College Station, TX 77843