I don't have URLs handy, but my recollection is:
1) McNealy of Sun has said that IBM provided the parts involved in the cache failures. My understanding is that comparable parts from other suppliers, used in the same machines, did not exhibit similar problems. The type and level of error detection and recovery appropriate is a function of the underlying likelihood of errors occurring, and the IBM parts were allegedly error-prone relative to expectations.
2) Usenet is full of reports of IBM drive failures. It's difficult to substantiate or quantify the problem, because probably the only people with the necessary data are IBM themselves, and they haven't admitted to a problem AFAIK. At some point anecdotal evidence must yield to statistics. However, anecdotally, I myself have experienced what I believe to be an unusually high failure rate in recent IBM drives, and I would not be surprised if such problems contributed to the decision to sell to Hitachi. How Hitachi will do with it remains to be seen. BTW, I have a vague recollection of a lawsuit being filed on the issue of faulty drives.
3) Debt is debt. You can identify it to financing operations if you like, but it's still on the balance sheet. Are you suggesting that if the financing deals all went belly up, the company could walk away from the debt?
4) I think within the past few days I saw a figure of 1500 to be laid off in this round. I don't know the number of employees in Global Services, so I don't know a percent. But isn't this the group being held out as doing especially well?
All JMHO. Everybody needs to do their own research and form their own conclusions.
Charles Tutt (SM) |
