On Fri, 21 Sep 2007, Jim Leonard wrote: Should I attempt this, could you give me an idea of what is involved? Do the cardcage modules come out from the rack with anything resembling "ease"? Does anyone have accurate dimensions for one of these cages? I've found three different dimensions on the web, and they differ by 12 inches, it would sure be nice if I could get someone to go out to their garage (storage facility, barn, etc) with a tape measure and come back and say "It *is* w x h x l". I appreciate your input, Jim; JP

Think carefully about deracking the Onyx 10K. It has special compression connectors that are very susceptible to small amounts of dirt -- in particular you should never, ever touch the connector. I wouldn't want to derack all of that without having had experience doing it. When we moved the Onyx2 Reality Monster from the same location, we did temporarily derack the topmost card cage in one of the 4 cabinets. Once the cabinet was back on the truck, we put the cards back in the rack. The cards themselves are secured into the rack with screws, so I really don't see them coming loose from road vibration. The Onyx is a VME bus based cabinet and the cards are simple edge connectors IIRC. We moved 2 of the Onyx type refridgerator sized cabinets, 4 of the Onyx2 type 6' cabinets, and a deskside cabinet (smaller sized VME based box) in a single move in a rented panel truck. None of the machines show any signs that anything vibrated loose during the trip, although none of them have been thoroughly inspected or powered up since delivery, but there is no obvious indication of anything having come loose. All cabinets were cargo strapped against the interior walls of the panel truck. The trip was 1300 miles on interstate one way, so I'd say if anything was going to come loose from road vibration, it would have done it. -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

In article <896657419.20070925195422 at g-lenerz.de>, Gerhard Lenerz <mail at g-lenerz.de> writes: Agreed; there is no guarantee, even if you use a commercial shipping agent. Personally I feel better about moving things myself and generally more nervous when I hand things over to a shipping agent. With myself doing the packing, I know exactly what kind of quality attention to detail I'm getting, but with a commercial agent I'm at their mercy and by the time it arrives damaged, its too late to do anything about it. Its not like insurance is any good here, because you can't get these things replaced or repaired. -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

I think for valuation purposes you can always put a price on it for property insurance. That would at least get you some economic restitution in case of disaster, but its not like you can just go out and buy a replacement item for these things. Its similar to having a piece of art. There's one. You can't get a replacement. At best you could purchase a reproduction made from photographs of the original, and it would only be a replica worth a fraction of the original's value. -- "The Direct3D Graphics Pipeline" -- DirectX 9 draft available for download <http://www.xmission.com/~legalize/book/download/index.html> Legalize Adulthood! <http://blogs.xmission.com/legalize/>

--- Gerhard Lenerz <mail at g-lenerz.de> wrote: Unfortunately, I don't believe that there is any way of really insuring a computer collection. And even if you did manage to buy insurance for your collection, getting them to pay up if something were to happen would be next to impossible. I recall a sad story posted here a couple years ago, about a collector whose house was hit by a car. Really. Someone (some drunk someone, IIRC) drove a car into the side of the house. Sizeable damage was done to the house, and a computer (a DEC PDP "straight" 8, I think) was destroyed in the process. I think the computer was covered by his insurance. But I don't know what the eventual outcome of it was, but I can't imagine that getting payment would have been easy. Or have helped. Because where are you ever going to replace something like that? Something like repairs to a house are easy to put a dollar value on. Materials and labor. Even things like vintage cars and antique furniture have a somewhat established pricing system. But computers? I mean, I know that there is a classic computer price guide (microcomputers only, BTW), but it's hardly the definitive word on the matter. Same with eBay price histories. Is there even a way to have a computer collection insured? -Ian

Rumor has it that Mr Ian Primus may have mentioned these words: Sure... mine is. It's thru State Farm and is a rider on my homeowners insurance. It currently costs me about $90/year (but the inventory's a bit old so if things went up in smoke, a few of the computers wouldn't be paid for) but IIRC it's $0 deductible, and covers replacement costs on all of my main computer & electronic stuff, my main computers, TV, digital camera, etc. I got it right after my wife dropped my (then) $700 Epson digital camera, which cost over $300 to repair. About a year later, it got taken out by a lightning storm with my main computer, 2 weeks later I had a check in hand, and 2 weeks after that, I had a new (and at the time, schweet) 1Ghz P3 system & a Nikon Coolpix 5000. The insurance paid for itself for many years to come... ;-) Laterz, Roger "Merch" Merchberger -- Roger "Merch" Merchberger | Anarchy doesn't scale well. -- Me zmerch at 30below.com. | SysAdmin, Iceberg Computers

On Tue, 25 Sep 2007, Gerhard Lenerz wrote: Consider also that the insurance company may want to have someone repair a damaged computer. Something like that happened to a friend of mine who was expecting an Atari ABAQ[1] to arrive by UPS. The package was lost, then eventually found impaled by a forklift. UPS wanted to send it to be repaired. [1] One of only ten or so in existance, IIRC. -- David Griffith dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text. Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing? A: Top-posting. Q: What is the most annoying thing in e-mail?

On Tuesday 25 September 2007, Richard wrote: A replacement value should be easy to figure out - just find some used equipment dealer who wants big $$$ but has the same thing you do for sale. Pat -- Purdue University Research Computing --- http://www.rcac.purdue.edu/ The Computer Refuge --- http://computer-refuge.org