Computer Replacement Program
Effective July 1, 2007, USM administration including the President and President's staff adopted a new computer replacement program for the university.
Program Description
USM has adopted a computer replacement program. In the past decade, the number of personal computers used within the university community has increased exponentially. The size of the computing staff has not increased at a similar rate.
The useable life-cycle of a computer system today is about 3 years. After the three year period, various components within the computer begin to fail. During the same time, operating systems, software, the internet and network upgrades continue to grow and put increased demand on the older hardware. The end result is a computer system that does not work very well. As the cost to repair and support these older machines continues to increase, the only effective way to manage these is to replace them on a regular basis. In summary, university departments need to replace about 1/3 of their computers every year.
In the past, when a department ordered a new machine, the replaced machine had often been repurposed to another employee or department and many times, even that second replaced machine gets repurposed yet again. This is unsustainable and the “trickle-down” process is no longer an option. When a new machine is delivered, the old machine will be removed at that time. The data and software on the machine will be removed with industry standard data-erasing tools and then disposed of in an environmentally and legally accepted manner. Departments should now replace the oldest machines and create a schedule to replace all department owned machines every three years.
The Division of Information and Technology (DoIT) will work with assigned department liaisons to verify the current inventory and design a plan to get all machines replaced over the next three years. This may require departments to reduce the number of machines that they own.
The replacement program consists of several goals:
- To reduce the overall cost of computer ownership by the university
- To create an efficient management cycle of the computers from purchase through disposal
- To assist departments in planning for a regular replacement cycle of their computers – both staff and student-use
- To have all university-owned computers within the manufacturers’ warranty period– generally 3 years
- Consistent computer hardware for all university computer users
- To eliminate the "trickle-down" process of re-purposing older computers to other staff or departments
- To comply with all regulations regarding data security and the environmentally acceptable disposal of computers
- To reduce the total number of computers on campus
The Division of Information and Technology is eager to work with departments in this project and we strive to be flexible in the implementation yet work to meet the spirit of the program and its goals. For questions concerning the program, contact Stephen Houser, houser@usm.maine.edu.
