RE: Reliable Self-Check?--Thanks for the replies

["Mann, James H." <JMann at gcpl dot lib dot oh dot us>]

The Greene County Public Library used 3M self checks for about 10 years. They performed flawlessly, the service was good, and the only real problems we had was with a rather costly upgrade to ethernet. But, we were upgrading 486 computers running a DOS-based selfcheck program at the time.
About 4 years ago we switched to Vernon mostly because of an offer that was much, much cheaper than upgrading our 3M machines. The Vernon models have also performed without any problems and we're just now dealing with some minor hardware related issues like replacing power supplies and CPU fans.
IMHO the weakest link with any self check system is going to be the CPU which may be a modern computer with a 3-year life cycle as opposed to the old 386/486 CPUs that seemed to run forever.
In the future we're looking at expanding the number of self checks we have using III's Patron Graphical Selfcheck software. I don't know what III will do  next year with the new release of this product, but right now it is a one-time  license for as many units as you want. We have deployed several units using older computers with nice laser scanners, and despite the limitations our patrons have taken to them. Our future plans may be to put these units in high traffic areas or near some sort of self service reserve shelf.
Hope this helps.

Jim Mann
GCPL
Xenia Ohio 


-----Original Message-----
From:	innopac-bounces at innopacusers dot org on behalf of William Gray
Sent:	Tue 9/28/2004 4:25 PM
To:	IUG INNOPAC List
Cc:	
Subject:	RE: Reliable Self-Check?--Thanks for the replies
 Thank you to everyone who has replied so far.

With one vendor in particular, the reviews are mixed.  But I feel like
I'm seeing some options here I hadn't considered before (both in
"fixing" our current machines, and in investigating machines of other
vendors).

If anyone else cares to weigh in on this topic, I'd love to hear from
you.

Thanks again,

--William Gray

-----Original Message-----
From: innopac-bounces at innopacusers dot org
[mailto:innopac-bounces at innopacusers dot org] On Behalf Of William Gray
Sent: Friday, September 24, 2004 2:57 PM
To: IUG INNOPAC List
Subject: Reliable Self-Check?

I'm looking for opinions from library staff experienced in using and
maintaining patron self-checkout machines: what is the most reliable
patron self-checkout machine on the market today?

When I say "most reliable", I mean a machine that does not regularly
become inoperable because of constant paper jams, software crashes,
keypad lock-ups, scanner malfunctions, print errors, etc...   

I'm trying to identify a patron self-checkout machine that requires only
a bare minimum of staff attention in order to keep it running.

Please post replies to the group so that we may all benefit from this
information.

Thank you in advance,

William Gray
Library Technical Assistant, Lending Services Greenwich Library

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