The Costs of Old Network Equipment

According to Moore’s law, the computing power doubles every 18 months i.e. the number of transistors required in an affordable CPU will double. However, at the rate at which technology is evolving, your device can become obsolete in three years or less.

Thus, in order to stay up to date and maintain your efficiency, you should replace your devices every three years.

However, in situations when budgets are tight, it’s tempting to delay upgrades. This delay can help you save in the short term, but there are costs to not replacing out-of-date hardware.

Here are a few reasons why you should not delay replacing your old equipment:

Increased Maintenance Needs

Network hardware deteriorates in about three years. Failed equipment leads to problems like increased hiring costs as more manpower will be required, delayed and inaccurate work processes, etc. Planned upgrades are likely to be less expensive as compared to unplanned hardware failure. A properly configured network is stable and requires little or no unscheduled maintenance. But, know that it’s time to replace your equipment when it begins needing unscheduled service calls.

High Energy Consumption

As opposed to old hardware, new equipment is energy efficient. New standards such as IEEE 802.3az standard for Energy Efficient Ethernet reduces power consumption by 50 percent and more in periods of low data activity. With less heat generating feature, new hardware also plays a vital role in bringing down cooling costs.

Decreased Performance

With time, the need of processor speed doubles. This increase in processing power means that older equipment is significantly slower than new equipment, and may even bog down when running newer software.

Sluggish workstations results in hours of lost productivity and employee frustration. Old machines with old software create inefficiency and are increasingly incompatible with the systems of other companies working with new technology such as smartphones.

Downtime

Pushed your hardware beyond its life? In cases like these, downtime is inevitable. If your network crashes or is down, you lose work time. You not only pay for maintenance or for new hardware replacement, but also have to bear the loss that occurred due to lost productivity.

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