Mean Time Before Failure
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Hello folks, I was just wondering if Netgate specifies a Mean Time Before Failure (MTBF) for their hardware appliances similar to what harddrives have?
I'm just asking. Curiosity.
Thanks!
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No.
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Okay. Noted. Thank you!
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Does your computer provide this info from Dell or Lenovo? What about your TV, does that give such info? Your Cell phone?
Does Cisco provide this for their hardware?
They come with a hardware warranty, just like any other piece of hardware.. You can even extend the sg-1100 for a few bucks to 2 years.
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Hello! I do get your point. And I'm not contesting it. I was just thinking of the average lifespan of a specific product/product model (be it laptop, cellphone, PABX, coffee machine, etc) so we can estimate when to change to a newer, better model. For my thinking of a three-year lifespan, I can start planning the next purchase 2 ~ 2.5 years into its life and just redelegate the old product as a backup just as the three years is finished or just sell it.
For Cisco, I was informed that they do have MTBF tables but the numbers are hidden behind an NDA.
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I have used Cisco for Ever - and we have a NDA with them, have never seen such tables..
3 years is a common refresh rate for such hardware sure.. You should plan on that for budgeting and you will be good!
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Yeah. Thanks! And your recommendation reinforces my recommendation not to wait for a product to fail before buying another. Three-year refresh is a good time frame for my company.
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If budget constraints are a problem have seen refresh pushed to 5 years, etc. But yeah you never wait for something to fail before you get a new one ;) That is not an IT sort of policy - the point of the refresh is to stay current and yeah replace the thing before it fails so that its controlled change/outage when you replace it with new one and minimize downtime.
This is done normally with all things in the IT space - users PCs, Phones, Switches, Routers, UPSes, Servers... All should be on a refresh schedule - what that schedule is would be up to the company and their tax guys because normally the equipment is being depreciated.
Only in the home space would you see someone using it until it dies ;) Or small tiny ma and pa sort of businesses.
Along with hardware refresh policy - make sure you keep your systems Updated... See people here all the time, company setups where they are running version of pfsense that is 4 years old.. WTF!!!
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https://www.netgate.com/support/product-lifecycle.html
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^ yup good info to understand for maintaining your equipment current both in hardware and software.
Pretty much any equipment maker or software maker should have such info - unlike MTBF ;) heheh
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If you have a specific concern, please contact our sales team, sales@netgate(dot)com; they will be happy to assist you.
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@chrismacmahon Thank you. We are just choosing which appliance to purchase within the next few days and we will be contacting sales soon after.
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@johnpoz Since I came in we have started to update the systems regularly -- we would normally wait a maximum of three weeks before applying the update. We would check the release notes and forums first to see what to expect. This is the easy part because I do not get any complaints from the money guys.
I get the "don't update / wait to update because things are working" logic but four years?!?
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Yeah there was just a thread not that long ago... Let me see if I can dig it up.. But threads all the time where they are running 2.1 versions of pfsense.. Which came out back in 2014
Guy was complaining that he just bought the thing and it failed.. Clearly it was atleast 4 years.
