New vs. refurbished?
Sometimes refurbished is a better bet than new from the reliability standpoint! Consider that in the solid state world most failures are "infant mortalities". The MTBF on a lot of SS equipment is so long that it becomes obsolete long before it reaches its ultimate wear-out failure mode. So a unit that is slightly used (and presumably not abused!) has actually had a bit of an extended burn-in period. Thus I would expect a lower probability of a return on such a unit for (another?) defect since it's past its infant mortal period, which is perhaps the first 100 hours of normal use.
Now, this same reasoning does not necessarily apply for any unit with a HDD or other highly-stressed components, and certainly does NOT apply for "intermittencies" that were not fully diagnosed and mitigated in the refurbishment. Unfortunately a lot of returned gear is never really "repaired" or fully checked-out as part of its refurbishment!
Too bad we can't selectively choose refurbished units from E* or D*. I for one am a willing participant in the acquisition of truly refurbished equipment for the reason above, especially if there is a cost incentive...!
Sometimes refurbished is a better bet than new from the reliability standpoint! Consider that in the solid state world most failures are "infant mortalities". The MTBF on a lot of SS equipment is so long that it becomes obsolete long before it reaches its ultimate wear-out failure mode. So a unit that is slightly used (and presumably not abused!) has actually had a bit of an extended burn-in period. Thus I would expect a lower probability of a return on such a unit for (another?) defect since it's past its infant mortal period, which is perhaps the first 100 hours of normal use.
Now, this same reasoning does not necessarily apply for any unit with a HDD or other highly-stressed components, and certainly does NOT apply for "intermittencies" that were not fully diagnosed and mitigated in the refurbishment. Unfortunately a lot of returned gear is never really "repaired" or fully checked-out as part of its refurbishment!
Too bad we can't selectively choose refurbished units from E* or D*. I for one am a willing participant in the acquisition of truly refurbished equipment for the reason above, especially if there is a cost incentive...!
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