Trying to keep from writing a 5 page letter on the history of the
situation, I compressed some events into short statements that were
misinterpreted as a jab at BD, but were not intended to be such. To
clarify, one of the original ideas (of many being considered) was to
connect the Mac to the FACScan, but the decision was made to have an
independent Mac workstation, and if all was well, keep the option
open to THEN connect the Mac to the Scan. Later, upon discussing
upgrades with an individual who was IN NO WAY CONNECTED WITH BD, we
were told the connection could not be made. Rather than seeking a
professional opinion, since we were not planning the upgrade any time
soon anyway, we just relied on the bad advice and moved on deciding
not to pursue it.
Many months later, after working with a FACScalibur this summer at
another lab, and seeing HOW WELL the Acquisition portion of the
CELLQUEST software worked, I began wondering again about connecting
our Mac to our Scan, hoping the comment that "it couldn't be done"
was wrong. I went to the archives of the flow cytometry bulletin
board on the internet and found several letters relating to Scan /
Mac upgrades and the like. I was surprised to learn that we may be
able to make the connection, but the letters I found were not very
specific as to how; they were more along the lines of after the fact
trouble shooting. That's when I wrote my letter. Again, so the
letter wouldn't be too long, I abbreviated the history, not intending
it to be a poke any individual or corporation.
In summary, some of our upgrade plans may never have been mentioned
to anyone at BD, so we had not sought their advice. We were never
told by anyone at BD that the upgrade could not be done. I apologize
if my abbreviation of the history seemed like it was intended to
implicate anyone; it was not.
Peace, Darren Hickerson, ECU SOM