comparision between chromeleon, empower and agilent software

[Surabhi]

To all users who have used all the three softwares,

Which one of the above u rate as more efficient, easy to use and 21 CFR compliant.

I have used empower and just a little aquanted with chromeleon. Which one should be preferred while buying HPLCs.

Regards,

[bakej0]

I would reccomend that you use the software from the manufacturer of the instruments you are going to purchase. For example, if you intend on purchasing Waters HPLC systems then I would suggest you use Empower, however if you are going to buy Agilent systems then I would use Chemstation.

We are currently using Empower with a range of instruments and generally it works well but there are some issues particularly in controlling Agilent systems. We do not have any control over our Shimadzu systems, only data acquisition.

[johnshall]

I suggest that you take a really good look at Chromeleon. It offers much more flexibility than Chemstation or EZchrom and as for Empower... Don't get me started.

Good Luck!

[gcguy]

I have mainly used Chemstation and I prefer it to the other systems I have used. As with all systems there will be good points and bad points.

GCguy

[Bruce Hamilton]

As far as I'm aware, Chemstation still isn't 21CFR compliant, and you have to add on the Chemstore package to make it so.

Chemstore C/S is robust and reliable, but doesn't offer easy support for non-Agilent hardware, and outputs can be limited.

I suspect Agilent now offer EZchrom as the simplest 21CFR option, especially as it handles a diverse range of equipment from other manufacturers. I've no experience of it.

If Agilent offer Cerity, flee!.

Bruce Hamilton

[jzt]

we did the CDS evaluation last summer with the intend to cover several analytical departments, from discovery, pre-clinical, to GMP support of clinical phase projects. we went with Chromeleon in the end. it covers a wide range of hardware from different vendors, and offers flexibility in setting up different calculation and report templates. We already have computers connected to each of the chromatography instruments, there's no need to purchase additional hardware for the lab to implement Chromeleon (some CDS require an additional box between the instrument and the server).

[wrxtotoro]

Agilent Chemstation is the easiest to use but with Chemstore + DAD, the speed of retrieving data from the server is just nightmare. However for R&D purpose, it would be the best as it give you the flexibility to do basically ANYTHING real-time. But for QC and compliance, it's not a really good idea I guess. Also you cannot line-up sequences/sample set one after anther like Chromeleon or Empower. (At least not in the version I have used 2 years ago.)

Empower is great in controlling Alliance HPLC, but it really have some problem in dealing with Agilent 1100/1200/GC. The worst thing is, when you encounter some problem and call Waters Tech support, they will say that it's Agilent's hardware problem and when you call Agilent, they will say that it's Empower's problem. Agilent keep saying that they gave Waters the latest firmware already and they are just too slow to update their program. Our lab face glitches here and there and we still still can't get the PDA to run right and the system lost communication occationally. We are going to apply a new patch for Empower next month and lets hope it can fix most of the problem. Simply put, I'd say use Empower with Alliance or Chemstation with Agilent. Unless your lab is really big and have multi-million dollars business deal with Waters, I don't think they would bother to tailor Empower for differnt brands of instrument in your lab. For CFR21 Compliance, I think this is better than the other two software though.

Chromeleon is a great software. I have run Dionex IC on it for like a year and it works like a charm. However I have never used it to control other brand of instrument so I cannot give you much feedback.

Good luck!

[DR]

The worst thing is, when you encounter some problem and call Waters Tech support, they will say that it's Agilent's hardware problem and when you call Agilent, they will say that it's Empower's problem.

Yep. Been there, done that, both companies damage their reputations by engaging in this sort of $%!#.

[Surabhi]

Thanks all,

From all the above discussion, it seems that Chromeleon with all other hard ware works better than other softwares.

In case of chemstation and empower, both work efficiently with their respective hard wares.

More input still required

Regards,

[Jackus]

If Agilent offer Cerity, flee!.

Yes, I heard a lot about this "miracle", forget it!
We used ChemStation till now, now we go over to EZChrom (due to 21CFR11). CHS seems to be easier, better control of HW (service, instrument params settings). EZCh supports many more instruments, Client/server architecture, ...

[unmgvar]

is the matter of C/S an issue here?

are we talking about one instrument only?
a few users?
is it for a university, where your user will change frequently? is it for an industry lab?

have you tested the service as well? I am a chromeleon user. I think that it is the best, but we have had excelent service support. you can have the best toy if you are not supported properly in your part of the world go with the product that does. in the end you will never get to use it to its full capacity.

ease if use, effeciency. i would look at the calculations and report summary possibilities
we are transfering all our calculations from excel to chromeleon,and we asked this morning to be tailored a generic report for assay that would include:

fields of entries for all dilutions steps of the several compounds in our product for the standards and sample, that it would calculate all compounds in one process. average result of du/triple injection, difference of the amount results between duplicates, and a notification if the difference was greater then according to SOP.
that at least 30 samples would be within one A4 page for each compound font 10. that all the necessary information for reviewing and release would be there as well.

they finished our request this afternoon, we gave it a rough testing, and we are going to validate it tomorow.
complicated stuff like this cannot be done in Ezchrom elite. to some level it is possible with empower, but it is a thick document that you get in the end and i think that you need to do several reprocess and change inforamtion to do it.

[Jackus]

complicated stuff like this cannot be done in Ezchrom elite. to some level it is possible with empower,...

It's a quite pity that we decided for EZChrom :-/. What's the support of Agilent instruments? (1100, 1200, 6890, 5890, ?1050? )?
Do you know how to create more complicated reports in EZChrom?
Thanks

[unmgvar]

they have full control of 1100 and they will be able to fully control 1200 by jully without the need to downgrade to 1100 drivers (which we saw working in another company)
they have full control to my knowledge for 6890. from what we saw they have the best ease of use interface with CTC.
i don't know how well they manage for the 5890 different series. from what we were told the I series needs hard to get board cards but the II series is easyle connectable.

in the former company that i worked i had to deal with Ezchrom. after intensive trainning and support and many months of pain, all they can do know is one compound assays, uniformity and dissolutions at a time. According to the VWR contacts and then SSI people what we were asking was too complicated. creating a trully advanced report or a sequence report in ezchrom is a pain.
i think that agilent screw it big for all their customers wit cerity and they blew it with ezcrhom. you cannot have an easy to use C/S software were the data is not saved in a data base and you are restricted with the name that you give to your runs.
our next step is to implement calculations for dissolution profiles wich we know another customer created for himself in chromeleon a few years ago.