Chromatography Forum

Just curious, as we are looking to switch manufacturers for a new LC-MS/MS due to support issues with current manufacturer.

What is your preferred manufacturer for an analytical instrument (LC, MS/MS, GC, UV, etc...) and why - Is it simplicity of the design? Support - both technical and maintenance?

I will start...
For GC-MS/MS, I prefer Agilent primarily because of their support - great online videos, support documents, tech service line. Maintenance is super easy too, we have to perform liner maintenance every other week (change liner, septa, gold seal, and trim column) and I can do it in less than 10 minutes.
For LC-MS/MS, I don't really have a preference right now, I have only worked with Waters but I have not been than impressed with their support network or instrument design.

I don't. I don't think I want a preferred vendor. Vendors get better, get worse, and all have interesting contributions to make. I'm a great believer in going in with an open mind, and trialling every instrument that possibly fits the job you need to do.

My observation over the years has been that service and support quality is less a matter of the manufacturer and more a vendor of the individual service people. For every story I've heard in Chicago that vendor X provides better support than vendor Y, I can pretty much match a horror story in NJ to the effect that vendor Y provides better support than vendor X.

I'd suggest suggest the best thing would be to approach colleagues at other companies in your area and get *their* experiences. That will give you a much better idea of what to expect.

Just curious, as we are looking to switch manufacturers for a new LC-MS/MS due to support issues with current manufacturer.

What is your preferred manufacturer for an analytical instrument (LC, MS/MS, GC, UV, etc...) and why - Is it simplicity of the design? Support - both technical and maintenance?

I will start...
For GC-MS/MS, I prefer Agilent primarily because of their support - great online videos, support documents, tech service line. Maintenance is super easy too, we have to perform liner maintenance every other week (change liner, septa, gold seal, and trim column) and I can do it in less than 10 minutes.
For LC-MS/MS, I don't really have a preference right now, I have only worked with Waters but I have not been than impressed with their support network or instrument design.

I have always been quite impressed with HP/Agilent as far as service goes for our GC-GC/MS and HPLC units. Over the years I have found that I can usually just email our service tech any questions I have and if it doesn't involve a site visit they are willing to provide quick answers to get me back up and going.

Our only LC/MS is from ABSciex and I have not had any problems getting service from them either.

For software I believe Agilent has some of the easiest to use software at least up until the new Mass Hunter, which I have not used yet so I can't say anything about how it works. The one thing that does bother me with what I have seen on Mass Hunter is it is following the trend of storing all the data in a data base instead of individual files like older software products did. For the IT people this seems to be an easier route for data storage and usage, but for us in the lab it isn't always so.