Chromatography Forum

This may make some of you poke out your eyeballs but I will ask anyway as I now have too much information and a bit lost where to start. Our lab just purchased a 7890 with 5977A MS, data acquisition will be Mass Hunter and all of which is new to me. I do not have a budget for training course, so I am on the self taught pathway. My questions to you experienced users is how do I tackle such a large project of becoming competent in software and technology.

Ofcourse my time alotted to learn is compressed, so I am looking for the most systematic way to become a competent user of my new equipment. I have found some Agilent webinars for MH software but I have not found much for understanding quad technology. I know there is plenty of info on the web but with my compressed learning curve I was hoping for recommendations to get me their quicker.

I appreciate any insight you can offer me

Are you in an academic lab? If so, you could consider signing up for Chromacademy, as I believe it's still free for those with a university e-mail address (sponsored by Agilent??). It is a useful self-paced online tutorial system for a wide range of chromatographic stuff, and will give you the general background (but not the specifics of how to use MassHunter). You can also pick-and-mix from the modules on offer, so you don't have to plough through irrelevant stuff to reach the bit that interests you.

A lot depends on where you are starting from. Have you run other GC-MS systems ? (I get the impression that you have). If not, what is your background and experience ?

Peter

Start with the service engineer who installs the instrument. With a new instrument installation, a service engineer typically gives a brief overview of the instrument and software. This should introduce you to Mass Hunter and the key items for taking care of your instrument. Your service engineer or sales representitive may know of other intrument users close by who you could talk with.

As far as what to do with that mass spectrometer - it depends on the kind of work you plan to do. If you plan to run existing quatitative methods - like US EPA methods -- there is one approach. If you want to use the instrument for the identification of unknown compunds, there is another set of skills needed.

Any chance od speding some time with a team already working with one? That would be the best way of get you started.

Thank you for all the suggestions. Hopefully to answer them all- I am not in an academic lab but private industry, however I am enrolled in Masters Programme so I will certainly check out the Academy programme suggested as I might qualify.

I have used GCMS - Saturn 2200 ion trap, so yes I am lucky to not start on step one for this project but still very overwhelemed most due to time constraints.

I spoke with field engineer who has given me a weathly information and it seems I just have to get to it now. Thank you again for your comments.

Since you already know what a GC-MS does and how to do the basics your main task is to get familiar enough with the software to run basic analyses, then calibrations, QC or whatever you need. How helpful is the software help ?

Peter

Peter, my initial post I guess was a bit of a knee jerk reaction to the time constraints It would serve me well to learn a little patience.

Things have settled slightly and with my prior knowledge, the learning path almost defines itself the last few days.

Software info is great however hardware info from supplied manuals are alittle lean. For example the service engineer showed us a source cleaning and his reference manual was very different. When I looked at our system supplied manual it was like the Coles Notes version, albiet currently I am not yet at the level of understanding for an advance manual but I would much prefer to learn at the level of detail that is documented in the advanced manuals.

I have tapped into various videos but I prefer the old school way of learning on paper so I can make notes etc. So, can I ask if anyone has a link to the advance 5977A and 7890B manuals that service engineers use?

Thanks again for all your input

We are looking at purchasing a new MS soon, not sure if we are getting a 5977 or the 7000 QQQ yet, but I will be facing the same thing with the Mass Hunter software. The hardware for the single quad systems hasn't changed much since the 5973 so I am ready to go on that, if we get the 5977.

I was the guinea pig for our first windows based Chemstation twenty years ago when we got our first 5971, no body else wanted to even try it lol. It just happened I was the new guy working the night shift so I had plenty of time to just play with the software and learn how it worked. Honestly that is how I have learned most of them through the years, just poke at the system and see how it works, software and hardware wise.

I don't know that even the Agilent techs have manuals that are much more in depth than the customer manuals are now. The days were there were manuals with complete schematics of all the parts and boards are gone, now if they think a part could be bad they just replace it. Sad really, I learned how to trouble shoot our old 5995 from looking over the complete board schematics and learning what each board did and how it interacted with the others.

I have not used ion traps yet, but I do know there are some differences when working with a quad instrument that you may need to learn. You will learn a lot from just running the instrument, but when you hit a specific problem just give a yell here, usually someone answers pretty quickly

Thanks James
This forum is awesome for information and people respond so quickly. Just to let you know there IS a deluxe manual out there that customers are not privied to. The installer showed me but would not send me. I guess its kindof an insurance policy for them to ensure there are still service calls.

Good luck with your purchase and go for the triple quad! I heard sales of Agilent's ion traps are not great which basically means they will discontinue in X number of years.

When it gets installed, stick to the installation guy like glue and take notes. They're not academics but know a lot of hints and tips they can teach so you can obey the two golden rules:

Rule 1: Do Not Break The Instrument

Rule 2: See Rule 1

When it gets installed, stick to the installation guy like glue and take notes. They're not academics but know a lot of hints and tips they can teach so you can obey the two golden rules:

Rule 1: Do Not Break The Instrument

Rule 2: See Rule 1

But Rule 1 always takes all the fun out of playing with the instrument

I have been using the Chemstation software for over 25 years and it does the job. I attended a one day training for Mass hunter a few months ago for GCMS and I wish I could start using it right away. The way Mass hunter presents calibration and all the extra options it provides makes the Chemstation outdated. We used the Mass hunter with ICPMS as well and it worked really well. Good luck.

I have found the familiarization guides very useful. For the LCMS version of Mass Hunter, they take you through the complete process from collecting the data to reporting the results

When it gets installed, stick to the installation guy like glue and take notes. They're not academics but know a lot of hints and tips they can teach so you can obey the two golden rules:

Rule 1: Do Not Break The Instrument

Rule 2: See Rule 1

I have a few mobile labs, we always break Rule 1 in them