Question: You are the manager of a department within a large company, 60,000 has been budgeted for computer upgrades in your department next year.
Cost control is important, so you don't want to overspend. If you need to ask for more money than was budgeted, you will need documentation to justify the request.
The information systems needs of your department are listed below:
All computers will need to be upgraded to Windows 8 and office 2013-your company has a site license for both of these programs and allocates the cost as $75.00 for Windows 8 and $100 or office 2013. Your department will be charged these fees for each computer ( even if new computers come with the software pre-installed).
There are 3 classes of users in your department: Users requiring class 1 computers need a minimum of 2GB of main memory, 1 GHz processor speed, and an 80 GB hard drive. Users requiring class 2 Computers need a minimum of 4GB of main memory, 2 GHz processor speed, and a 150 GB hard drive. Users requiring class 3 computers need a minimum of 4GB of main memory, dual processors with a speed of 2 GH z, and two 250 GB hard drives.
The IS department assesses your department $1,000 per computer annually for their services.
There are currently 15 people requiring class 1 computers, 20 requiring class 2 computers, and 5 requiring class 3 computers.
2 more people are expected to be hired next year that will need class 1 computers.
Each current employee has a computer. There are no extra computers. Class 1 computers currently have 256 MB of RAM, CPUs with a speed of 0.5 GHz, and 30 GB hard drives. Class 2 computers currently have 512 MB of RAM, CPUs with a speed of 1 GHz, and 80 GB hard drives. Class 3 computers currently have 1GB of RAM, CPUs with a speed of 2 GHz, and two 125 GB hard drives.
10 of the class 2 computers have a maximum main memory of 512 MB and cannot be upgraded. The rest of the computers are fully upgraded.
You may find it more cost effective to allocate an existing computer to a new class and buy a new one in its existing class. You can also take parts from existing computers and use them in other computers. Assume that any parts you can find will work with the existing computers.