this post was submitted on 30 Jan 2024
843 points (98.2% liked)
Technology
59385 readers
1166 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related content.
- Be excellent to each another!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
Approved Bots
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Or these companies could pay to train (no pun intended) technicians to learn the systems they’d like to maintain. No matter how old they are.
Until entropy comes for the actual hardware (assuming they won’t invest in remanufacture or production of replacements). Re-engineering a successfully working system is more costly and might result in worse outcomes, especially in the near term.
Often these system rely on old components which are just not made anymore.
People don't design every switch, computer and chip themselves. They buy whatever mainstream stuff is available at the time and combine it into a system
If you want to resupply those old parts you literally need to search Ebay to buy some weird outdated 2nd hand MSDOS PC to put in your "awesome reliable railway system".
Upgrading at every new whim is of course bad, but once your system reaches legacy age it's often necessary to fully overhaul and modernize it for the next ~15-20 years.