Date: Mon, 31 Jan 94 16:24:49 HST
Subject: SX50
From: "Tom Hulsebosch"

John, I mailed a copy of the letter to Conty and cc'd one to
Andy Davis today. I've heard from two more labs that want to
be part of our group - U. Mass and Ontario Geological Survey.
Neither wanted to be on the letter. I don't have their e-mail
addresses with me but I'll send them later.

Tom H.

Mr. Claude Conty
Marketing Director
Cameca Instruments
103, Boulevard Saint-Denis
BP-6, 92403 Courbevoie
Cedex, France


Dear Mr. Conty,

The purpose of this letter is to notify Cameca of the formation of
a Western Hemisphere SX-50 Users Group and to share with you the
results of an initial meeting in San Francisco on December 6. The
primary mission of our group is for mutual assistance (e.g., sharing
information like methods developed and solutions to common problems).
We hope to work with Cameca for the greatest benefit to all current and
future SX-50 owners.

This letter has two aspects: the main aspect, we hope, is to point
out some of the things that we as a users group can do through mutual
assistance. A second aspect, which some of our users feel strongly
about, concerns some problems they have had with their instruments and
service from Cameca Inc. We feel it is important to air these problems,
hopefully not to start on a negative note but rather to get them out in
the open and resolved satisfactorily. We will all benefit from this.

First off, what can we as a users group do?

First we could serve as a "clearinghouse" for transmitting ideas
between users and Cameca, in 1) compiling suggestions from members for
improvements in the software, 2) compiling bug reports, and 3)
suggestions for hardware modifications. The Internet "Super Highway" is
an ideal vehicle for this.

Second, we can assist Cameca in spreading news, fixes, upgrade
details, etc. to the users quickly and effectively. We would hope that
Cameca would also have Internet access sometime in the not too distant
future.

Third, users will be able to share information about analytical
techniques, maintenance, standards, peripherals (printers etc.),
upgrades. It would particularly be helpful for new SX50 users. One
suggestion is to poll the users about manuals that many of us have
already written for users at our own sites. Another has also been to
make some training videotapes, which some of us have the technical
skills to do.

Fourth, we could help poll the members about ideas for periodic
training sessions. Already we've heard some comments about the need for
some image analysis/processing training sessions. We understand that
the European Cameca Users Group (CAMUS) has periodic users' meetings
coordinated with Cameca with some training, and perhaps we could work
toward something like that.

Fifth, we could share "success" stories (it would be nice to hear
some of the great things about the SX50), like tricky analytical
problems (resolving interferences, etc.), new materials analyzed,
awards users have received, neat imaging, etc.

These are some of the initial ideas of what we could work on. We
would certainly welcome working together with Cameca in this endeavor.
And Cameca would certainly benefit, particularly in having a users
group providing potential (U.S., Canadian, etc.) SX50 buyers an
additional resource.

And now for something completely different. Besides laying out
what we can accomplish, we'd like to document some bothersome
problems that some of us have experienced. Others of us may have been
fortunate enough not have had the same severe level of problems, but
nevertheless agree that there are some improvements that Cameca should
consider. We should emphasize initially that the SX-50 electron
microprobe is an excellent machine. Like all sophisticated
instruments, it has occasional problems.

Some of us have experienced extended downtime due to a lack of
prompt and knowledgeable response to our request for help. (One example
has been the Univ. of Hawaii which has had ongoing beam stability
problems.) This is extremely frustrating. Cameca does not enjoy a
uniformly good reputation for service in North America. We have heard
that this has been a major factor in some recent lost sales. We know
that Cameca would like to improve its service reputation and has
recently hired a new service engineer, which could alleviate problems
with response time for west coast SX-50 owners. Many of us feel that
another solution, which we understand existed in the past, might be to
have engineers off the platform in Courbevoie rotate here to service
our SX50s. If Cameca decided to take this course of action, it would
receive a warm welcome from our group.

This raises another concern that some of us have, which is the
perception that there is a communications problem between Cameca Inc
(U.S./Canada) and Cameca (France). While internal corporate operations
are none of our business, it is our business to have prompt and
knowledgeable service, and not to feel that we have gotten lost in some
trans-Atlantic mix-up.

We have a few suggestions for service improvements, such as
providing owners with a schedule for routine maintenance similar to the
one given to new car buyers. A clock that logs "HV Hours On" would be
very useful for determining maintenance intervals for some components.
This is especially important for those of us that cannot afford a full-
service contract. Some of our group members have learned of a few
precautionary measures after costly repairs.

Another concern is the lack of a demo SX-50 in Stamford. While a
demo machine is no panacea, parts could be tested before they are
shipped (some of us have received defective parts from Stamford) and
parts from it could be borrowed when they are not otherwise available
in Stamford (an all-too-common problem). We are sure there would be
many other benefits to Cameca of having an SX-50 in Stamford, including
a controlled environment for demonstrations.

Software. Many of us purchased a Cameca microprobe because of its
advanced software. However, when we started using the software, we
experienced problems; two recent examples are numerous "core dumps"
while using Quantiview, and movement of the stage to random positions
during automated (xyz) acquisitions. Initially, we were told that
those problems were unique to our individual labs. We soon began to
speak to each other and discovered that many of us had the same
problems. We recognize that Cameca has finite manpower with regard to
fixing bugs in addition to developing new and exciting products. With
the help of our group, we hope to assist Cameca in streamlining the
debugging process.

Quantiview is potentially a powerful software product but still
has some bugs. Some of us have documented those bugs to Cameca (and
now, as an organized users group, we will try to do so in a more
consistent manner). We have been told that new releases of the
software would address these problems. Although some bugs have been
fixed, some remain and some new ones were created. There are several
different versions of the software in circulation, but there is little
or no communication from Cameca to the owners about these new releases
unless we complain.

Some of us have heard rumors that Cameca is developing a new
microprobe with completely different software and acquisition hardware.
While we are not requesting the release of sensitive information, we
would like the chance to prepare for future upgrade paths at the
earliest opportunity. For example, should we be budgeting for new
computer hardware? We are not surprised that some of our DEC users are
buying independent software that appears superior to Cameca software in
some regards. We think this might be due to a lack of communication
between user's requirements and desires and the software engineers in
France.

We would appreciate a realistic timetable for future releases of
Cameca software. Is there a list of the planned modifications? We would
like to be involved in providing input to Cameca by furnishing a
consensus (of our members) of what are the most important fixes and
modifications in the future. We also hope that Cameca will consider
providing more resources to deal with the apparent/perceived overload
in the software department.

We hope this letter will initiate a frank dialogue between our
users group and Cameca. We hope it is received in the spirit with
which it is sent, of a desire to work together to improve the SX50, for
the benefit of all. We look forward to receiving your response, which
should be sent to Mike Garcia (Univ. of Hawaii). He will distribute it
to the other group members.

Sincerely,


Mike Garcia, U. Hawaii
Tom Hulsebosch, U. Hawaii
Brian Patrick, UC-Santa Barbara
Roger Nielsen, Oregon State
Mike Drake, U. Arizona
Chris, Capobianco, U. Arizona
John Shervais, U. So. Carolina
John Fournelle, U. Wisconsin
John Valley, U. Wisconsin
Peter Schiffman, UC-Davis
Ed Vicenzi, Princeton
Alexandra Navrotsky, Princeton
Michael Whitehead, CF Minerals
Ray Guillemette, Texas A&M
Will Lamb, Texas A&M
Ian Steele, U. of Chicago
Bill Nash, U. of Utah