From: Howard S. Mostowski 301-827-0704 FAX 301-827-0449 (MOSTOWSKI@cber.fda.gov)
Date: Mon Jun 29 1998 - 13:53:27 EST
HI Fellow Flowers, Here is my situation, and perhaps that of a few others. First a little background information. I am a one person flowcytometry service unit at FDA/CBER on the NIH campus. I still maintain my old H-P, because at- tached to it is my trusty work-horse the FACSMate and its associated soft- ware. For those of you not familiar with the FACSMate; it is a 96 round- bottom well plate sampler; which B-D no longer supports. It was replaced by the 40 tube Carousel. My situation is this: Many of the researchers whom I do work for do mega sample experiments and/or do the set-up in 96 well plates for con- vience. The reason being it is a royal pain in the gluteus-medus to wash, stain, spin-down, and empty 40 plus tubes several times and then perhaps fix. Also there is the possibility of dropping or miss sequencing a tube. Not to sound too harsh, but this something the folks on top at B-D fail to comp- rehend-Lord knows I tried to explain it to them on multiple occasions. At time they seem to follow the course of it works, change it, or more dollars. Enough whining and back on track. Due to the above I have to main- taine two hardware and software systems. The FACSMate has to be as close as possible to FACScan. Thus the Mac system is apox. 6-8 ft. away. While this is great for my cardiovascular training, it gets tiring at days end. Not to mention time wasted in transferring and converting the data. My question is simple, the answer I fear not. Is there a Flow Com- puter Jock or Jockette out there in Flow land, that could advise me on how I might be able to convert the FACSMate software [H-P] onto my Mac; so that I would be using one system. A little bit more info. for those who still utilize the FACSMate, I purchased a QVS switch box and a 50-pin cable; so I no longer have to climb Mt. FACScan every time I go from on system to the other. I would also like a tally on how many labs still use or prefer the FACSMate over the Carousel. If ever you need help with the FACSMate feel free to call or E-mail Cordially, Howard
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