14 DAY TRIAL // Puget might just be the most uniquely-positioned company in relation to the hard disk drive crisis that came about after the floods in Thailand.
Puget thinks it will get off easy and, even if it does have supply issues, it will let customers play a direct role in allowing their systems to come into being.
The news feeds have basically been flooded with this or that statement about the HDD crisis and how each company plans to deal with it.
Pretty much every IT player will feel some effect from the sudden concern that HDDs will be short throughout 2012.
Every IT player except Puget, that is, or so the company says.
It turns out that Puget was able to stock up on platter spinners enough that it doesn't think the whole mess will affect it much.
Also, it will take its own measures to make sure its stockpile lasts for as long as possible.
"This is exactly the kind of scenario we had in mind when we purchased our building in Auburn, WA,” said Jon Bach, founder of Puget Systems.
“The equity in that investment gives us the purchasing power to be aggressive in preparing for shortages. We have bought up many months worth of hard drive inventory, and our hope is that we will not even have to deal with a shortage of supply here!"
Things can still go worse, though, but Puget is, as already mentioned, prepared for that too.
One option customers will have is the predictable SSD alternative: getting a solid state drive and then add an HDD whenever users get around to buying one, preferably after prices went back down.
The really unusual opportunity, though, is that buyers will be able to send in the HDDs they already own, which Puget will include in their computer.
"While our normal policies do not allow this for primary drives, we are happy that as a small business, we can be flexible given the situation," Bach said.