E-Waste: PC recycling is on the agenda now
California, USA: In the month of May, hardware maker Dell plans to make public its goals for PC recycling. Analysts say that the move by Dell should put pressure on IBM, HP and others to go public with their recycling trends as well.

Environmental groups in the US have constantly lobbied for government and industry to address the dangers of electronic waste, or e-waste, for PCs, monitors and related gear contain metals such as lead, mercury and cadmium, along with other chemicals, that can be harmful if they get into the environment.

According to IDC, Dell, HP and IBM--the world's three largest PC manufacturers, have collectively shipped about 60 million units in 2003. The Environmental Protection Agency in the US has estimates that 250 million computers would be thrown out over the five years between 2002 and 2007.

Dell, which shipped nearly 26 million PCs in 2003, said last year that out of the tens of millions of PCs it had shipped since establishing its first recycling program 12 years prior, only 2 million PCs had been recycled. It is yet to publish recycling numbers for 2003.
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Agfa announces web based :IntellSyst remote service
Mortsel, Belgium: Agfa has announced a new product in the company's services portfolio. :IntellSyst ensures faster response times, higher equipment uptime and more effective, proactive maintenance of Agfa systems. :IntellSyst exchanges information between the customer installation and Agfa's Enterprise Server automatically and at regular intervals. It checks critical parameters such as the power of the laser of a platesetter, the temperature of processing baths or the disk space available on a workstation running the production management software. In case of any anomalies, Agfa's Global Services engineers are alerted by email and intervene proactively to eliminate problems early before they affect operations.

The :IntellSyst interface is a web browser, which allows remote management from anywhere. Beta tests for :IntellSyst are being completed and the product will be available at Drupa in Dusseldorf, Germany, May 6-19. :IntellSyst will become part of Agfa's workflow support contracts and service maintenance agreements.
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