Up until March of last year a lot of ATMs in the US were still running OS/2 . . . I "upgraded" a lot of them to Windows XP. Yuck.
When I would take the OS/2 system offline and replace it with a Windows cage the payment network would sometimes tell me the uptime on the deprecated machines . . . one network operator claimed 8 years of uptime at one particular machine. I have no way of confirming that, but I definitely felt the OS/2 machines were rock solid, especially compared to the vulnerable Windows machines. Most small banks with NCR machines are running two software packages (APTRA Edge or Advance) with default admin passwords and are really behind on the monthly bug patches. Eek.
The OS/2 machines required you to input config info in hex though, so I was glad I didn't have to work on them in the field too much.
When you think of it, 8 years of uptime isn't special for a machine running on a UPS and not needing a reboot for software updates. There simply isn't a reason for a well-built operating system running on solid hardware to crash.
No UPS for a lot of machines. I can't imagine the OS/2 getting an update simply because core ATM features haven't changed since the 80's. But it was still impressive uptime because ATMs are generally cantankerous creatures.
A software upgrade on the XP machines was ridiculous. It usually involved 3-4 hours of loading and booting and restarting with several different CDs. The other techs and I were convinced that NCR padded the installs/updates to take longer since their certified field techs billed out at around $300/hour.
When I would take the OS/2 system offline and replace it with a Windows cage the payment network would sometimes tell me the uptime on the deprecated machines . . . one network operator claimed 8 years of uptime at one particular machine. I have no way of confirming that, but I definitely felt the OS/2 machines were rock solid, especially compared to the vulnerable Windows machines. Most small banks with NCR machines are running two software packages (APTRA Edge or Advance) with default admin passwords and are really behind on the monthly bug patches. Eek.
The OS/2 machines required you to input config info in hex though, so I was glad I didn't have to work on them in the field too much.