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I was
not there during the Early Voting Process when they encountered these
problems. But while doing some more testing on these units that had these
problems, yes I could do the ejection with a paper clip. However, I am not
sure whether some of the Poll Workers will be capable of doing this.
They even have trouble inserting in a card. But we can put this into the
Poll Workers Training class, for the Poll Workers that can do
it.
Jeff
Well written
Jeff. Attached are my thoughts on
the card reader from around January
One really good point
you raised here though is that you needed to reboot the system to get the card
out of the reader. Could you get
the card out of the reader with a paperclip instead? Every reboot of the system in the
field makes me “uncomfortable”.
It’s not that there is a specific problem with rebooting, but if we are
going to corrupt the system some day, I bet it is going to happen with a
reboot, so I would like to see operating procedures keep that to a
minimum.
Ken
-----Original
Message-----
From:
owner-support@gesn.com [mailto:owner-support@gesn.com] On Behalf Of Jeff Hintz
Sent: Thursday, May 09,
2002 7:11
AM
To: support@gesn.com
Subject: RE: Early Voting using AVTS - Shelby County, TN
Sorry, I
meant the new R-6 AVTS units.
-----Original
Message-----
From:
owner-support@gesn.com [mailto:owner-support@gesn.com]On Behalf Of Jeff Hintz
Sent: Wednesday, May 08, 2002 8:48
PM
To: Support
Team
Subject: Early Voting
using AVTS - Shelby County, TN
Here is a general summary for
the Shelby County Primary Election on May 7th, 2002.
Shelby County used 133 new R-4 AVTS units for Early Voting. They
started on April 17th in the Election Office with 7 units. Then on
April 26th, they added their other 18 sites, with 7 units each. They
finished Early Voting on May 2nd.
They had 9 units that had
problems during the Early Voting Process. There were 3 units that
would not release the Voter Card after voting. It looks like 1 of the
Card Readers has been installed too tight because when you insert a
card there is friction when inserting the card and then when it ejects, it
simply stays in the card reader, you then have to pull on the card
while rebooting the system in order to get the card out. There
are 2 other units that have no friction problem, but it looks like the card
reader needs the spring or whatever ejects the card to be
tightened/strengthened, because the card reader does not eject the card far
enough out of the reader, and then the card is stuck in the reader, then
having to pull on the card while rebooting the system. There are
3 units that do a continuous boot, when starting the system. Once I
inserted a PCMCIA card the continuous boot stopped, however the poll workers
did not remove the PCMCIA card and reinsert it, which might have resolved
the problem. There are 2 units that went completely blank, and will
not boot up. There is 1 unit that boots, but the screen is a rainbow
of colors and cannot be seen.
Obviously all of these units
will be shipped back to McKinney for repair and maintenance. I just
wanted to give everyone that will be using AVTS units in the future, a heads
up of possible problems you may encounter. Also, this represents about
a 7% failure rate. Is there anything that the manufacturing plant can
do to improve these problems. If we install 19,000 units in Georgia,
then we are looking at having to repair over 1300 units after their first
election.
Other than machine problems and
the Table Top Card Reader/New Smart Card problems. Everything else
went fine. The loading up of all 133 PCMCIA cards, accumulating
results, and Central Count all worked without a
hitch.
Jeff
Hintz
Diebold
Election Systems
405 N. 115th
Street
Omaha, NE
68154
(402) 697-7171 office
(402) 697-7166
fax
(402) 871-3346
cell
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