Purchasing

Before purchasing new equipment consideration should be given to: - necessity, whether there is a justifiable need - sustainability, and whether existing equipment can be reused - location, is there a suitable place for the equipment - cost-effectiveness, and whether the same goals can be achieved through use of shared resources

For new research students and staff who require standard applications (email, productivity applications, Teams), the department will provide a suitable laptop or desktop computer from the College-approved supplier.

If a research project requires more compute-intensive work (e.g. simulation, visualisation), consideration should be given as to whether it is actually necessary to purchase a high-end laptop or workstation, or whether shared facilities can be used (local cluster, external HPC facilities, visualisation wall). If funding for equipment is secured through a research grant, please consider investing in shared facilities, rather than purchasing expensive equipment for use by a single user, which then sits idle for a large proportion of the time.

When purchasing high-end compute hardware, preference should be given to high-performance servers which can be hosted in the data centre, a secure and controlled environment, rather than high-performance workstations which are put in offices and will generate heat and noise that will reduce the quality of the work environment for those in the same room.

For advice on computing purchases, please contact aero.computing@imperial.ac.uk.