MET/CAL® Plus - Why upgrade?
MET/CAL software has evolved over the years to incorporate new features and support for both new and older calibrators and standards. Most improvements are made in response to requests from the MET/CAL user community. Fluke Calibration regularly hosts User's Group meetings throughout the world, where we listen to our customers and use their input to provide what they say they want. Upgrading to the latest version of MET/CAL can provide you with many valuable benefits.
New features, yet backward compatible
New MET/CAL features are provided to users through software version upgrades. Fluke Calibration knows that customers have invested time and money in developing MET/CAL calibration procedures over many years. Therefore, the latest versions of MET/CAL can still execute procedures written with the very first MET/CAL release.
New warranted MET/CAL procedures
Fluke Calibration is continuously creating more calibration procedures for MET/CAL software. As each new version of MET/CAL software is released, the newest features make procedures easier and more efficient to write. Unfortunately, procedures written with newer versions of MET/CAL software may not run on older versions, which do not support the new capabilities. This leaves MET/CAL users of old versions unable to use newly written and supported procedures from Fluke Calibration. Instead, they must write their own as new assets are added to their workloads.
Training based on latest version
Fluke Calibration offers scheduled training for MET/CAL software in the USA, Europe and other selected countries. Training is provided on the currently shipping version of MET/CAL. While much of the information provided is applicable to older versions, the new features are stressed, which will make it difficult for students to apply the knowledge they have gained if they are working with an older version of MET/CAL.
Knowledgeable technical support
Fluke Calibration maintains a support group to help customers who have technical questions about MET/CAL. The support group can provide maximum help on the currently shipping version of MET/CAL, because that's the software they have access to daily. Support for the immediately previous version is also very good, but for older software, answering support questions becomes difficult. Sometimes, problems in older versions have been solved in the latest MET/CAL, so the support group will advise the customer to upgrade.
Current Fluke licensed products
MET/CAL includes a database from Sybase and Crystal Reports Professional from Business Objects. These products are being upgraded continuously through new version releases. MET/CAL Plus ships with the latest version of these products that is practical and consistent with MET/CAL's own release schedule. Older MET/CAL systems may be using versions of Sybase and Crystal that are no longer being supported and maintained by their creators. Keeping up-to-date with MET/CAL releases assures that the complete product can be supported.
Modern system compatibility
Over the years, operating systems from Microsoft, as well as computer hardware, have improved. Sometimes these infrastructure improvements might render an older version of MET/CAL inoperative, or cause errors that are addressed in the latest MET/CAL. Using old versions of MET/CAL may lock you into using obsolete hardware or a very dated and unsupported operating system.
How to Upgrade from Previous Versions of MET/CAL® software
- From version 7 and later. To upgrade to MET/CAL Plus 8.0 from version 7 and later, new licenses are required. Acquire an upgrade to the MET/BASE package, and then acquire the license upgrades you need. You will be asked to provide a license report for your existing software licenses. Click here to view a video on how to generate a license report for your software. You are recommended to contact Fluke MET/SUPPORT (metsupport@fluke.com) if you need assistance with the upgrade.
- From pre-version 7. MET/CAL Plus customers using versions prior to 7.0 will need to acquire a new, complete MET/CAL Plus Version 8.0 product, including a new MET/BASE and appropriate new MET/CAL or MET/TRACK licenses.
MET/SUPPORT Gold customers with an active contract on the date that the next MET/CAL version is released will receive a free upgrade to that version of MET/CAL Plus (only applicable to version 7 and above).
Concurrent licenses explained
When MET/CAL Plus is installed on a network, it uses a concurrent license management process to manage access to various applications. A concurrent license is one where the software is installed on many machines, but is licensed to run only on a specific number of those machines at any given time. When a user begins to run a MET/CAL Plus application, it checks with the server to see that there is an “open” license available for use. If all licenses are in use, the application stops and reports this information to the user.