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Restaurant POS Terminal Questions and Answers

How Many Restaurant POS Stations Will My Business Need?

* Considering peak customer volume
You must plan the number of stations based on peak business. If you don’t you won’t be able to sufficiently handle the flow of customers during these periods.
* The number of employees taking orders
For serving tables, I suggest having 1 station per 3-5 servers. High volume areas such as bars and cashier stations may need to have a dedicated station for that purpose. When switching to a POS system from a cash register many people make the mistake of forgetting that their POS system is not only used to conduct sale transactions but for order entry as well.
* The layout of your restaurant
Assigning a separate station like for your bar tender would be much better, so he could easily serve customers customers without any delay.
* Assigning stations effectively where customers pay for their meals
If you plan to have customers pay at the front you should have 1 or 2 dedicated cashier stations to fast track transactions. If the servers are going to carry their own banks, we suggest fewer servers per station.

Which style of POS computer is best?

* Desktop: the standard desktop type.
o Least expensive computer option
o Has onsite warranty for 3 years
o Takes more space but can be hidden away below a counter
o Flexible enough for adding extra ports
o Latest CPU speeds and memory
o Screen and computer are separate; so you can easily isolate which ones has technical problems.
* Small form factor (SFF): smaller than desktops.
o Compared to the standard computer, SFF is more stylish
o 3 Year Onsite Warranty Standard for this component
o Saves more space
o Fewer options for expandability
o Latest CPU speeds and memory
o Screen and computer are separate; so you can easily isolate which ones has technical difficulties.
* All-in-ones: combined computer with touchscreen technology.
o Stylish, space-saving terminal with fewer wires required
o Manufacturers warranty: 1-2 years (Not onsite)
o Comes standard with sufficient ports for almost any operation
o CPU speed is generally slower than the other two options but sufficient for the Point of Sale needs.
o Combined screen and computer

How many cash is ideal for my restaurant?

* Unless you want your servers to carry their own cash banks, placing cash drawer at every station you want to use to end transactions is advisable.

Integrated credit cards?

* You can easily process and track record of every credit card transactions using your POS system in one location..
* Reduces transaction time by 3-4 seconds with a high speed internet.
* If high speed internet is not available we suggest using a standalone terminal for processing.

How many kitchen/bar printers?

* Having one printer for your kitchen would be sufficient for your restaurant, not unless you have different sections serving different dishes inside your kitchen then it would be better if you place printers on all sections.
* As an example, you can have all your appetizers print on one printer and all your main dish printed on another.
* When choosing for printers to use for your kitchen and bar, use impact (dot-matrix) printers instead of thermal printers. Why? Because tickets that are printed on thermal printers becomes unreadable when exposed to heat, and the loud printing of impact printers can alert your cooks and bartenders of incoming orders.

Do I need more that one receipt printer?

* Since you're going to have more than one station, you would likely need more than just one receipt printer.

Does having a back office computer helps in restaurant management?

* A back office computer is good for allowing managers to run reports, access the system to make changes to menu, check inventory levels, or adjust employee time clock times, without disturbing servers and cashiers.
* It is not necessary to have a back office computer unless you have 4 or more stations. However, it's a great idea to host the database on a back office computer if you have 4 or more stations so none of the stations has the extra load of running the database.

About the Author

With over 20 years of restaurant point of sale experience and helping businesses in the food-service industry nationwide increase their efficiency and bottom-line profits, the author of this article is the VP of Customer Relations at POS-For-Restaurants.com.

What's the best Low Profile AGP card available with DVI Port ?

> Low Power Consumption for HP d530 SFF (Small Form Factor - Cabinet with 185W Power Supply)
> Should support Aero in Vista & 7 (WDDM Compatible Drivers)
> @least 256MB VRAM

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814161318

This is the best one I could find. AGP is getting hard to find, and low profile always seemed limited.

Universal Studios President Says ‘Cowboys & Aliens’ Wasn’t Good Enough; ‘Land of the Lost’ Was Just Crap (slashfilm)

Honesty isn't always fun, but in environments where it is a rare commodity
honesty can provide entertainment like nothing else. Ronald Meyer is the head
of Universal Studios. He's a US Marine who co-founded the Creative Artists
Agency (CAA) in 1975 and became president of Universal in 1995. He has held
that post ever since, through six regime changes. He's doing something right,
even when he does things wrong. The question is, which of these things was
wrong: making Land of the Lost, The Wolfman and Cowboys & Aliens, or publicly
admitting that the movies were mistakes? While appearing at the Savannah Film
Festival, Meyer talked with surprising candor about Universal's recent
fortunes and the state of the studio's business today. The quotes in the
headline are just the beginning. Movieline [1] saw Meyer speak at the SFF, and
we can kick off with his general comments about what the movie business is: [A
critical hit is] great when it happens. But we did A Beautiful Mind, and I
don’t know that we’d do A Beautiful Mind again. That’s the sad part. It’s
great to win awards and make films that you’re proud of ...

slashfilm

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