Cyber Arena Case Study

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About the Shop[pic 6]

The name of the computer shop is Cyber Arena. The location of the shop is in Lepanto which is near to our school (UE), FEU, UM (University of Manila) and others. Computer Shop near schools is really recommendable because students who are in a hurry can immediately proceed there. It is also helpful for surfing some school related projects and especially playing computer games which is very in to students who loves to play these kind of games. Before, the number of computers they have is only 26, because they lack in money and they don’t have enough space. But when the right time came they gathered in their daily operation, bought 6 more computers and now they have a total of 32 computers. They are planning to add 5 more computers but they still need the approval of the owner first. [pic 7]

The money that they earned or the profit per day is ranging about 2,500 to 3,000 thousand pesos. With that we can see that in a month they're gathering 90,000 to 93,000 thousand pesos. He said that this is already too much money to have per day or month because usually a computer shop may have only 60,000 per month. They also have these promos like in evening, starting 9 o’clock you'll get 10 pesos per hour instead of 15 pesos (usually in morning and in afternoon). Also in this kind of season, they have a discount if you're always renting their computers, you'll get a discount.

Computers in internet cafes help users to enjoy their usage. The Cyber Arena Internet Café uses different brand of computer like Samsung, Oreon and BenQ. Each computer has an operating system of Microsoft Windows XP Professional, v2002. They have a server type of café that is connected to a main computer whenever someone wants to use it or their time is up and customers can’t open the computer unless the server command to. Computers are updated with different online games and other application software for research or surfing purposes. All computers are in good condition and all operating. On the other hand, not all have disks or disk less and only four has port for flash drives. They also offer other services like printing, id pictures, lamination and even parking outside their shop.[pic 8][pic 9]

Service providers are great advantage in a computer shop. Especially, it is what users do when renting in a shop. Cyber Arena Internet Cafe has 2 service providers Globe and PLDT. Both internet connections have 5 mbps. The person in charge said that sometimes even though it is not raining the internet connection turns slow. With this matter, they put 4 connection choices namely PLDT, Globe 1&2, and Battle LAN. If one provider is slow, the customer has the freedom to choose and connect in other internet connection using their Internet Selection System. And after clicking the selected internet provider, a message box will pop-up to show the user that you are already connected to that provider. It is a unique idea because providers differ in speed depending on the location and situation you have. He told us that PLDT and Battle LAN are the best connection for games and GLOBE 1&2 are for surfing the net. [pic 10]

As we moved to our interview, the first thing we asked him is about the customers of the shop. We asked him “who are the persons mostly using or renting your computers?” and he answered “students” definitely we agree to him because their shop is near to the universities. To continue the question we asked him if they have customers renting their computers for a long period of time and he answered yes and we asked “how many hours he/she takes?” and he answered 32 hours based on what he experienced in the shop. Another question we asked to him is “what particular time did your shop is full or overload of customers?” and he answered mostly in the afternoon. Next question is “are you open 24 hours?” and he answered It depends if they still have customers at that time especially 12:00 AM onwards. Then we asked to him if there is any difference in the number of customers renting or using your computers in the weekends than a regular day? And he answered yes because during weekends mostly of the students have no classes so that it has a little bit difference during weekends and school days. Another question if they already experienced robbery in their shop? And he replied not yet and hopefully never. We also asked him “how can you make your customers loyal in your shop?” And he answered by offering them quality service and promos so that they will remember us and in the time that they need computer shop to use, he/she will recommend us to his/her other friends because he/she already experience our service. Lastly, we asked that if there is someone or a business person wanted to purchase a branch inclined with the name of their shop? And he answered yes; actually we have branches in different places in Manila.[pic 11][pic 12]

Suggested Improvements

Entering a computer shop, exhausted and tired after all the nth computer shops that we tried to interview, Cyber Arena is a shop that we found without hesitations. After we conducted an interview to the one in-charge in the computer shop he allowed us to inspect the computers and go around the shop to see the whole place. By doing these, many things came in our mind for the improvement of this shop. First of this is the space of the shop and the arrangement of the computers. They should arrange their pc’s in a way that customers can still move and not too close to each other. Also because of this, the computer shop looks too crowded especially when all the stations are occupied. Another thing that they should consider is the temperature in the place because we all know that when we are using pcs for a long period of time it produces heat and there is a chance that the pc will overheat. And also the CPUs are inside a box that can also produce heat inside. Second, the position of the wirings or the cables is not properly arranged. They should fix the linings and avoid the wires entangled. It’s not organized as it looks and it may cause some short circuit to the shop. Third are the pc specifications. When we open a pc and we saw that the operating system of it is still windows XP professional which is not that updated compared to today’s. According to the person in-charge computers here are separated to each other or have a specific place depending on how it works. Some are good for surfing only, some are best for games only and some can manage both but only few. In terms of pc for surfing they don’t need a high processor as long as it can handle those basic jobs but might also be used to watch TV and movies, listen to music, play some games, perhaps share music and video files across a network. Systems like this need a little more in the way of hardware power, like a larger hard drive to store all your music and movies, as well as a big screen, a good sound card and Headphones, but they still don't have to be too expensive. In terms of gaming purposes some games will not require anything hard core in terms of specs. It all depends on the particular games you play and at what resolution you like to play. [pic 13]