96-Well GeneAmp® PCR System 9700 From Applied Biosystems

The 96-Well GeneAmp® PCR System 9700, or PCR 9700 as I will call it from now on, has been in use in our lab for at least 5 years now. It was purchased as a follow up to its much bulkier brother, the PCR 9600. The PCR 9700 can be controlled in 2 separate ways. You can program, save and run your programs directly on the machine itself, or you can use a computer to do the same on one or more machines at the same time. For the latter, you can link a group of PCR 9700 machines to one computer. This could come in handy if you want to run the same program on multiple machines, as would be the case in a high throughput screening lab. To use a pc to run several PCR 9700s, you just select the machines you want to run and then select the desired program. You then decide whether you want to run the machines directly from the computer, which requires the pc to be on during the run, or you can download the program to the memory of the PCR 9700s, so the programs will stay available even after the computer has been turned off or removed.

In the 5 years that our lab has been working with the PCR 9700s, we have found them to function pretty reliably. But this will depend on the amount of time you are running the machines. We have 16 PCR 9700s and they perform about 3 runs a day, every day, so I am not surprised to have to send one in for repairs every 3 months or so.

The big advantage of using the computer software is that you can more easily create a new program than on the PCR 9700 itself. And if you have a large number of machines, it can save you a lot of time, because you only have to write the program once and copy it. Also, the selection of the program is a lot faster on the computer, especially if you have a large number of programs to choose from.

There are some issues which I would like to mention. The first is the limited options for selecting a program to run. If you have a list of, say, 50 programs, you have to scroll through them to find the one you want. A possible solution to this would be the ability to assign a program to a user; then each user would only have to scroll through his/her own list. An other issue is the temperature accuracy; if you measure the block temperature, you will find that it differs from the set temperature by as much as 1ºC, as measured using a Driftcon system.

But if you are looking for an instrument to set up tests for large screenings, the PCR 9700 is a fine machine to work with.