POS Terminals

POS (Point Of Sale) system is a combination of software and hardware, designed to manage sales. It's a maximally compact and effective system. In most cases, a POS terminal is a computer with a touch-screen connected with a cash register.

POS terminals are often misidentified as touchscreen monitors. Therefore, let's define what each does mean; Touchscreen monitor is a simple screen, which does work by touching it with a finger. It needs a PC to be connected with it. As for POS terminal, it's a combination of touch monitor and computer, in other words - a combination of them. Now we're going to introduce several well-known POS terminals to you:

FIRICH ENTERPRISES CO (AKA FEC) is a popular manufacturer of POS terminals, such as Gladius Smart, Glaive D, Retail Smart, MegaPOS Lite. Their specifications do not significantly differ from each other. For example, AerPOS has a 1.8 GHz Intel processor. RAM is 1GB by default, but upgradable to 4GB. It has a 90W power supply. AerPOS uses a built-in Intel Graphics Card and internal speakers. The price exceeds 1000 USD. Besides, FEC does also produce touchscreen monitors.

Birch does also produce touchscreen monitors and POS terminals. They are as widespread as the production of FEC. CARISMA is the popular POS terminal made by Birch. Its specifications are as follows: Processor - Intel Atom Dual Core 1.8Ghz, power supply 12V 6.67A 80W, hard drive 500GB. It also includes Wi-Fi, MSR card reader and VDF customer display. And the price starts from 1400 USD.

One more famous manufacturer is Elo Touch Solutions. Their models X15, X17 and X20 have similar properties, but different screen sizes. Processor - Intel 2.41 GHz Celeron Quad-Core, graphics card - built-in Intel HD Graphics, RAM - 2GB (up to 16GB), hard disk - 320GB, power supply - 134W.

NCR (National Cash Register) Corporation is an American company also producing POS terminals and touchscreen monitors. One of their newly featured products is NCR XR7 with a modern design and dual monitor. As the company announced, after more than 130 years in retail, they are proud to have reinvented the POS. NCR XR7 properties are: Processor - Intel Core i3 – 4330T, i5-4570T or Intel Celeron, motherboard - Intel Q87 Express chipset, RAM - 4GB (up to 16GB), hard drive - 80 or 120GB SSD or 500GB HDD. NCR XR7 costs about 1700 USD.

This is a very small list of widespread POS terminals. Although, it's hard for small business (cafe, bar, fast-food, market etc.) holders to buy those above-mentioned devices. It's a lap of luxury and it can't lead a business to success. Moreover, most of the POS terminals have worse specifications than usual PC does. To help you to make the decision, let's compare the POS system to the "PC + Monitor" (or the "PC + touchscreen monitor") system.

Pros of POS:

• Compact, occupies less space.
• Comfortable for work.
• Visually effective for customers. Makes them feel that the company takes care of their comfort.

Cons of POS:

• It's expensive (from 900 USD and more).
• Usually, it's hard to find/install its drivers.
• Most of them have worse specs than today's smartphones.
• It's hard to find a person (in Georgia) able to repair POS terminals. Maybe because of their non-standard (compact) parts and it's hard to find them here. Importing POS parts includes its difficulties.
• Not recommended to use it as server, because it can endure fewer loads.

Pros of "PC + Monitor":

• Cheaper (about 900-100 GEL. In the case of a touch monitor made here, about 1200 GEL).
• Can be used for a single/multi-device system, because it endures more loads.
• Has better specs.
• Easy to find/install its drivers.
• Easy to repair, because it has standard parts and can be easily found in Georgia.
• As a rule, the resolution of a POS screen is smaller than usual monitors.

Cons of "PC + Monitor":

• Non-compact, occupies two times as much space.
• Less effective to impress customers (however, PC case is usually placed under the table, therefore it doesn't affect customer's impression since it's hidden).
• Probably, less comfortable to use than POS terminal.

We hope, that this article helped you to choose suitable hardware, while taking into consideration the capabilities of your company.