> This could have easily been located by a logical swapout technique, which I wanted to redo, but the sysadmin claimed he had already done that and persuaded the higher ups that since swapping hadn't found the problem and I was a 'professional' I must use other methods.

I'm late to this thread but I've lived with my husband long enough to always look in places he has "already checked" when he's looking for some lost item (e.g. keys). Never trust another person's say-so on things like this unless you know them very well.

No wonder the company went downhill.