QA and IT - to install or not to install - that is the question

When dealing with QA yo must remember that there are extensive IT requirements, this is of course product dependent , but for true QA to exist, several things must occur which relate to IT.
First and foremost Product Manager/ System manager must define :

• on which Platform the Product must run.
• What are the minimal system requirements for the product.

once the above has been determined it is extremely vital that the QA performs tests for all of the System configuration defined;

And here comes the tricky part who is in charge of the installation and maintenance of these environments.
In the organization in which I am part of w do not have a separate IT group. this creates havoc in my opinion for the following reason.

1. Not all QA are predefined to have IT capabilities and thus a lot of time is wasted due to insufficient skills.
2. Since no proper IT exists there are no predefined sets of instructions as to how and what exactly to set up with in the Platform itself
3. QA time is "wasted" on OS setups.
4. Since QA are not exactly qualified for this they find it difficult to issue clear instructions to system Field Engineers on how to set up costumer systems, thus creating in consistency of OS types and configuration ... which basically will lead to unexplained problems from specific costumer with out any clear reason.
5. No one can handle new hardware certification/ old hardware End-Of-Life replacement.
   

In my opinion it is vital to have a strong IT group in every company , and not just for the sake of handling the tedious tasks of system setup but in order to set up guidelines so that we create a consistency between all of the systems installed among the different costumers