The "Containers Pooled" is only used for reporting purposes (see note below) and is not used in the calculation of Particle counts per container (normalized counts times the container volume, i.e. 903 cts/ml * 10 ml/container = 9030 cts/container). The "Containers Pooled" in the Sample Set-up screen is used when the sample size is so small that many vials are needed to get a sufficient sample. To use pooled containers select "Counts per container" under Configure/Data/Display tab. This way the customer can see Counts per container instead of Counts per volume. In the sample recipe (under Configure/Sample), they would set the Container Pooled to the number of vials being pooled and the Container Volume to the amount of the individual vial.

An example:

For samples of 1 mL per 10 vials (primary containers) need to be pooled to obtain 25 mL in a secondary container for an analysis.

Containers Pooled = 10

Container Volume = 1 mL

The report results will be normalized "Per Container" which will show the number of particle counts per vial instead of counts per volume.

NOTE: The containers pooled are never used in any calculation. We sample according to the sample volume, determine the counts per ml and then multiple by the container volume to give an approximation of the counts/container. I think the confusion comes from the fact that you would think that we would divide by the number of containers to get the counts per container but we don't. The reason is that we can never sample the entire pooled volume.