[Opensource] Thin client....very cheap computing!

[Brett Groves]

Hi all,

We had a major problem last year with trying to supply ICT support to 
our VCAL area last year as there was no budget available (sound  
familiar?). Stumbled across the fact that Ubuntu Linux comes with thin 
client support built in. We gutted 20 old Acer 5100's, removed the hard 
drives etc and grabbed a spare 100Mbs 3Com switch and connected them all 
up. For a server we bought a very high end Acer PC for about $1300. We 
set it up over the hols and it really does work impressively, exceeding 
all expectations. There is virtually no indication to users that they 
are working on a dumb terminal except there is no need to bother turning 
them off!

So for about $1500 we kitted out a whole computer lab and we have no 
worries about licences or paying for updates.....impressively cheap.

If anyone on the list is looking for a solution like this to get 
computer access for students using all open source and mostly old 
hardware then please feel free to drop me a line for help or you are 
most welcome to pop through the school to have a look at how it works in 
action.

If you are worried about Linux as I was I managed to teach myself pretty 
quickly how to configure the whole system using the resources on the 
Edubuntu site and a bit of googling. I'm no uber-techie by a long way so 
it gives you some indication how simple Ubuntu at least is to play with.

Brett Groves
ICT Manager
Croydon Secondary College
03 9725 8277
groves.brett.g at edumail.vic.gov.au


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