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View Full Version : What kind of computers does your school/university/workplace use?



xequence
October 29th, 2005, 02:26 AM
Our school has Dells. Pentium 4, 512 MB RAM, Windows XP Pro, and alot of other software. In total the software is... XP Pro, MS OFFICE, VB6, A whole bunch of macromedia things, corel drawing stuff.

My old school had macs. Some has OSX, some had system 7 or something.

briguy
October 29th, 2005, 02:40 AM
Windows 2000, Office 2000, Baseline. Baffles me, quite honestly.

adwait
October 29th, 2005, 02:41 AM
Well, I am in an engineering school and my college has all types of computers from thin clients connected to an application server running FreeBSD (in the library) to P4s running Fedora Core (in some labs) to P4s running WinXP (in the CAD/CAM labs) and mac(in some labs).

peterbrowne
October 29th, 2005, 03:32 AM
MDG.ca systems with WinXP, Tandex with Win98, and a Novell server

Corvillus
October 29th, 2005, 03:35 AM
For our computer science department, we have SunRay thin clients connected to Solaris 9 servers. For pretty much everything else, it's various boxes of various technical specs running Windows XP connected to either Windows servers or Novell servers.

aysiu
October 29th, 2005, 03:41 AM
All Dells. Some are Windows 98. Some 2000. Some XP. They're trying to upgrade everybody to XP slowly. I wish I could install Ubuntu with XFCE on some of those 98s...

Riverside
October 29th, 2005, 03:47 AM
All non-technical workers (marketing, sales, accounts etc) run Windows 2000 Professional & Office 2000 Professional on Compaq Deskpro machines. Technical workers in some departments (technical support, some operations staff) run the same, in other departments (service development, some operations staff) run either the above, or FreeBSD, or Linux (Debian, SuSE, Ubuntu are all in use). All staff regardless of department get a Compaq Deskpro running Windows & MS Office should they want one, those running other operating systems either run a second machine or or one dedicated non-MS OS box.

The above applies to desktops, servers run Solaris (several versions), Linux (ditto), FreeBSD, Windows 2000 Server.

23meg
October 29th, 2005, 03:50 AM
P4 1.8Ghz 512MB machines for general student use (lots and lots of them), dual P4 2GB or higher spec machines in our department. All Fujitsu/Siemens (good build quality, nice keyboards and monitors, best I've seen in a university), all Windows XP, not a single Mac, not a single *nix machine, which makes me carry a Slax (http://www.slax.org) live cd all the time.

raublekick
October 29th, 2005, 04:06 AM
We have two Computer Science labs at school: one is fairly new Dell XP machines with bitchin' LCD monitors, the other is older (1.8GHz) Gateways running Debian. The rest of the labs around campus are newer Dell XP machines.

At work we use various Dell computers with XP/Office/etc. The quality ranges from brand new to pretty old. My computer is a 600MHz with 768MB RAM. Surprisingly I can run Fireworks, Homesite, Firefox, IE, and some other programs all at once with little slowdown.

Brunellus
October 29th, 2005, 04:09 AM
I work at a fairly large law firm. So their hardware, as best as I can see/tell:

Dektops:

HPs. Standard desktops are 1.0 GHz P4, 256mb RAM, 20GB hdd, cdrom, full-towers. 17 inch LCDs, native res 1280x960, but nobody but me runs them that high.

Laptops:

Limited-issue to travelling attorneys and partners *only*; IBM thinkpads. I think they have some sort of hard-token security (card) on them, but I've not been close enough to one to tell, really.

Servers: Unknown. Haven't snuck into the server room yet. The application servers are running some version of Windows Server; they have to go down for reboots routinely. I suspect that somewhere there's *nix hiding out in serverland, but I haven't yet really explored that.

Software: Win 2000, Office 2000 (with lots of additional macros/tweaks/etc), document-control system, and so on. User terminals have a VNC client--usually used by the IT guys to give tech support from their desks in the basement. Lotus Notes from circa 1996, used for nothing but minor database duties now.

Notably, there is one MS-DOS legacy app, a custom-coded time entry system. when you're done entering time using this software, it exports its data (in what form I don't know) to yet another accounting package)

The whole firm runs Outlook/Exchange, and if anything will prevent an eventual move to FOSS here, it will be that.

the IT guys keep repeating the "dont' run any software but ours" mantra, but users routinely ignore this. Spyware/adware is *everywhere*.

***
All that said, I keep SLAX and DamnSmallLinux at my desk as insurance against a major network calamity (e.g. a worm). That way, while the rest of the network goes down, i just boot from Slax (which recognizes all the hardware on my work box), and keep on ticking.

***


Almost makes me think that we could have been better off with thin clients and big, firebreathing application and fileservers in the basement server room.

earobinson
October 29th, 2005, 04:10 AM
home: ubuntu duh
school:debian (com sci u of t)
work:windows and apple, and linux servers not sure of the distro

WildTangent
October 29th, 2005, 05:25 AM
My school has 2 different computer models. The "old" ones are IBM desktops, P4 1.6 ghz, 256MB, 40GB HDD that until recently ran Windows 98 (Now XP Pro). The brand new ones are IBM Thinkcenters, P4 3 ghz, 512MB, 80GB HDD with XP Pro. The new XP computers are really difficult to do anything with, they're locked down pretty tight. I have managed to install Firefox, Thunderbird, and Winamp, but only with the portable versions (designed for USB drives) installed into my documents folder which travels with me no matter which computer I use. The IT head doesnt discourage my activities (mostly because he does the same thing :P). All are connected to a central Windows 2003 server at the board of educations office, rather than the old system where there was a Windows 2000 server in every school. Real smart, now when the server goes down, NO ONE in the entire city can do their work :P The media arts, and comm tech labs have eMacs running OS X.

-Wild

rpgcyco
October 29th, 2005, 06:25 AM
We got "new" computers at my school last year. P4 2.4GHz, 512MB, Windows XP, Office XP. I think they're Dells.

Recently, however, the PCs we used before the new ones have been used for a computer room [in the library]. When I first booted them up, I was suprised to see GRUB with Red Hat 9 [OMG] in the menu list.

Once Red Hat finishes booting however, there is a prompt "Press enter to start session..." (or something like this), and then all of a sudden your in Windows Server 2003.... :|

- Rpg Cyco

topcop
October 29th, 2005, 10:57 AM
We have HP/Compaq machines
P4 3.2GHz HT , 1GB RAM, GeForce FX 5950, DVD+-RW, 17" rotatable LCDs etc
OS: Windows XP Pro and Debian Sarge (dual boot with AFS for home drive on both)

We have had debian sarge for a while (at least 2 years), the admin likes to keep the testing branch so may upgrade to etch once its stable enough and sarge gets too old for desktop use.

Thanks to the beefy machines and GFX cards we all play DOTA allstars in the computer labs after hours when the admins aren't around even though games are banned :-\" (Keeping college anonymous incase any of the admins hang out here) ;)

BWF89
October 29th, 2005, 01:50 PM
Elementary school: 100% Macintosh

Middle school: 100% Macintosh

High School: The library, computer art class, the C++ programming labs, and the homerooms that have computers all use Macintosh.

The computer aided drafting and the Visual Basic rooms run Windows PC.

majikstreet
October 29th, 2005, 03:14 PM
my middle school just upgraded to dells with windows xp... we used to have macos9 computers.. when I was in elem. we had really old macs!

-m

drummer
October 29th, 2005, 04:39 PM
At high school we have about 20 PCs running XP in the library and one eMac running OSX. Not sure of the PC specs, but they're pretty average to slow.

In the computer labs there's 15 or so eMacs (G4), 3 of which are better than the rest (dvd burner, more ram), all running OSX. In the second computer lab is a mix of about 10 of the new iMacs with everything in that sexy widescreen package, with the cd slot on the side, and about 10 older iMac DVs.. all running OSX.

The multimedia lab has an iMac DV, a G4, and a G5 with a 20" cinema lcd monitor *drool* (too bad it's bolted to the desk ;P), again on OSX. There are a couple more computers in the server room (file server, proxy, etc..) some on OSX and some a linux distro, not sure which distro though

There are also a few other PCs running XP around the place, in staff rooms, etc. and another room of iMacs (older) running Mac OS9.

Lastly, there's the soundhouse which has about 20 IBM PCs running XP which are P4s I think.. pretty decent, as they are used for audio editing, recording, etc. Each PC has a keyboard (the music kind) connected through midi, recording mics and monitor speakers. And the teacher's computer is hooked up to a huge mixing desk, and lots of other complicated stuff with lots of buttons :D

EDIT - forgot the computers in the TAS department, about 20 PCs running Win NT4, and are used for cad stuff, and programs related to architecture and design.

sas
October 29th, 2005, 06:23 PM
A couple of hundred or so compaq laptops with security keyfobs all with docking stations and 19" screens.

Various other laptop deployments (regional managers, execs)

Then there's a few thousand desktops - pretty much a mixed bag from P3 500mhz to P4 2gig or so (i think).

Approximatly a third of the desktops run XP, the rest are in the process of being upgraded to XP from NT4.

Then we've around 220 windows servers (one at each branch) mainly NT but being converted to server 2k3 at the same rate as desktops go to XP.

Probably another 200 NT4 and 2003 servers at head office.

Around 150 solaris boxes mainly running on solaris 6 and 8. Two linux intel xeon boxes running on RedHat AS 2.1.

There's a handful of AIX boxes, around 5.

There's also one SCO box, running on x86.

All of the x86 boxes are running on Intel chips.

MethodOne
December 4th, 2005, 01:30 AM
My old high school at the time I was there used various custom-built computers with Windows 98 and 128MB RAM, but one lab used ASUS Terminator barebone systems with Windows XP. The lab with XP has MS Office 2000, Photoshop 5.5, Illustrator 8.0, and PageMaker 6.5 with plugins for yearbooks. I didn't like the fact that a Web filter was installed on the network.

Here's my college:

The library uses MPC (Micron PC) ClientPro systems with Windows XP. They have MS Office 2003, AutoCAD 2006, medical software, Firefox 1.0.4 :), Winamp 5 without the Media Library, WinZip and Netscape 7. The specs are a 3 GHz Pentium 4 w/HT, 512MB RAM, 52x DVD/CD-RW drive, and a GeForce FX 5200 video card. I can't access my flash drive with Damn Small Linux because the hard drives are SATA.

The "Chat Room" has two sets of OmniTech PCs with Windows XP. They have the official AIM, MSN, and Yahoo! clients; a pinball game (in addition to the Windows one); some compilation of board games; RealPlayer (the horrible Windows version); Netscape 7; and WinZip. One set has a 900 MHz Pentium III, crappy Intel graphics, 256MB RAM, and a DVD drive. The other has a 2 GHz Pentium 4, 512MB RAM, a Matrox Millenium G400 video card (their setup is not good for games), and a CD drive. I prefer to use the newer computers because DSL looks better and there are speakers, but I can't use my KNOPPIX DVD.

The "Skills Center" has some OmniTech systems with XP, a 1.9 GHz Pentium 4, 512MB RAM, and a Matrox Millenium G400 video card. Their software include MS Office (XP on some, 2003 on others), some software for GED classes, Netscape 7, Winamp 3, WinZip, and RealPlayer. I accidently left Firefox 1.0.7 and Python on one of the systems because I thought it would restore after every boot.

The labs are the same as the library, but some have Intel Extreme Graphics 2 and DVD burners. They also have mobile racks that have an XP installation with admin rights, Windows 2000 with admin rights, SUSE with root access, and Fedora with root access.

I gave a set of Ubuntu Breezy CDs from shipit to one of my instructors, and she gave a student a copy of them.

Finally, I can't wait to take my Linux class next semester.