Thin Clients in a Computer Lab Environment?

chachi8 asks: "I work as a lab administrator in a university, and I currently look after about 500 Windows-based PCs spread out over 20 locations. The IT administration at my school has recently (and quite suddenly) decided that thin clients are a direction we should be pursuing, and I've been doing some research over the past few weeks. We've recently been visited by representatives of Citrix who basically showed us some really impressive software that is far from cheap. Because we're a university facing budget cuts, cost is a major issue for us, so what I'm interested in knowing is whether anyone has implemented a thin-client solution in a computer lab environment, and whether it turned out to be cost effective over a 3-5 year timeframe. Clearly, the idea of being able to add an extra few years to the lives of our lab PCs is very attractive, as is the thought of being able to centrally administer the software in all of our labs, but I'm as yet unclear as to whether the costs of servers and licensing (and everything else) will really result in a long-term savings in money."

Re:K12Linux LTSP

[Metrollica]

I don't like the idea of teaching students especially at a young age about the "supposed" benefits of Linux and open source software. These youngsters will grow up malformed to a Microsoft controlled and dominated society and can cause deep psychological problems for the rest of their lives. You wouldn't want the children to turn out like this [stallman.org] now would you? Closed source Microsoft software belongs in the education sector, particularly when young impressionable children are involved.

Well, from my experience...

[mrroot]

From my experience working in the computer lab, most of the clients who came in weren't very thin at all. Most of them were fat guys with bad haircuts.

Re:K12Linux LTSP

[Sakhmet]

yeah using linux can teach how to think...

I have been told that school is there to teach you WHAT to think, not HOW to think.

Yeah, I rolled my eyes too, but that comment came from an educator.

Sakhmet.

Re:K12Linux LTSP

[irksome]

and the server is a duel proc, PIII ...

Your server fights with itself? ;)