Class master

[clareyclogs]

Hi! I need some information for my school - hope someone can help. We currently use Class master as our staff and pupil interface for our network. We find it very slow and clunky. What do other primary schools use? What about RM? Is anyone using vanilla? Please let me know... I'm fed up with our current system!!
PS Don't get too technical!

[Dos_Box]

I've never heard of Class Master. Who makes it, and do you have a link?

[clareyclogs]

It's made by Edutech

[glennda]

I've had dealings with them b4 there hardware was cr*p and the software not much better.

I would go for vanilla if you can or if not then go for something like rm.

[clareyclogs]

Do you have experience of RM for primary schools though?

[glennda]

Nope but I only mentioned rm as I can't think of any others I would possibly touch. I've had even worse dealings with viglen which also had cr*p software/hardware.

I personally run Windows with Linux bits in but my network.is a lot larger then a primary.

[glennda]

I've never heard of Class Master. Who makes it, and do you have a link?

www.edu-tec.co.uk

they merged with SCL online which used to sponsor a forum SCL Online/ Edu-Tec

i had 170 of there machines (oxide54 still does!) and by the time i left we had sent over 60 back to be repaired as they broke.

[davekimber]

having spent the past 10 years or so as a freelance computer engineer working in Surrey schools I can honestly say that I have never had a bad experience with Edu-Tec Ltd. ClareyClogs what version of Classmaster are you using? Most of the schools I work in that use Classmaster are now running version 5.1 which is extremley smooth and interfaces with 2008 R2 very well, The pixie build feature is very tight and builds entire ICT Suites within an hour depending on the amount of packages you have installing. The new improved management console is very intuitive and very easy to manage.

Glennda you seem to have some real issues with Edu-Tec! when you say that you had to send back over 60 PCs because they broke, do you mean they died or that they where physically broken. I would suspect with that amount of failures I would think Edu-Tec where shipped a faulty batch of components from one of their suppliers, I have installed and maintained hundreds of Edu-Tec PCs and Servers, and yes I have had a few dead on arrival but then again given the quantity of equipment they supply you would expect this to happen.

Also how can you recommend RM for a primary school when you have no experience of using the system and according to you everything else is CR*P. Advising someone to use Vanilla when they obviously have little or no technical knowledge is quite ridiculous and shows a complete lack of understanding of the OP.

I had an issue with CD/DVD drives on a couple of Edu-Tec PCs a while back not playing DVD's Turns out the firmware on the drive needed updating, when I called Edu-Tec they replaced the drives the following day and the school was very happy.

I have found Edu-Tecs customer service to be very helpfull and most of the problems I have are delt with within 24 hours with the majority being delt with at the time of phoning them.

I do not exclusivly use Edu-Tec I have schools running RM CC4, Ranger (owned by RM) Viglen and standard Microsoft 2008R2

I do not work for Edu-Tec or any of the leading suppliers I am solely independant and speak as I find.

[glennda]

Glennda you seem to have some real issues with Edu-Tec! when you say that you had to send back over 60 PCs because they broke, do you mean they died or that they where physically broken. I would suspect with that amount of failures I would think Edu-Tec where shipped a faulty batch of components from one of their suppliers, I have installed and maintained hundreds of Edu-Tec PCs and Servers, and yes I have had a few dead on arrival but then again given the quantity of equipment they supply you would expect this to happen.

I had an issue with CD/DVD drives on a couple of Edu-Tec PCs a while back not playing DVD's Turns out the firmware on the drive needed updating, when I called Edu-Tec they replaced the drives the following day and the school was very happy.

I had the CD/DVD problem myself which was more annoying when they denied for 3 + months that it was that until we sent them an email showing them that the firmware on (samsung i think) cd drives needed to be updated to fix.

Also it wasn't just parts failing it was just very badly put together. We had to call them in to take a pc away to fix as we couldn't touch them Alot of the problems at the beginiing where CPU problems where they needed reseating.

[oxide54]

viglen classlink was terrible, by all accounts.

edutec software never used it was showed a demo, wasn't really impressed.

RM haven't used since I was at primary school, and I hacked it then. aged 7.

[oxide54]

Glennda you seem to have some real issues with Edu-Tec!

with very good reason -

but dave you make a good point about OP skill set and recommending vanilla, imo primary is the market for this "baby-sitting" network management platforms.

i'm not recommending RM as I haven't used a recent version, but thats what I would suggest investigating.

[guerino1]

Hi,

You might want to join and check out the organization called "EDUCAUSE", which is composed of a large number of Education specific IT resources that might be able to help you with this.

My Best,

FG