Thin Clients and Streaming Media

[jwheelhouse]

Hi All,

I've been reading through the forum and a few of the queries I've had have now disappeared but I wonder if others can help with a Query about MultiMedia...

We're looking into converting two rooms to thin clients (49 clients) using a Citrix solution that we have seen working well in local schools similar to us. This year we are also moving to Media Services, streaming media video in WMV format over the network.

I know Thin Client copes with Multimedia in an acceptable way in software apps (such as Birchfield Software) and playing whole video files but I have been unable to see if it works well with streaming media (such as the BBC News 24 Live Stream) as this is similar to the streams our server will provide.

If it does not perform as expected the other option we are considering is using XP Embeded Clients such as the HP t5720 as it can have Windows Media Player installed and streaming that way.

Anybody had any experiences with this or suggestions?

Thanks

Justin

--
Justin Wheelhouse, Systems Manager
Holy Trinity School

[Geoff]

Just had a go on our Terminal server. Peaked at 5% load watching BBC News 24 Live over the 224kbit stream. System is a Dual Opteron with 3Gb running Citrix Presentation Server 4.5 Platinum.

[Ric_]

Agree with Geoff... streamined media can be handled fine... obviously don get too carried away with the number of concurrent clients though.

SpeedScreen in Cit4rix helps with this sort of thing too IIRC (it definately helps with Flash video).

[jwheelhouse]

Thanks for the replies. Can I ask what Clients thats on?

My main reason for asking is that if we can avoid the XPe machines I think we will as its quite a difference in price compared to the linux clients!

Justin

[Geoff]

P2 450Mhz/64mb Ram PXE booting Thinstation.

[Ric_]

I use HP Linux-based thin client devices - I've phased out my Thinstation ones now so that I can take full advantage of the lower TCO

[Geoff]

I know, this is just my junky test machine I have here.

[jwheelhouse]

Thanks Guys,

Just looking at the server spec now and we're looking at 2 of the followin:

HP DL-140 G3
Dual Quad Core Xeon E5335 2 GHz, 4GB RAM, 2x GB Lan and 2 x 76GB SAS 15,000RPM Drives (Mirrored)

Does this sound ok for 25 clients per server?

Also is there a software cost in addition to the CALs?

Cheers

Justin