Net Loan Slowing Workstations Down

[2011ComputerMan]

Hello All,

 

In the college where I work we use a software called "Net Loan" to monitor the time our students are spending on the library computers. This software works great as it allows us to limit the time users spend at the workstations and does not allow them to log back in for a while after the time limit has been exceeded.

 

With all that being said the software is also terrible as it sits over the top of the operating system and subsequently uses a tremendous amount of resources which slows the computer down and makes it very stressful for students to use. This is most noticeable at the Net Loan login screen (which replaces the Windows login screen). It can take up to 15 minutes for a user to get logged on.

 

Can anybody suggest an alternative to this Net Loan software? I thought about writing a login script which automatically tells the user they will be logged off after X time has passed. However what will stop them just logging back in?

 

Any suggestions will be much appreciated.

 

Regards

[mjs_mjs]

something like this maybe

[Matt_lorensbergs]

Good Morning,

 

We would not usually reply on an open forum in this manner but in this case and due to the nature of the post we felt obliged to do so. I am one of the account managers at lorensergs, developers and providers of the netloan PC management software. You (understandably) didn't mentioned which institution you work at so I am not sure whether I look after the account there or if it is my colleague, but nevertheless I am happy to respond.

 

The first thing to say is that the 'client' software that sits on the individual PCs and controls things like the login screeen and session control is not particularly resource dependent at all, so if you are experiencing slowness in logging on or during any other function of the PC it is highly unlikely to be related to or caused by the netloan software. A slow login in the way you described would typically be caused by something like;

 

Speed of the PC itself logging into Windows - if so, this would be the case with or without netloan in place

Speed of the network

Speed of the AD response - is there a problem with the AD which is causing it to respond slowly to our user authentication request (unlikely as these usually timeout after 5 seconds or so and you'll get an error message)

 

Having said all that, rather than discussing on an open forum we would of course be willing to provide advice and help you work towards a resolution through our support desk (I have just checked this and we have no open support calls of this nature so i do not believe this has been reported to us yet) - your IT Manager will have our contact details.

 

Many thanks

 

Matt Etherington

Account Manager

lorensbergs Ltd

Edited October 15, 2013 by Matt_lorensbergs

[2011ComputerMan]

Thank you for all your replies. Lorensbergs Ltd got in touch with the institution I work in and provided some help with this issue.

I can now confirm the issue has been resolved and was due to a extremely dated version of Net Loan that the previous networking guys never updated. The version has now been updated and is working well. Logging in to the workstation in under 10 seconds.

 

Thanks again for your help.