ThinClients - what to buy?

[AlexM]

Hi All,

 

We have a poor school (financially!) who are looking for a bargain TS solution and wondered which ThinClients are both cheap and reliable. Have used the Axel units previously and have found them very good but it's been a while since I've done any installs.

 

Anyway, sorry it's a little generic but really looking for a decent client.

[localzuk]

Personally, I'd say don't buy specific thin client devices. I'd say buy refurb desktops and put Windows Thin PC on them. Its what we did with our "thin" ict suite. Entire room cost us less than £5k.

[mtillbrook]

Personally, I'd say don't buy specific thin client devices. I'd say buy refurb desktops and put Windows Thin PC on them. Its what we did with our "thin" ict suite. Entire room cost us less than £5k.

 

exactly! Dedicated thin clients, for some reason, tend to be expensive for what they are. You just need a PC that will run an RDP session basically. You could look at cheap net-tops or something like that!

[Winner]

We are using Pentium based NUC's as thin clients for our staff. We put 4GB ram and 120GB SSD's in them and load them up with Windows 10 with only the free ThinKiosk software installed. They work great, are cheaper than a dedicated thin client, and can be managed with your existing solution (in our case Configuration Manager).

[gshaw]

Axel Client or maybe Intel Compute Stick if space is tight?

[box_l]

https://ryanmangansitblog.com/2013/03/18/creating-a-windows-thinpc-thin-client/

 

You don't even really have to rebuild them, (we did though), just edit the RDP file and run the script.

 

We have used this to convert 120 old netbooks into perfectly workable wireless thin clients.

 

You will have to make sure the RDP.rdp file is correct for your setup, spend some time fine tuning for auto disconnects, hardware passthrough, etc.

 

BoX

[PotNoodleTech]

We are using Pentium based NUC's as thin clients for our staff. We put 4GB ram and 120GB SSD's in them and load them up with Windows 10 with only the free ThinKiosk software installed. They work great, are cheaper than a dedicated thin client, and can be managed with your existing solution (in our case Configuration Manager).

 

Surely for the same price you can get Win 10 Fat client desktops? NUCs are not cheap for what they are.

[localzuk]

Surely for the same price you can get Win 10 Fat client desktops? NUCs are not cheap for what they are.

Indeed. This is why we went for refurbs. Got them with 3 year warranties here too. There's no need for a fancy new box to do this.

[PotNoodleTech]

For the price of the i3 Dell OptiPlex's you can get from refurbished suppliers with warranty I totally agree!

[mjk]

A Chromebox should fit the bill nicely.

[Davit2005]

Had so HP t410's All in Ones at last place with a Citrix VDI back end but they are compatible with MS and VMWare solutions.

 

They were even powered via PoE so no issue with students unpluging to plug their mobile chargers in :-) .

 

Not dirt cheap but here are some Re-Furb 90 day waranty examples, may get cheaper HP education discounts.

 

Hp Hp Smart Zero Client T410 All-in-one - Cortex-a8 1 Ghz - 1 Gb - 2 Gb - Led 18

 

iGel thin clients may be another choice.

Edited February 9, 2017 by Davit2005

[Winner]

Surely for the same price you can get Win 10 Fat client desktops? NUCs are not cheap for what they are.

 

We settled on these due to the extremely low power draw, coupled with the added flexibility of built in wifi, and of course the small footprint. Costing us approx £250 ex VAT each

[ICTDirect_Dave]

Personally i'd suggest a refurb route would give you greater flexibility.

 

For example:

 

Core i3 HP Elite or Dell Optiplex

6gb ram

250gb hdd

win 7 professional or win 10 professional

new keyboard & mouse

AND a 2 year warranty

 

Only £125 each

 

Hell, it's only an extra £25 each to take those up to quad core i5!!

[chinesewhispers]

Which Axel units have you used before? Would you be interested in some used M70 units?