Smart Notebook Education

[discoveranother]

Hello,

 

Looking for Smart Notebook costs for a school.

 

Firstly, is there an online version of Smart Notebook, I am sure I have read somewhere there is ?

 

and secondly, does the latest version require the school to have smart notebook boards or can it be licensed on touchscreens ?

 

Thanks for any advice

Edited September 16, 2019 by discoveranother

[CHiLL]

SMART Notebook 19 can be used for free (with some features disabled, unless you license it). I upgraded our site from a perpetually licensed SMART Notebook 11.4 over the summer to 19.0. I could have paid to upgrade the license to unlock all the features, but it seems that we don't use most of the features that are locked. Most of our staff use SMART Notebook to simply annotate/draw on the board. A small handful may actually use Notebook to plan lessons and create Notebook files, which is still available in the free version of 19.0. I'm keeping an eye out for any users who want to use the locked features.

 

However I believe that at least the free version of SMART Notebook will only work on SMART boards/TVs and would need licensing to work on other devices (don't quote me on that though).

[Oaktech]

SMART Notebook 19 can be used for free (with some features disabled, unless you license it). I upgraded our site from a perpetually licensed SMART Notebook 11.4 over the summer to 19.0. I could have paid to upgrade the license to unlock all the features, but it seems that we don't use most of the features that are locked. Most of our staff use SMART Notebook to simply annotate/draw on the board. A small handful may actually use Notebook to plan lessons and create Notebook files, which is still available in the free version of 19.0. I'm keeping an eye out for any users who want to use the locked features.

 

However I believe that at least the free version of SMART Notebook will only work on SMART boards/TVs and would need licensing to work on other devices (don't quote me on that though).

 

Do you know what the locked features are?

 

We have 11.4 everywhere for ease of deployment, but we have a subscription licence for Smart 16 that only covers approximately 1/3 of our displays (No, I don't know why my predecessor thought that was a good idea either) We are a completely smart school so if we can use 19 for free that would solve a massive headache.

[CHiLL]

Do you know what the locked features are?

 

We have 11.4 everywhere for ease of deployment, but we have a subscription licence for Smart 16 that only covers approximately 1/3 of our displays (No, I don't know why my predecessor thought that was a good idea either) We are a completely smart school so if we can use 19 for free that would solve a massive headache.

I believe this is the full comparison list between free and paid: https://www.smarttech.com/en/Products/Education-Software/SMART-Learning-Suite/Pricing

[discoveranother]

SMART Notebook 19 can be used for free (with some features disabled, unless you license it). I upgraded our site from a perpetually licensed SMART Notebook 11.4 over the summer to 19.0. I could have paid to upgrade the license to unlock all the features, but it seems that we don't use most of the features that are locked. Most of our staff use SMART Notebook to simply annotate/draw on the board. A small handful may actually use Notebook to plan lessons and create Notebook files, which is still available in the free version of 19.0. I'm keeping an eye out for any users who want to use the locked features.

 

However I believe that at least the free version of SMART Notebook will only work on SMART boards/TVs and would need licensing to work on other devices (don't quote me on that though).

 

Thank you very much for your response. I know the free version of 11.4 works fine without the need to have an interactive smartboard. This version will interact ok having it installed on a laptop connected to a touchscreen.

 

They were using apparently Smart Notebook 16 or 2016 I believe but the license has ran out and the watermark logo now reappears. They were going to just remove this version and install the free 11.4, but it is a time consuming job removing eveything and reinstalling 11.4, so they now just want a license or upgrade but it looks like the https://education.smarttech.com/products/smart-learning-suite/pricing-calculator shows a massive difference in price if no smartboards are used and unsure if one license can be used for several teachers if they just have one board onsite but several touchscreens, as the price comes out the same for one smartboard as it does for several.

[CHiLL]

Thank you very much for your response. I know the free version of 11.4 works fine without the need to have an interactive smartboard. This version will interact ok having it installed on a laptop connected to a touchscreen.

 

They were using apparently Smart Notebook 16 or 2016 I believe but the license has ran out and the watermark logo now reappears. They were going to just remove this version and install the free 11.4, but it is a time consuming job removing eveything and reinstalling 11.4, so they now just want a license or upgrade but it looks like the https://education.smarttech.com/products/smart-learning-suite/pricing-calculator shows a massive difference in price if no smartboards are used and unsure if one license can be used for several teachers if they just have one board onsite but several touchscreens, as the price comes out the same for one smartboard as it does for several.

I believe we can use the free version of SMART Notebook 19.0 without being connected to a board, so like a member of staff using their school laptop at home. I thought you meant about using the interactivity on another touch device, like a Promethean board or something!

Edited September 16, 2019 by CHiLL

[discoveranother]

I believe we can use the free version of SMART Notebook 19.0 without being connected to a board, so like a member of staff using their school laptop at home. I thought you meant about using the interactivity on another touch device, like a Promethean board or something!

 

Thanks for your response. Much appreciated.

[atcoates]

Yes looks like Smart have launched a Smart Notebook Basic.

 

SMART Notebook basic version includes:

SMART Notebook 19

SMART Product Drivers 12.13

SMART Ink 5.5

Access from home

45-day trial of SMART Learning Suite

 

https://support.smarttech.com/docs/software/notebook/notebook-19/en/sls/your-account-and-subscription/notebook-basic-subscription-features.cshtml?cshid=explainsubscription

[discoveranother]

Not sure if anyone has used this online version or if it is still valid.

 

http://express.smarttech.com/#

[Starbug1]

Yes looks like Smart have launched a Smart Notebook Basic.

 

SMART Notebook basic version includes:

SMART Notebook 19

SMART Product Drivers 12.13

SMART Ink 5.5

Access from home

45-day trial of SMART Learning Suite

 

https://support.smarttech.com/docs/software/notebook/notebook-19/en/sls/your-account-and-subscription/notebook-basic-subscription-features.cshtml?cshid=explainsubscription

 

We installed Notebook 19, after Smart told our IT Subject Leader that this was the best version to use with our setup (Windows 10 and Office 2016); the link we were given was to the full version and the warning message said we could continue to use the basic version for free.

 

We do not use the premium features so the basic version would be fine for us, so we weren't too worried to see that the premium freatures would expire after 45 days.

However what happened was much worse than we expected: users are now told they have to log in, or the program won't load. However it does not allow us to actually log in, it goes through a series of prompts and gives various error messages.

Is there an actual download for the basic version that does not come with any of the bloated "premium" features? I clicked the above link but couldn't find a download link.

Alternatively, can we still use the old Notebook 11.4 software with Windows 10 and Office 2016?

Also, are files saved with version 19 of Notebook backwards compatible with 11.4?

If anyone can answer any of these questions, we would really appreciate it!

[atcoates]

You can select the basic version below but it's only a web installer. I'm sure you could browse temp folders etc to get an msi to deploy. It might however be one of the limitations of the basic version.

 

 

https://education.smarttech.com/products/notebook/download#trial

[CHiLL]

As we're finding out, if you install SMART Notebook 19, it will activate a free trial of the premium version for 45 days or however long it is. Once that expires, users are prompted to sign in to SMART Notebook to continue using it for the free functionality, so they have to sign up for a free account using their school email.

[Starbug1]

As we're finding out, if you install SMART Notebook 19, it will activate a free trial of the premium version for 45 days or however long it is. Once that expires, users are prompted to sign in to SMART Notebook to continue using it for the free functionality, so they have to sign up for a free account using their school email.

Here's what we did:

• Add/Remove programs > Remove Notebook 19 (not removing anything else)
  
• Run Notebook 11.4 2013 web installer, tick Notebook 11 only
  
• Copied snapshot.exe to a server; using Group Policy to copy the file to "C:\Program Files (x86)\SMART Technologies\SMART Product Drivers\snapshot.exe" (as instructed at:
  otherwise the camera tool icon won't work)
  

 

So far this is working perfectly.

 

In fact it's better than that: some staff had reported PDFs taking longer to load, on investigation this was only occurring on PCs with Notebook 19 installed. Now those PCs are running Notebook 11 PDFs load instantly.

 

Smart won't admit that Notebook 11.4 is compatible with Windows 10. While I accept they do not support it, they will try to convince people not to use it. In reality, it can be used and it does work!

[Koldov]

Sorry for being naughty on two counts (necro and double posting), but I'd like this sorted out and as we all are I'm sure very busy, I could do without nagging teachers interupting me every 5 minutes...

 

Hopefully it's not just me and those still using 11.4 or 19.1 have seen the same...

 

Flash has now apparently died and yet even on laptops that have not received the MS update and still have Flash showing in add/remove programs, Flash content in Smart will not work... I'm not sure why or even if something has actually happened somehow that I'm not aware of... even laptops that have only just been started from sitting in the cupboard for the last 2 months...

 

Anyone still using Flash objects in 11.4?

 

The other question is the perceived wisdom that 19.1 'free/basic' is the other option, but I downloaded it and installed it yesterday and there is no basic option on the installer it will only let you install a trial.

 

So, I did that and when I started the program it immediately asked for a Google or MS sign-in (no option for a Smart account sign-in) and if you cancel that, the program ends... looking at the Google sign-in option it says this has to be already linked somehow...

 

Any ideas?

[matty-normy]

Hopefully help on a few bits. But from an issue we had I'd found this which says that Flash disables itself so may appear but may not be active?

https://www.windowslatest.com/2020/12/27/adobe-flash-player-is-about-to-stop-working-on-windows-10/

 

Then you do have to sign in to use the latest version either Google or MS although this provides no real functionality except for a few emails about the features that you are missing out on. Its worth noting that each user on the computer will have to sign in.