Promethean vs Smartboard

[FN-GM]

Hi all

 

What do you prefer, Smart or Promethean IWS's? Myself i like the Smarboard.

 

Z

[john]

Im a Smart guy myself, but there is a place for promethean, but I must admit I haven't found a that is the only place they go kind of setup yet.

[Edu-IT]

Never used a Promethean. I don't have a problem with Smartboards.

[EduTech]

we have both promethean and smartboards.. and i must say i like the smart boards better

 

although the promethean come in very handy when you cant get a projector on the ceiling

 

James.

[torry_loon]

Do Promethean support Linux yet?

[flyinghaggis]

Im a Smart guy myself, but there is a place for promethean...

 

There most certainly is a place for Promethean Activboards and it's called a skip

 

We bought a batch 20 Promthean boards last summer and 25% of them failed in the first year. The drivers and software are a royal PITA to deploy thanks to the fact that Promethean want to screw you for more money to hand over their 'special networked' version of the software. That and the activpens that come with the boards seem to break after about 6 months of use and at £30 each it's no laughing matter when you've got to buy replacement pens for 25 boards!

We've bought a Smartboard 680i2 recently for testing and I'm amazed anyone bothers with Promethean these days given how much better designed and built the Smartboard is!

Edited September 2, 2008 by flyinghaggis

[djdohboy]

we have both smart and promethian, and I have to say SMART wins hands down, but the ultimate kicker is the pens!! at least if the teachers loose the pens with the smart board its not just a peice of junk, you can use anything, an old dried up whiteboard marker, finger anything!! but the promethian is useless without its pen and there far to expensive to just replace every time a teacher misplaces one or breaks one.

 

*rant off*

 

Ohh i feel better for that already lol

[FN-GM]

This might sounds weird, but i have found Smartboard pens don't get lost as often as Promethean.

[djdohboy]

ill tell you why they dont go missing as much, the kids know with a promethian board that if they steal the pen the teacher cant use the IWB for that lesson, with a smartboard it doesnt matter, so they dont bother as much.

[Michael]

I've used both and Smart are easily better. The setup procedure is easier and is a true plug 'n play experience through USB. The software and teaching tools are also more developed. The Smart boards are also considerably lighter than their Promethean equivalents. When carrying a Promethean, it feels like a child is hanging on the end!

[SteveMC]

This might sounds weird, but i have found Smartboard pens don't get lost as often as Promethean.

 

I suspect that's because they don't get used so much - seeing as teachers and pupils tend to use their fingers instead.

 

Our cabling team have spent the last couple of weeks re-presenting bodged SMARTBoard cabling installed a few years back by another company (many metres of VGA, USB and audio cables coiled up on the floor - a lovely health and safety trip hazard!).

 

Steve

[witch]

This has been discussed before - and I said it then and I will say it again......

Smartboards win hands down over Prometheans. One of my schools have Smarts, one Prometheans and I have NEVER had a problem with a Smart board. Prometheans on the other hand...lose drivers, vga cables go, power supplies blow up - the list is endless.

[LeMarchand]

2 of my schools have Smartboards and one has Promethean (the head decided that they were "more durable").

 

Smart wins hands down: ease of use, no problems with the drivers getting lost/forgotten (and having to do a non-standard reinstall when it happens), even the (much-maligned on here) software is a lot better, especially the provided content - and as for the pens on the Prometheans...

[sparkeh]

My old school used to have Promethean and the connections were always disappearing along with drivers. The pens broke way to easily and were a fortune to replace. They were a nightmare.

 

Smart boards at my current place have been great though we are starting to have some trouble with the older ones. A couple have gone really wacky and don't follow the pen at all which I guess is something to do with the membrane being damaged.

 

But on the whole, Smartboards win (though Smarts' documentation is dreadful).

[Hightower]

although the promethean come in very handy when you cant get a projector on the ceiling

 

I believe SmartBoard also have installations that can be used in these situations.

 

At my old school we had ActivBoards and I have to say they were a nightmare. Not least trying to replace the pens when they went missing. But things like dodgy matrixes?

 

There was a few times we got the chaps out to repair some boards and they said "they can't do anything as there is a power socket on the other side of the wall which is interfering with the matrix".

 

New school is mainly SmartBoards and I have to say, they are so much easier. They just work. It's easier to roll the software out to machines.... lose a pen? no problem, use your finger..... and so far I have had no problem with matrixes!

[bossman]

I have not had the experience of working with Smartboards only Promethean but all the same have had very little problem with them they just work.

 

As I have 43 soon to be 45 I deploy the drivers and software over the network and they work very well.

[ZeroHour]

EduBottle the prometheans to hell tbh for me

They fail often (we had a 25% failure rate within a year of install) and the software is not the best shall we say.

 

BTW moved this thread to Hardware where I think it should be?

[Paul_L]

Work in a number of primary schools, with a mix of both boards (and others) Smartboards seem to come out on top as far as teachers are concreaned.

 

As for me, yep, smartboards as well

[SteveLaw]

I'm quite surprised (and pleased) by this. I always liked Smartboards better but I thought I was in a minority

[K.C.Leblanc]

Smartboards here, considering the number of them we have they cause hardly any trouble.

 

I've always felt Smart is the way to go unless you can forsee furniture being bounced off boards.

[bizzel]

Another vote for Smartboards here. We've only got the one, the rest of the school is Promethean but I always preferred the Smart software.

[Ric_]

You see, I would have voted for an 'other' option. I've done a couple of board evaluations and never chosen either. I've not looked at Smart for a while and I know their products have got better since I last looked so I wouldn't like to comment. The Promethean boards seemed very good and of a sturdy construction, but they certainly didn't warrant the £300 premium over the Interwrite boards that I've standardised on here.

 

I know a certain element is the software but I've been lucky enough to have had staff that had used neither Smart or Promethean's tools

[Michael]

On the subject of whiteboards does anyone know where I can purchase 2 power supplies for a Promethean board, other than from Promethean themselves? From the people I've spoken to they cost a fortune!

[john]

eBay, or perhaps CPC they will sell generic PSUs that will do the job, but obviosuly if you have board warranty or anything like that it will void it so do make sure the boards warranty is out before using a generic PSU.

[Jamman960]

We're a promethean only school(decision made before I joined), we've been fairly lucky. I've only encountered 2 problems so far - one of our boards kept blowing psu's due to a faulty controller board and one of our newly installed +2's has a faulty vga switcher.

 

I'm not sure how but none of our teachers have managed to lose a pen although I have taken all of the spares away this summer(1 per board)

 

Software wise I've never really had any problems, they just work

 

We currently have 21 boards accross 2 sites.