Windows 7 - Primaries

[SYNACK]

is there anything in Win7 itself you'd consider as being really good.

 

Ignoring esoteric things like "security" and "stability"

 

I mean - whats really wrong with WfWg3.11?

 

Way better offline files for teacher laptops

Much better self repair ability (system files, reg etc)

Way better over VPN/remote links due to a much faster network stack

More managability via GP even if you only have a Windows 2000 server as DC

Better power managment, suspend for powersave etc.

Easier install with support for non cretatious era hardware ie SATA drives

Automated multipass defragmentation

Fully integrated .net 3.5 framework and windows installer modules makeing .net stuff run faster and stuff install faster. This is important when pushing managed MSIs.

Automated presentation mode that detects projectors when attached and offers a wizard to help

Built in codecs for lots of different formats avoiding the need for DVD software or Quicktime/xvid etc.

 

Is just the stuff off the top of my head that has made a difference here (most applied to Vista too).

 

 

I remember 3.11, it was fine for playing solitare on as I reacall and even had a 32bit mode that could be installed for full 32bit freecell

[SimpleSi]

Way better offline files for teacher laptops

 

doesn't apply to non-domain machines - all files just stay on laptops

 

Much better self repair ability (system files, reg etc)

 

Is it possible to quantify such a thing or is this just a feeling/marketing feature - no way to prove wither way I suspect

 

Way better over VPN/remote links due to a much faster network stack

 

Only if you've got a VPN which most primaries without domains wouldn't have

 

More managability via GP even if you only have a Windows 2000 server as DC

Would you really mix a Win2000 sever and win7 clients - really? (and doesn't apply to non-domain use anyway )

 

stopping now

 

Non of these come close to being justification to spend loads of dosh on old machines

 

to restate - is there anything in Win7 ITSELF - i think not - the defence (or prosecution) rests their case millord

[SimpleSi]

One of the primaries i cove is going to windows 7.

 

Did they ask for it

 

I am going to Windows Server 2008 R2 with Windows 7 Enterprise at easter. The staff know and have had access to a couple of test machines since September

 

To plagairise - "But Mr Dent, the plans have been available in the local planning office for the last nine months."

 

but they will have to get used to it

 

 

and have had plenty of time to look at the software during ppa time etc.

 

:rotflol:

[edit] wheres the icon I need?[/edit]

 

regards

 

Simon

Edited January 30, 2010 by SimpleSi

[LeMarchand]

Also just looked at microsoft schools agreement, realised with our recent purchases we now have reached the min quantity required, unable to find a price though, is it expensive?

 

The agreements were in place when I started (and the heads tend to be v. good at getting "deals"), but the one time I got a quote I couldn't see that the cost was justifiable for the school. i'll try to remember to check it on Monday.

 

@Si: Surely as new machines are bought to replace aging/dead ones they will come with W7 and drivers for XP are going to be increasingly difficult to find? My schools have managed to "bypass" Vista, but it's going to be difficult to get XP downgradeable machines soon. (Maybe I'm lucky/our LEA is a bit more progressive, but all my primary schools have domains).

Edited January 30, 2010 by LeMarchand
Typo

[SYNACK]

@SimpleSi - You are entitled to your opinion of course. It would be nice if you had actually bothered to state that you wanted a list of features that did not include any domain envolvement at all and completely dismissing my opinion and powers of observation is more than a little rude despite the smielys.

 

doesn't apply to non-domain machines - all files just stay on laptops

Only if you've got a VPN which most primaries without domains wouldn't have

 

As above, ask the question you want the answer to.

 

Is it possible to quantify such a thing or is this just a feeling/marketing feature - no way to prove wither way I suspect

 

Thankyou for dismissing my several years of experience with Vista and almost year with versions of 7 as a feeling. It did make me 'feel' good when it continuously repaired its core system files as a hard drive failed from under it, propmted the user that the HD was failing and kept working with just a bit of a slow down. The drive in question would not even format when I tried and was loosing large chunks of space each time it was booted but each time Vista restored fresh copies to safer locations and rebuilt the system to it could boot. It was also a fantastic ad for it when it rebuilt the system registry chunk from the system restore backups seamlessly on boot after a nasty GPU crash incident. The same typep of incident that took at least half an hour to do manually with XP.

 

Would you really mix a Win2000 sever and win7 clients - really? (and doesn't apply to non-domain use anyway )

 

I see no reason not to, they would still talk just fine and with SP4 installed on the 2000 server and Windows 7 RSAT you would still have full group policy managment ability. File serving, DHCP, DNS AD have been made more secure and faster but have not changed so much that they will not work just fine with a 2000 server. If I had to make the choice of newer client OSs or newer server OSs I would go for the clients as they are closer to the user and push management more effectivly than downlevel clients.

 

You did not adress the other features listed like driver support, power managment and super easy projector setup so I guess that you consead these points.

 

stopping now

 

Non of these come close to being justification to spend loads of dosh on old machines

 

to restate - is there anything in Win7 ITSELF - i think not - the defence (or prosecution) rests their case millord

 

Your original post did not ask for features that justified spending on old stations as such this was not covered. If your school does not have an MS agreement and if all of your hardware is over 7 years old then probably not. As I don't know what your exact criteria are for a killer feature that would impress you it would seem more efficient to point you at the microsoft page that outlines what is actually included. As you seem to have already made up your mind on the issue either through logical analasys or fixed opinions (I will not speculate as to which) it seems pointless attempting to defend or prosecute in a case that has already been decided.

 

One final thought that comes to me featurewise is bitlocker encryption for staff laptops for data protection. I know that is likely to yeild cries of truecrypt is free etc, but it is not built into Windows XP, not as easy to configure and recover and slightly less secure and less transparent to the user.

 

 

/rant - sorry that this turned out a little more combative than I had intended but I am loosing patience with the XP is the epitomy of computing crowd as the retoric is getting close to the OS X is the best thing in the world crowd which winds me up.

Edited January 30, 2010 by SYNACK

[SteveMC]

As an experiment, we tried installing Windows 7 on one of the old machines from the primary we're about to re-vamp. The box was a Celeron 2.4GHz, around 7 years old. Once we scrounged 1GB of RAM, it was surprisingly usable. That's even after installing all updates, Office 2007 and AVG Anti-Virus Business Edition. Of course, it's never going to cope with anything heavy by way of multimedia (in fact, I suspect even flash-based websites are going to be an issue).

 

Whether it's worth spending around £75 per machine to get them running 7 (that's for a memory upgrade and the OS licence) is another matter, seeing as the boxes are mostly on their last legs.

 

Stephen

[SimpleSi]

@SYNACK - no rudeness intended that's why I plastered the posts with smileys :)

 

I thought I had stated the non-domain enviroment as per

Ignoring W2k8+Win7 clients arrangement (cause I imagine there's all sort of goodies in that arrangement for you domain control freaks

 

but I can see that its ambigous but I'd thought by now that everyone around here knows that I don't use any domain features in any of my networks (mainly because I'm too simple minded to understand them :) )

 

I only moved onto using W2k3 as file servers from Win98 in the past 2 years

 

I'm just trying to demonstrate (and others are doing this much more eloqeuntly than me) that spending money on changing an OS on old machines isn't value for money in my opinion

 

Sorry again to have upset you as I have greatly appreciated your advice over the years

 

 

 

regards

 

Simon

[SteveMC]

I'm just trying to demonstrate (and others are doing this much more eloqeuntly than me) that spending money on changing an OS on old machines isn't value for money in my opinion

 

One thing I forgot to mention above, - it can be very tricky (if not downright impossible sometimes) to locate Windows 7 drivers for old hardware. Our test machine used an old SIS chipset, which isn't officially supported - although newer drivers seemed to work, despite not mentioning the model.

 

Stephen

[SimpleSi]

but I am loosing patience with the XP is the epitomy of computing crowd as the retoric is getting close to the OS X is the best thing in the world crowd which winds me up.

 

Heh - I'm with you - IMO there is and never has been and currently not in forseeable future (and looking forward to day when its true and we are all out of jobs because they just work ) any OS that actually does for a computer what a hammer does for nails

 

Maybe GoogleOS will be it? - Turn it on and 7 secs later its on the net and the choc mountain controls all your apps and settings

 

 

regards

 

Simon

[silver]

Whether it's worth spending around £75 per machine to get them running 7 (that's for a memory upgrade and the OS licence) is another matter, seeing as the boxes are mostly on their last legs.

 

Stephen

 

This would be our main problem, along with the software that doesnt work issue: we went up to Server 2008 in the summer and lost several bits that the teachers used a lot - despite someone VERY knowledgeable giving me a hand, we couldnt get some of the stuff working and I suspect that would be the same with W7. (no way could we afford a new server AND upgrading to windows 7)

 

As chrrb said, it is hard enough in a primary to get money for new machines, never mind upgrades.

I suspect that what will happen will be that new machines will be bought with W7 on, and slowly the whole system will be upgraded

 

I would be very interested to see how it goes in a primary as well

[witch]

We haven't yet but we will in the next phase of computer upgrades. I support 6 primaries and myself and the technician for our neighbouring cluster have decided now is the time to make the move.

 

We've already got a couple of staff laptops lurking around with 7 on. They've been no problem what so ever. In my opinion they are a great improvement on Vista, which we had no plans to upgrade to.

 

Only just up the road from you and would love to see the upgrade when you do it. I'm surprised the schools can afford it - mine certainly couldnt.

As others have said, the cost is prohibitive - even for a middle-deemed-secondary like mine. ATM we need new machines first and I think when we get them I will push for a mixed W7 XP environment (presumably this is OK) rather than downgrading to XP as we do now.

[SYNACK]

I'm just trying to demonstrate (and others are doing this much more eloqeuntly than me) that spending money on changing an OS on old machines isn't value for money in my opinion

 

Sorry again to have upset you as I have greatly appreciated your advice over the years

 

All good, sorry that I went off at you about it, in hinsight the smileys do defuse it much more, appologie accepted and I hope to continue being helpful in future.

 

I do agree with you about the upgrade cost as it must be cost effective to make sense doing it which for older machines it is usually not unless you happen to be under volume licensing.

 

One thing I forgot to mention above, - it can be very tricky (if not downright impossible sometimes) to locate Windows 7 drivers for old hardware. Our test machine used an old SIS chipset, which isn't officially supported - although newer drivers seemed to work, despite not mentioning the model.

 

You are right about the drivers, they can end up taking time, a couple of days in my case. With the older systems if it has built in drivers these are often much better for stability than manufacturer ones, if there are no included drivers quite often the XP ones will actually work depending on how their OS string was written in the inf file as long as you are on 32bit. I had this a lot with Dells and old intel GPUs which work fine off the XP driver. There is also the option of finding newer products from the same manufacturer with the same hardware in it. We had an issue with the integrated sound in hp d330m uT computers not using the internal speaker. Found the driver for Vista/7 but it only worked with external speakers as hp had moded the hardware. As it turned out a later model hp we had used the exact same modded chip and came with drivers which worked perfectly and re-enabled the internal speakers.

 

Heh - I'm with you - IMO there is and never has been and currently not in forseeable future (and looking forward to day when its true and we are all out of jobs because they just work ) any OS that actually does for a computer what a hammer does for nails

 

Maybe GoogleOS will be it? - Turn it on and 7 secs later its on the net and the choc mountain controls all your apps and settings

 

I fully agree, there is no OS that does the job perfectly and there probably never will be

 

ATM we need new machines first and I think when we get them I will push for a mixed W7 XP environment (presumably this is OK) rather than downgrading to XP as we do now.

 

Running XP and 7 side by side is fine but it does require a bit of tweaking with regards to profiles, favorites and GPs though as Vista and XP store these in different ways meaning any roaming users end up with two profiles. Its not too bad though when you get it sorted out and I am sure that there will be plenty of people on here who will have done it as well to help out.

[TechSupp]

I think I will be in a meeting next week looking at where we will be going with out system, (its a primary as well) and there has been talk of why don't we move the PC' to 7 although I think this will be for new PC's, to replace older ones. We have mandatory profiles, anyone any experience of issues with a 2003 server xp/7, I know its been stated there are issues/tweaks with roaming profiles so does that mean with mandatory we would be OK? Only teachers have roaming but don't mind putting them on mandatory :-)

[DrCheese]

Don't want to go totally offtopic, but I admit I am somewhat confused at the lack of any sort of Windows Domain in alot of primary schools. Even an el cheapo server (say... £200) could easily run a full on domain/file/Printer/WSUS server for an environment the size of a primary school. It would make managing even a small amount of PC's a billion times easier.

 

Within a school tho I'd want it for auditing alone, it's kinda hard to track who was logged on to what system if just using workgrouped machines and if a member of staff is involved in a child protection issue I'm pretty sure the police would want to know the complete history of a user.

 

As for Windows upgrades, there usually isn't an overarching reason to upgrade from an end user point of view given that end user experience doesn't really change considering that most users just use Office and surf the web, but if you went on that we'd still be sitting on Windows NT4, which would be "good enough" for 95% of tasks.

 

On a unrelated note, those schools that aren't on SA and looking to buy Office 2007 should consider holding back for Office 2010 which is due for release in April/June. If your going to retrain users you are better off using the latest version so you don't have to worry about upgrading again for a few years.

Edited January 30, 2010 by DrCheese

[SimpleSi]

Ah - fresh meat

 

Please note rules of this thread - i'm effectively a troll - but a well meaning one that's a little bit simple and just needs a pat on the head and a there there

 

I admit I am somewhat confused at the lack of any sort of Windows Domain in alot of primary schools. ... It would make managing even a small amount of PC's a billion times easier.

 

Well - if you don't control anything - then there isn't anything to manage is there?

And zero x lots of effort = zero?

 

Obviously thats simplifying it a bit much but if your use teacher/TA control and monitoring as opposed to computer control and monitoring you can you one logon with full admin rights and auto windows update and jobs done

 

Within a school tho I'd want it for auditing alone, it's kinda hard to track who was logged on to what system if just using workgrouped machines and if a member of staff is involved in a child protection issue I'm pretty sure the police would want to know the complete history of a user

 

cant argue with that so that's a downside and if we ever had such an incident then it would need looking at.

 

but if you went on that we'd still be sitting on Windows NT4, which would be "good enough" for 95% of tasks.

You see - your starting to come round to the proper way to look at ICT in primaries (Although no need to move beyond W98SE IMHO - most of the software works better in it )

 

On a unrelated note, those schools that aren't on SA and looking to buy Office 2007 should consider holding back for Office 2010 which is due for release in April/June. If your going to retrain users you are better off using the latest version so you don't have to worry about upgrading again for a few years.

:cough: Openoffice mate - why spend ANY money you don't have too

[korifugi]

Crikey - I seem to have kicked off a bit of a debate!

 

I think the overall benefits in general outweigh the flaws and this thread was just to ask what everyone else thought really. I'm certainly not going to just upgrade straight away and be done with it.

 

As something like this could be quite a major change then I'll need to check it properly.

 

I've got a spare box I can set up - so I'll do that and throw software at it (not literally mind!) to see what does/doesn't work. I'll be posting a list so we all know for the future.

[SimpleSi]

...And further to the lack of domain

 

A lot of schools do have domain enviroments - either the tech has the skills to do it or they paid an outside company to set their it up and they obviously do the standard way or they get they tech support from a secondary and they set it up the standard way as well.

 

I personally don't have domain management skills so I look for alternatives

 

One problem with individual user logon is that it isn't the best model for a class of 30 in a suite with 15 computers

 

One workaround is to have class logons which maps a drive letter to a shared class area with folders for each child (or pairs of children).

 

I myself have 1 logon/computer and a global shared area and a little autoit script that lets pupils choose their class and then maps P: to the class shared subfolder. (teachers get access to whole tree).

 

I use WPKG (so don't need GPOs) to deploy packages but I don't worry about them being silent as they are just run as a logon script.

 

And I only use package deployment if I think it would save time that running around all the machines that need it - I only tried packaging SMART notebook this week as normally I only put in on smartboard connected computers and teacher laptops - normally max of 14 computers/school.

 

Teacher last week wanted it on 20 laptops for monitored lesson next day so I decided it might be better to package it up for deployment as it might be useful at my other schools (Failed to get gallery done but luckily she didn;t need it )

 

 

But no way is it useful to learn how to package Tizzy's Toybox cause its only on about 6 comps/school

 

time to stop -even I'm drifting off my OT now

 

regards

Simon

[SimpleSi]

Crikey - I seem to have kicked off a bit of a debate!

 

Nice to have you back - thought you'd been scared off

 

 

I've got a spare box I can set up - so I'll do that and throw software at it (not literally mind!) to see what does/doesn't work. I'll be posting a list so we all know for the future.

 

Now - that'd be very useful

 

Actually -when I looked back and saw you'd posted this in Blue Skies - I did think - mm - this person knows they are off the wall - so I should have been less virulent :)

 

regards

Simon

[korifugi]

Actually -when I looked back and saw you'd posted this in Blue Skies - I did think - mm - this person knows they are off the wall - so I should have been less virulent :)

 

Nah - thats okay. I'm pretty thick skinned.

 

At the moment it's kinda halfway between a pipedream and a project, I just thought it'd be a good idea to ask about it on here as there is surely someone that's already moved over - and failing that there'd be advice.

 

I'm still going to set a box up to see how plausable this all is, so await the blog people as it'll be better to put results up in that format.

[SYNACK]

Again useful, but in the times I have had to use the W7s repair tools. they have not fixed the issue and have still gone the reimage route.

 

I'm not so much talking about the repair console ones or the ones that you have to do anything to trigger, I'm talking about the ones that just see a problem and fix it seamlessly without requireing extra time of the technical staff.

 

But how much of that extra manageability is relevant to primary schools?

 

We use it a lot in the primaries that I support but I would say that it would depend on the school.

 

 

When in school Computers and on when in use and off when they are not they are switched off. Also from experience W7 has not given any increase in battery life on laptops.

 

Moreso for the teachers that leave their computers on compulsively and do the same with their laptops that sit idle for half the day.

 

PCs come supplied the DVD player software and quicktime/xvid are free downloads, simple to include on an initial build.

Simple enough to include but it still takes time and also can cause issues if you end up needing to include codecs that clash, having lots bundled does help this as they are pretested for such clashes.

 

Again these were just general features that are useful to my sites, I don't know the exact details of other sites so couldn't comment.

 

@TechSupp - The same differences apply to mandatory profiles too I think so you would need to have a seporate one for W7 with some way to differentiate, probably with a .V2 added to the foldername or using local mandatory/default. You also have more stuff to redirect with 7 like favorites etc which as you are on mandaroty at the moment are probably already stored in your docs folders so should transfer fine. It is doable but I think that it would be about the same amount of effort either way mandatory/roaming and I have heard (on this forum) that mandatory profiles are tricky on 7.

 

 

Its weird I do work in primary schools but many of my views and experiences seem to be somewhat alien. Perhaps its differences in school sizes (350+ for me), I don't know but I do seem to be stiriing trouble on this thread. Perhaps I to should label myself as a troll too despite my intentions.

Edited January 31, 2010 by SYNACK

[SimpleSi]

I'm talking about the ones that just see a problem and fix it seamlessly without requireing extra time of the technical staff.

 

Does a tree in a far away forest make a sound when it falls?

 

Prove it

Si

[SimpleSi]

Its weird I do work in primary schools but many of my views and experiences seem to be somewhat alien.

 

Well you do live a far away land

 

Perhaps its differences in school sizes (350+ for me)

 

My biggest school was double form entry (450) and that was the first one I plugged in W2k3 server (Well just converted a desktop actually ) and set up the suite XP Pro ones as domain clients (Acutally paid someone do it as I was clueless) but decided it wasn't worth the cost/effort of upgrading the other school comps (4/class that were all XP home machines) mainly because of the class/individ pupil logon issues.

 

 

I don't know but I do seem to be stiriing trouble on this thread. Perhaps I to should label myself as a troll too despite my intentions.

 

Your just in the clever category - to you its trivial/challenging/acheivable and affordable to hunt down drivers etc and force the 16bit software to work

 

And you don't know that there is another way to acheive same end result - e.g teachers teaching and pupils learning

 

Lets face it - if a school has never had any tech support and its still just an oeverworked ICT co-ord with little money then there still going to be close to standalone/static ip mode

 

regards

 

Simon

PS -I'm the only in this village - it was my bridge that you crossed

[SYNACK]

Does a tree in a far away forest make a sound when it falls?

 

Prove it

Si

 

I watched it happen and checked the event logs later to see why it took an extra minute at boot time. I did not get screen shots of that but here is the smart error that occoured during the HW failure http://www.edugeek.net/forums/windows-7/39719-why-windows-7-when-xp-wont-die-3.html#post370081 again, no screenshots of the event log as I did not think that I would accidentally stumble into the inquisition

[SYNACK]

Your just in the clever category - to you its trivial/challenging/acheivable and affordable to hunt down drivers etc and force the 16bit software to work

Your too kind I just have nothing better to do

 

And you don't know that there is another way to acheive same end result - e.g teachers teaching and pupils learning

 

Now it is you who live in a far off and mystical land (our teachers arn't that bad - well most/some of them)

 

Lets face it - if a school has never had any tech support and its still just an oeverworked ICT co-ord with little money then there still going to be close to standalone/static ip mode

True, luckily that situation is getting less and less common in NZ.

 

PS -I'm the only in this village - it was my bridge that you crossed

 

I knew I should have looked both ways becore crossing

Edited January 31, 2010 by SYNACK

[contink]

Back to this after a long few days dealing with my ruddy tax return and accounts... *cue: silent scream*

 

 

Anyhoo... One thing that hasn't been picked up on so much is the training aspect... I for one am a small business with turnover in the £4k per school range so any training is very much self taught, books, etc... and me sitting with a Win2k8 server and a few Win7 VM's trying to figure it out. This is all well and good if you have time available but Son_1.0 has put a stop to any of that and I'm increasingly concerned that I may not catch up because the other option is putting my prices up to cover training costs which is also a non-starter.

 

This brings me to the money thing... Virtually every school I have is cutting staff posts and/or hours just so they can pay my bill (which incidentally is 20-30% less than county charge for less able or experienced staff!).

 

These same schools all have, hardware that is going to need replacing somewhere between two years ago and three years time (at a stretch). Most are looking at an increasingly complex IT requirement and naff all money to do it with because of other initiatives or building maintenance that are more critical...

 

To call the situation appalling is putting it mildly...

 

 

 

Anyway, that's all doom and gloom... What I AM concious of though is that we could be helping each other deal with some of the technical issues by looking specifically at the Primary side of things, software in particular and start recording work-arounds, solutions or simple "mission impossible - don't go there!" tips on different packages that are common.

 

I know we have the wiki but is anyone willing to start recording some of those so we can slowly add to them over time..?