tmcd35

Polices are assigned at the lowest common OU level required, we have a deep OU structure splitting user and computer OUs and, in each, splitting by teaching/non-teaching, rooms, years, etc. Each OU may have up to four GPO's gouping similar policies - Desktop, Security, Internet, Printers

Having seen a few episodes of American Top Gear, the show can definitely survive with different presenters. I wonder why Cpt Slow and the Hamster can't present two more re-edited shows without Clarkson to end the season? Still sad if this is the end, I like the old buffoon and think the format is very entertaining, especially the specials. I think most Clarkson controversies have been complete over reactions. We need more details to know whether this is more of the same or something more serious.

When I started here it was three people using two desks in the smallest broom cupboard available, just happened to be next door to a slightly larger closet that is the server room. A couple of years a go I got my own office just up the corridor, about the same size, maybe slightly smaller, than the old broom cupboard but it's mine. The two techs now have the broom cupboard to themselves. None of these rooms have windows... As a manager, moving to my own office was the best move I could possibly make. Not only can I now listen to american alternative rock all day, but I get to focus more on the strategic planning and can be a little more hands off on the day to day stuff. We have a helpdesk. The techs mostly take care of whats on there on a largely ad-hoc basis. I chip in every now and then as timer permits. I rarely go out of my way to delegate tasks unless there's a particular training need or a major time factor. They're professionals, they don't need micro managing. We have an online helpdesk. That should be the answer, but... I have a phone in my office, the techs have a phone in their office. The techs office is the traditional extension for IT support. Still staff just phone my new extension number and bug me. We now have new greeting when we answer the phone. In the IT Crowd they famously answered "Have you tried turning it off and on again?". Our equivilant is "have you logged it on the helpdesk?" Depends on the structure of the team/size of the school, but typically it makes sense using apprentices or junior techs as first line support. We informally do that here. Tech does 1st line, Senior tech kinda does 1st/2nd line, and I do 2nd/3rd line support.

Hyper-V is included free as part of Windows Server, with full management GUI. So long as you are using the resultant host install to only manage and host VM's then there is no reason to use Hyper-V 2012 unless the host is starved of CPU and RAM resources to run a standard Windows GUI and host the required guest VMs. I really wouldn't worry about or use Hyper-V 2012 unless you can think of a really good reason. If you can your server is probably under spec'd anyway. Just install Hyper-V as part of the full Windows GUI, makes life easier.

^ beat me to it! It's worth re-iterating, as @Boredguy points out, the Windows licencing requirements are the same regardless to whether you use Xen, Hyper-V, VMWare, VirtualBox, or whatever.

Our reprographics lady is a member of all departments. When she logs in she can select from a list of departments to charge the job by department. Unfortunately the DocuPro has a limit to the number of departments it will display on the MFD screen. If you have too meny departments, as we do, you'll have to either type the full name of the department in to the MFD or use department codes as before. Again this only goes down to department level, not user.

Currently, if it's got a pulse... I am putting in a 7 year cycle refresh starting next year and doing 3 switches a year.

This might just be the last film I saw. Caught it on Netflix a week or so ago. Surprisingly engaging.

I'm waiting for the inevitable 6 movie extended editions blu ray box set

I think I asked Konica this, for the same reasons, when they installed the system. Just double checked our install, Departments are linked to OU, then there's Cost Centers which sit entirely within DocuPro. Unfortunately, no it doesn't link to AD groups. It's a very different beast to Papercut. More database/spreadsheet oriented than clean website frontend.

Have you looked at Bee Bots and Pro Bots?

We use DocuPro here, it's part of the Konica Minolta managed service solution. Compared to Papercut? it's a different beast. Personally I prefer Papercut, if it wasn't for the managed service it wouldn't be my first choice. It's application based rather than web based. It has a built in reporting feature that reports print jobs by users, groups, and costcenters. There's no reporting for printers themselves, instead you have to interrogate the DocuPro's print logs for each device.

Off the top of my head we have... * 8 characters - Google requirement * Change every 90 days, one a term * 3 unique passwords * lock out for 5 min after 5 attempts

The only I play day in day out regardless of anything else, I don't actually view as a game - more as a practice aid. And that's Rocksmith. Now 16 songs I am happy with and will be starting on Pearl Jam's Jeremy this week For the rest, I've been working through a major retro gaming replay project for almost a year now. Started playing games on an Odyssey 2, then Intellivision, C64, NES, MegaDrive, CD32 and now Playstation. Last week I was playing Tomb Raider and got up to Level 7, Palace Midas, and quit at that point as I seem to always do. Next couple of nights it's Crash Bandicoot, and then I have Fade To Black lined up. Next really big games that I'm looking forward to and will take a bit more time over are Abe's Odyssey and Final Fantasy VII (originals not PS4 remakes), but they are a couple of weeks away yet...

RAID levels and design is a product of function not fashion. Choose the one that is right for the task at hand. RAID 5, 50, 6, 60, etc. are all perfectly sensible and acceptable solution depending on the scenario. As @DMcCoy, above, I cringe at the thought of spending ££££'s on 15k SAS drives and using RAID-1. The cost per Gb has to be factored in at some point. On the other hand if you are using 4Tb 5k SATA drives, RAID-1 is probably sensible. These days though, I think hardware RAID is quickly becoming yesterdays technology. Now with have multi-core processors and cheap RAM software RAID tends to make more sense. Systems like ZFS and Storage Spaces offer greater flexibility and allow you to grow you storage array over time in a way that is harder to achieve in hardware. Our current storage array is 2 drives in RAID-1 for OS, 12-drives in RAID-50 for storage, and 2 host spares. They are all 450Gb 15k SAS drives. It's fast, reliable, rock solid, and has been for nearly 5 years. We replace a couple of drives each year whether they need it or not, rebuilds take about 8 hours per drive. It was the right system design at the time for the budget we had for the project. We are about to replace it with a system based on two replicated Windows Storage Spaces boxes with 1xSSD for OS, 2xSSD for cache, and a mixture of 15k 450Gb SAS and 10k 900Gb SAS for data. I'm pretty sure we'll be using parity storage spaces rather than mirrored storage spaces because I'm not convinced by the benefits of mirrored disks in this set and the increase in cost per GB is extortionate. I do have some spare 2Tb SATA drives that might go in some of the spare bays in one of the servers for things like video files, isos, etc. They'll probably be either straight stripped or mirrored. So, the question is - what type and size drives are you using, and what data is being stored on the drives? Only with that information, plus possibly user count, could recommendations on which RAID scheme you use be meaningful.

Yeah, Orgins was OK, definately the weakest of them. But even Origins is leaps ahead of a lot of games. Bad for this series is exceptional in just about any other franchise. Personally I think they made a mistake moving away from the liner story of Asylum. Arkham City, despite being open world, seemed rushed because the narrative would constantly remind you of a time limit to complete the story or Gotham was doomed. I was too scared to do the open world side stuff in case I took too much time. Of course I realise now I could have ignore the story as much I a liked and it would have just waited for me to continue...

I thought this was a trick question, but... I see Gold and White...!?!

They had those when I was at college. They had some RM win 3.11 machines. "Someone" (I name no names) would "accidentally" disconnect the BNC from the back of their machine - bang, the whole network goes down, computers stop working, whoops

The laptops themselves are generic Clevo jobs, the same you'd get from Ergo, Stone or Novatech, etc. (Classmates are Intel, and the same ones Stone do). That said, our teachers and pupils love the special school branded lids they do. As for Very_PC themselves, we've used them on and off for a couple of years now. Laptops, servers, and desktops for IT suites. One of the easiest companies to work with for the rare warranty repair we've had. Highly recommended (unless my commission cheque bounces then go for Novatech instead ) EDIT: We've got the about 20 classmates in total and they are OK/Good for light word processing and internet work. Seem to be pretty durable for kids to use. We use them for SEN. As for laptops in general. Last lot we got were Baytrail Celerons, Quad-core, 8Gb ram, 120Gb SSD. They run like the clappers - fastest machines we've got. Easily beat out some of our i3 desktops. We've not given any to students, only staff. Oldest are about 2 years old now and we have some 3year old Novatechs as well.

99? I'd quit work as a projectionist for Odeon cinemas in 97 and started an Applied Computing course at Uni on 98, so that would have been my first year of Uni - getting good grades and thinking I had a future...(I got a 3rd in 2001). Started at PC-World part time Christmas 99, I think it was. Wouldn't get my first real IT job as an IT tech until 2005! I was a PC-World sales monkey for far, far too long.

Anything touching the whiteboard? That's the favourite answer to this problem. Also, check the Virtual Tablet device is disabled in Device Manager, although this usually just effects board alignment rather than wandering mouse syndrome. For laptops make use the trackpad is disabled as accidentally touching it while typing can annoyingly cause this as well. I assume you've replace the mouse and tried different USB ports in case of hardware failure?

Type lots of assets into our new (we've had it a year) database while keeping half an eye on e-mails and edugeek and responding to teacher requests and daydreaming about being at home playing Tomb Raider on the PS1...

Yesterdays Eurogamer article on the subject: Valve to debut new VR hardware at GDC next week • Eurogamer.net As for Steam Machines, I think the recent Alienware boxes prove its impossible to build a generic PC that can compete with consoles on price without being a loss leader and being able to leverage income from licensing game sales: New Alienware Alpha | Dell UK - Another year/eighteen-months and PC price/performance will reach the right point but buy then will be over midway on the current console cycle and wondering what Nintendo's next plans are...

I noticed this trailer the other day and rewatched the Olyphant film over the weekend. I must say I really enjoyed the last film and don't think it should've been panned as much as it was. Is it me or does Agent 47 look like the bad guy in that new trailer? I think Hitman remains my favourite game series of all time, even if it did take a slight backstep with Absolution. Hopefully we'll get news of the 6th game at E3 in June, and hopefully they'll bring back the excellent limited save mechanic of the first 4 games. EDIT: Just re-watched the trailer. Is this a remake of Terminator? Starring 47 as the Terminator, Syler as Kyle Rees, and whoever the target was as Sarah Connor? (I'm guessing Ciaran Hinds is Skynet in this analogy?)

For purely a file server, 4Gb should have been fine - but you can never have too much RAM. What speed NIC does the server have? Is there scope for additional, NIC bonding? What type of hard drives are in use, their speed, are they RAID'd? if so what RAID level is in use? Regardless of how much RAM you put in Windows should be using the page file as a matter of course. Slow logins could easily be a problem somewhere else. What type of profiles are you using? How big are they? Can you use folder redirection to limit their size? What speed are the client connections? Wired/Wireless? Our file server is using just under 8Gb at the moment and I suspect, with our virtualisation layout, it's pulling a heavier workload. Our logins are currently around the 45sec mark.