ToyHeartsFan

They are good and the tools I had with mine included a small nozzle / brush but you can't really get between the fan blades on a cpu heatsink so you need high pressure like the blower with the thin tube attachment (or a compressor) to get that out. A Vac even a good one like the one I linked won't do that. Vac / Blower are best used together or just get the blower and some good masks and ask the cleaner to vac the room after - lol

You could nick Henry from the cleaner just dont use it inside the case because of the static (which is why I use the vac I linked) and get the blower I linked (or a small compressor) and use them at the same time - I know you said you had no money but they are cheaper than cans so tell your bursar it will save the school money especially if it stops a PC powersupply overheating and going bang! Note: I would only use Henry and the like for normal dust I wouldn't want to use it for toner as it would go straight through the filters. And do buy some masks you really don't want to breathe the stuff in

- OMG no don't do that; I'm not sure if all toners are as bad as each other and modern toners might be safer but they used to be classsed as a low level carcogenic. I only use the Vac I linked which has a highly rated filter desiged fot toner and some special toner cloths the toner clings to when working on printers. - I use cheap disposable ones and when I can I use the vac at the same time as the blower to reduce the dust in the air. - lol

I use these: LCD, TV, and PC Screen Cleaning Equipment, Training and Consumables - Datavac Electric Duster ED-500 LCD, TV, and PC Screen Cleaning Equipment, Training and Consumables - Atrix Omega Supreme ESD Toner Vacuum C/W Free tools The only problems with the vac / duster is its a bit of a hassle lugging the stuff around if you are working in different locations and the motors do get quite warm but I think they are the best options currently available. I use the odd can as well but they are getting very expensive, dont last very long and you need to be very careful how and where you use them as most of them are extremely flammable. RE compressors and moisture build up - the tanks should have a drain valve so you can empty the water out, I've never tried using one for cleaning PCs so I dont know how bad the condensation is but I dont think the compressed cans are brilliant either if you're not careful you can end up freezing what you are trying to clean.

i3 but only because it was the same price as the last batch of core2duos we purchased. Its the highest spec machine in school I can understand people buying i5s but unless you're video editing or something I really cant see how an i7 is value for money...

“I've been running PCE for almost 3 years now” The people that started this thread have now been using it for 6 years unless they gave up on it - lol “I offload this work to our cover supervisors when they're not doing a lesson.” It should be a member of SLT; our head does it although I also have access I only usually deal with the technical side. There are likely to be captures from staff as well as kids although staff members aren’t going to look at stuff they shouldn’t it could capture personal emails and the like there is also data protection to be careful of as you could accidently capture SEN data, child protection stuff etc… which is why it should only be SLT. “on my vista machines for about 6 months it continually crashes and will not uninstall” If you deploy it via msi you can usually uninstall it the same way without problems, there is also an uninstall tool you can get from forensic if an uninstall fails (they keep updating it). Sorry I’ve only ever run it on XP so cant comment on Vista but even on XP every now and again there are problems when forensic or microsoft release an update there’s not a lot you can do about it. Vista / W7 is more secure than XP and that could cause more compatibility issues. Also I would have thought that most of their testing was on XP and W7 as most people skipped Vista but I could be wrong. It’s a good ESafety tool but can cause explorer / IE crashes now and again the only problem now is our school is starting to consider purchasing devices it can’t be run on i.e. Ipads and the like at which point it becomes useless…

Sorry Im snowed under if you try searching for Cleaning projectors or the like it should pull up some threads if I get time later I will have a look. I mean the internal light path rather than the the external lens, there are multiple small mirrors and lenses inside the projector. Under the top circuiit board there is a plastic moulding that holds the lenses / mirrors in place. If you cant take a laptop apart and put it back together without having screws left over then I would not attempt to clean it yourself unless you are willing to scrap the projector anyway. If you do attemt it I would advise that you leave all of the lenses in place, if you put them back in wrong you will have a nightmare trying to figure out why the image is messed up, dont touch the mirrors at all the grease on your hands / harsh cleaners could damage them, just use somthing to blow the worst of the dust out. I would strongly advise you not to remove the prism if you do it will increase the chance of it all going pear shaped. Dont take the projector apart until the lamp has cooled, dont work on it while it is live (i.e. unplug it), be aware that capacitors can hold charge (electrocute you) even if the projector is not plugged in, be careful of static - you could damage the electronics, be careful how you handle the lamp - take it out and store it safely while you work on the projector - they are under pressure and can explode. If you still want to try then you need a nice clear working area and plenty of time a cam to take pics so you can remember where everything goes might be an idea as well.

Two things spring to mind: 1. The old bulb was left in too long and not replaced when the replace lamp warning came on and this has damaged the electronics - probably not economical to repair. 2. Dust on the optics, I clean them myself on out of warranty units but I covered electronics at college many years ago which included TV repair so I know I can do the work safely (even if I was working on the equipment while it was live which isnt necessary just to give them a basic clean). There are a few threads on cleaning projectors on here and I think one had a guide, it depends on your background and experience its not that difficult but it would be easy to make a mistake and damage the projector further if its not your area of expertise.

Hi Rage People are not having a go at you but due to experience they can see potential problems with some of the plans and are just trying to advise as best they can. We all have budgets but for core systems management should be asking how much will it cost to get a server/s that does x, y and z not here’s X amount of money go cobble something together but that is down to the management at your school and at the end of the day all you can do is advise them. Re your discussion of backup method: it’s not the media that is the issue but the way it is used i.e. with tapes you have a set which you rotate, the tapes that are not in the server should be somewhere secure in a different location secure from flooding, fire etc... If you have multiple external hdd’s and are treating them the same way as a tape solution then its fine. But if you only have a single hdd that sits on top of the server day and night then it’s at the same risk as the server is i.e. flooding, fire and electrical damage. By the way LTO4 will back up 800GB Native on a single tape and there are newer higher capacity systems available but it is a mute point because you can’t afford it if your school doesn’t take data protection seriously. “I'm the only full time IT staff ( 1 guy comes in once a week for 3 hours for extra support and that contracted existed over a year before I started)” I work at a 3 form entry primary Reception to year 6 + Nursery + a small childrens centre, IWBs and PCs in every room, laptops and a suite of 30 PCs. So that’s about 200 Machines in total although a lot of the laptops don’t get much use and I also work on my own as you do. Originally it was a split post i.e. I was supporting a second school of the same size for a number of years. For major works they should provide additional support / pay for server migration etc… but once your network is running efficiently i.e. software installed via group policy, MS updates installed from a WSUS server it will take some of the pressure off you. “I appreciate replies so far but what I really wanted was an opinion on the specification of the system I posted. is it a good price? would it be adequate for a school of 550 users approx? ( average user at a time 25 - 60) Potential to expand. (considering space is scarce I doubt much expansion would come about. maybe a few more laptops and maybe ipads)” It’s difficult to predict future load on a server who knows they could win the lottery next week and decide to buy 550 laptops your current use seems pretty low but I still would not want things like WSUS on a DC. Processor use can be quite low but you need to watch the load on the NICS and hard drives as they can get a thrashing if you have software running from network shares etc. Price – if you’re not sure then you should be asking more companies for quotes / solutions then you can show the head and say this one is in budget but this one is slightly over but has a backup solution then it’s down to them they either find the money or accept that the backup solution is poor. Our setup PDC – Curric server Admin Server- also a DC (same domain so shares logon load etc) Old curric server running WSUS, door access control system, internal intranet page Old admin server running Sophos They are all getting on a bit now but they all have raid 5 arrays with 10/15k rpm drives and gigabit connections

As was I Maybe they need to move the thread to a music forum - lol

Two things I noticed other than missing UPS 1. No mention of tape drive / backup solution 2. Raid 5 using only 4 drives - not sure how they are going to be configured but its not ideal, if all 4 drives are live then you dont have a spare hot swap if you are using 3 in the array and the forth is a spare hot swap the server will be unavailable if a drive fails until the array rebuilds with the hotswap. With 5 drives the array keeps working if one fails, ideally you would also have a hot swap i.e. 6 drives. Some will say that you should also mirror the OS and have a seperate array for the data. Note: I have had drives fail in brand new servers the more redundancy the better!

Easy Tiger – lol Careful I’ve seen photos of Hannah when she has gone clay pigeon shooting the gun was as big as she was – lol Oh and did I forget to say their dad is also in the band so watch it – lol Seriously though because they are local I’ve been going to their gigs for years and I’ve got to know them a bit, they are nice girls and are very passionate about the band / the music they produce.

Football - what is that? lol It means I like real music by some very talented people that are brilliant live not engineered pap News | The Toy Hearts They are currently recording their 4th album and have opened for the likes of Imelda May and Ricky Skaggs. The only problem is they are starting to get noticed now (radio interviews, articles in the national press etc) so it's soon going to be impossible to see them in small local venues like I've enjoyed for many years. They have quite an extensive tour including headlining at the Birmingham Glee Club in April any one that enjoys real / live music should pop along to one of their gigs.

^This I've extended partitions on 2003 servers several times and it is normal as Arthur has said, it works fine just looks a bit messy!

If the networks are on the same cabling and just have different domains then I would seriously consider scrapping the Curric domain and using the new server that will probably only have a handful of users as the DC. There is no reason to have seperate domains for admin / curric you just need to have the correct security permissions in place most schools have been doing this for years now. I was reluctant to go down this path myself originally but have not seen problems on any of the school networks I've worked on that migrated to a single domain setup. I would use the old 2003 server as a member server with the curric users / curric software on it and the old linux box if its servicable used for something such as workstation images / wsus / print server etc but you would probably need another copy of server 2003 to put on it. Things I would check what ever you do: Working UPS on each server, backup solution in place (tested). We are still using XP but I'm very aware that its living on borrowed time so any work you do now reinstalling the workstation you will have to do again before they end support completly and stop releasing updates (April 2014 - I think!). EDIT - I posted before seeing your reply but I still think the way to make the best use of your limited hardware would be to join the domains.

I know our HP modules dont work in our Cisco switches but I couldnt tell you if your allied telesis module will work in a HP switch or not. Unless someone else has already tried it you will just have to give it a go. Electrically they should be the same and you can get generic modules but I think its down to the firmware on the switch whether or not they will work; unfortunately some manufacturers force you to buy their modules and they are usually more expensive.

Windows update shouldn’t touch any apps but unless you have disabled it adobes update might uninstall it when they release a patch / new version. If the PC is switched off part way through an install or an upgrade fails it could leave the PC without a working copy of acrobat reader regardless of whether its adobes updater trying to upgrade the software or you pushing out an update via AD. I would either deploy it (like we do) via AD or put it on the base image I wouldn’t do both it just confuses things. Our base images only contain the bare min i.e. OS, drivers and DVD software everything else is pushed out via AD, yes it takes a bit longer to prep a system but there is no messing around uninstalling old versions of apps etc… Other things to look out for would be any software that has bundled an acrobat reader installation with its software or could someone simply have forgotten to include acrobat reader on one of your base images?

Maybe you have better brackets in Notts then unless you reduced the image size so it doesnt fill the entire board? The Sanyos I replaced were attached to a mounting plate specific to that model so I attached a universal bracket to the pole but I had to offset it enough to take account of the different lens position or the image would of been off the edge of the boards. The brackets I've seen have very little lateral adjustment.

MSI’s that I can deploy via AD if it’s an exe install I will throw it back at you. Licence Keys that can be pushed out with the MSI using an MST I wouldn’t mind too much but please stay away from other types of copy protection they just cause problems. If you sell unlimited site licences at fair prices schools will buy them. Network Managers i.e. people like me hate software that comes with single user licences or a handful or licences for a stupidly high cost. It doesn’t matter if only 5 kids will use a program we want to deploy it site wide so it doesn’t matter which PC they are using and we don’t want to buy more licences every time we buy a new PC / laptop. Online downloads are great, you can even give us access to updates etc that way but there are schools that still have very slow internet access so DVD / USB Mem stick in the post should be an option but given the price of hdd’s if you want to send it on a free 500GB USB hdd that’s fine Online hosting has its advantages i.e. kids can login from home you can provide a managed service i.e. install updates etc but it depends on the app i.e. do they actually need / want access outside of school. Software will always run faster on our local machines than it would via our 10mb internet connection.

@lazkopat yes you clearly said that you have replaced the lamps and because your projectors are not very old and the users are happy with the image quality they should last the school another 2 years before you need to replace them. My last comment was aimed @Chris_in_notts who didn’t realise you had Sanyo projectors and can’t replace them with Casio without some DIY / Moving the pole its not just the throw distance that’s the problem when you replace a Sanyo it’s the lens position as well. These threads can hang around for years hence my warning at the end of my last post (it wasn’t aimed at you @lazkopat) in case someone sees my post and thinks ToyHeartsFan modified his mount that means we can as well and they bodge it and the inevitable happens… I’ve only ever moved one pole but I was happy to do that one as it fixed to an “I” beam and you could probably have hung a small car from it. I also know that the modifications I have made to my existing poles are as safe as the original installations. But it most cases I would get someone like @Marc in but it just wasn’t necessary for us to do it this time when I replaced our Sanyo’s with Casio’s.

Yes the throw distance would probably have been fine but the lens is in the wrong position either the pole would have to be moved a small distance to the left (when looking at the board) or the bracket modified so the projector was offset. When looking at a Sanyo projector from the front while ceiling mounted (ie the projector is upside down) the lens is on the extreme right but on almost every other brand of projector the lens is on the extreme left. It's only 6-7 inches but the image wont line up with the interactive board if you just swap projectors. I removed the projector plate and bolted a universal mount onto the extreme right (looking from the front) of the original bracket but not everyone will want to or be able to do this in which case the pole would still need to be moved. ****Please always err on the side of caution and get someone in when moving / modifying poles unless you know what you are doing and can do it safely.****

As Marc said it will help with shadowing, it should also help a bit with ambient light conditions if the projector isn’t very bright. I think Becta might have been pushing shorter throw projectors as it supposedly reduces the risk of users looking into the projector beam which can damage eye sight. But unless you are buying the ultra short throw type (wall mount) I’m not convinced they are any safer than a projector at 3 meters. @Marc – I found that quite often the data cables come from the side it just depends on the layout of the room a number of our classes don’t have the space due to original fixed furniture at the front of the classroom for a PC so they are on a side wall (Victorian building) but in most cases a short male to female extension for the vga cable is all that would be needed. Our step ladders are about 5 foot high and you just wouldn’t be able to reach the ceiling with them to change the pole position in our school so if I needed to have a pole moved it has to be outsourced. I’m a bit wary of suggesting that people move poles themselves in case anything goes wrong. I’ve seen some bad installations some that I would consider dangerous i.e. a projector bolted to a suspended ceiling tile which you should never do.

I believe they stopped making / supporting the software quite some time ago now and moved to an online version which you pay an annual charge to access instead of having the software installed locally and having to update it every couple of years. You could try contacting them directly but they might just tell you to purchase the online version which is also the only way you can get updates now. I understand why they have done it as it guarantees an annual income and reduces support costs but for schools like ours that upgraded every couple of years rather than annually it means it will cost us more although it does remove the hassle of updating it all of the time.

I replaced 4 Sanyo XE31s with Casio XJ-M150-UJ-EDU earlier this year; the sanyos were end of life: the picture quality was very poor, they were not bright enough and the bulbs were the best part of £200. If they really were only purchased in 2009 (ours were from 2006) and the teachers are happy with the image quality (even on a bright sunny day) then it might be woth buying 1 set of lamps which would give then a couple of more years life but then I would replace them. The casio projectors are expensive but should pay for themselves over time. One thing to remember is that Sanyo have the lens on the opposite side to almost every other manufacturer so its not a simple swap. You may well have to move your pole even if the throw distance is correct; With some DIY I managed to fit a universal bracket onto our existing pole and offset it enough so the pole did not have to be moved saving us at least £200 per room on installation costs. If you decide to move the pole yourself or modify the existing mount as we have done you need to be sure you know what you are doing because a projector falling from height has the potential to cause serious injury/death.

I’ve used both of these companies, prices seem competitive and service has been ok (I’ve no links with either). http://www.avpartsmaster.net http://www.suppliesforschools.com It depends on the age, spec and condition of the projector whether it’s worth getting a new lamp. We have one old Sanyo PLC - SE10 and despite the image still being very good a new bulb is the best part of £200 so it will get replaced after Xmas with one of the Casio bulb less ones. Others that still have a good image and reasonably priced lamps get an in house deep clean and new lamp. If your projector is an old model that isn’t in production any more then the lamps could be in short supply hence the high prices you are finding. Prices for lamps are still expensive some models are worse than others but thankfully in most cases they are still better than they were a few years ago.