starscream

ooo good idea. They don't look as pretty though! Ha! I guess they will offer better cooling? Is cooling ever an issue with the blades? Are blades 2U?

Again, when mixing down I would try to keep it to the local machine to keep the compilation time down. Nothing worse than waiting hours to see your results then finding you have to do it again!

Bet you have long mixdown times though. Movie maker is very limited and I doubt you would have a dedicated machine for it. Pinnacle is good but too simple for my liking. If it is for projects then I think something more beefy would be better like Premiere but if it is for whole classes then move maker is good, but I think the best quality is something like 2.1mbps or something.

If it were me I would go for lots of memory and a decent graphics card. Obviously firewire is a must. There are graphics cards out there that are specifically designed for video editing rather than gaming so I would bare this in mind. Oh and lots of fast hard drive space. I would have said video editing can be one of the most intensive jobs asked of a computer. I think a lot of them perform the same during the editing side of things. Where you get benefits from size and speed is during the mixdown stage where effects are generated quicker, this I think is where the mac wins). I have done lots of editing with poor computers and managed to edit fine until th mixdown took hours and hours to complete for a 20 min vid. I heard macs are better for video editing, more efficient etc. What software would you be running? I get good quick results with pinnacle, but if you're looking for some more industry standard then you would need something like Adobe Premiere or something better still. I think some macs come with video editing software as standard. I have never owned a mac or used one much but I have drooled over them on several occasions!

Hi All. I am ordering a new Dell server for one of my primary school's today. It is a poweredge. In the past we always had towers as we only had one server to worry about, however, in the future I plan to have backup servers, RIS servers etc.. Only problem is we have very limited space in the server room (cupboard!). We don't have a full side racking system yet but I would like one eventually. At the moment we have a comms cab that is attached to the wall up a height. It is not very deep and can't accomodate a rack mounted server, we would need a floor standing one for that. ..my dilemma is this.... Do I buy a tower server again that can sit on the floor save in the knowledge it is fairly robust and sturdy but in a few years when we get a rack system it will still be on the floor? Or Do I buy a rack server now and sit it on the floor or some other precarious place and then when we get the rack it can be cleanly mounted along with any other servers we may have acquired by then? I guess it is a choice between worrying about the present or the future. Also I can't even be 100% certain we would even get a rack system. But it would be top of my wish list. I think both form factors cost the same. Are there any other things to consider when picking a FF. For example, do the blades offer as much cooling as the towers? Would we need extra cooling for a rack server? Cheers in advance. John

Wasn't there a new driver release in the last month or so? Just an idea if it is pen related.

I think it is a company he acquired rather than set up. Xenon I think are another company in their own right but manage the hardware side of Viglen. I can't remember, I was told at the Classlink training years ago all about it, which itself was held at the Xenon HQ in Altrincham.

I have been trying Italc for a few days now in a virtual domain. Seems to be a great tool for teachers to use and doesn't offer the level of control that Lanview does so prevents teacher's messing things up. I have noticed though that I have to wait a good few minutes once the server and clients are online before the connectivity between them works. Maybes this could be down to some latency in VMWare or something. I am going to test it more before making it live on our networks. I am a little concerned that I get an error after logon on the client machine about the italc service crashing or something but it still works fine. This could be down to my virtual machine, will have to create a new one. This is the reason I found this forum actually as I was searching for people who use italc. It looks very similar to the remote control software offered by viglen and ranger. A lot cheaper though! ha!

Would that be the same problem that you detailed in http://www.edugeek.net/index.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=7617 where you say the fault was actually with the wireless network card drivers? And your point is? We paid for a managed service that didn't work. I don't care what causes the problem, I just want it to work and Viglen failed us on that. They shouldn't be selling it as a solution if it doesn't work, they should use different hardware in that case, or when we logged the faults they should have repaired. You can tell me how great Viglen is all you want but again I am just listing my BAD EXPERIENCES, this is what this forum is for after all! I can't believe I am being slated for listing my experiences with Viglen, everyone has their own views but you can't tell me our network worked fine when it blatently didn't and Viglen never repaired it. That is the end of the story. Yes it may have worked fine for you, but not for me. I am not going to post my good experiences in a bad experiences forum. Can't you understand that? I am a mellow person, I don't flame on the internet (or at least try not to) I have simply listed my own experiences with the company and I am being told that I am wrong. If I am so wrong then come and tell me why Viglen didn't fix it? It has been reported many times and you have to give in and get on with it eventually, they is only so many hours, days and weeks you can devote to contacting their tech support. A company the size of Viglen will always have to sub contract. I'm surprised they left you with no working whiteboards and dangerous wiring. I never said they left us with it, they fixed it.... eventually. It took them 6 months to fix the problems, 6 months without whiteboards. Yes I agree they may have to sub contract but the whole situation should never have happened. For example, you have only praises for Viglen, I telling of how they have let us down. Their sub contractors should have done a proper job. It is Viglen's fault if they don't and Xenon (viglen's hardware section) didn't do a very good job repairing the damage. At least it works now. I have many more complaints and praises but I am concentrating on the major issues. It's all about balance. It's very easy for someone to come on the Internet and write a list of bad things about a company. That can be very damaging to the company. Yes, we all want to be warned of bad experiences, but please try to keep it balanced. From reading your initial post it would seem that Viglen have never supplied you with anything that you were satisfied with. Is that the case? I'd be surprised if it were. It's always easy to knock the big boys but think carefully before you do it with such gusto. Again I can't stress it anymore that this is a bad experiences forum and I am posting bad experiences, I see nothing wrong with that I am doing. What is the point in saying that the service they provided us with was terrible, but the support tech on the phone was pleasant? When you say to balance it, why should I balance it if the bad outweigh the good? I have never been slated so much in a forum on the internet before. I posted my bad experiences in a bad experience forum. I can't say that Viglen served us well if they didn't. I can't make up good points just to make it look like they aren't that bad. For us they were that bad. Maybes I am a perfectionist but when I buy something, I want it to work. It is exactly the situation as buying a car that doesn't work, you would refuse to take it if it didn't move. Problem here is we had no choice as it was all installed. Only my lack of interest from senior management prevented us from taking legal action. No body could be bothered with the hassle. Like I said previously, I am very happy that some of you have had good experiences with Viglen. Again I am extremely disappointed and upset to find that people can't accept my experiences. It is as if I have been branded a liar just because I am making people aware of experiences I have had. I have nothing against you coming on here and listing good experiences that you have had to try and balance it out but what I don't agree with is you picking my posts apart and trying to counter balance them with my lack of balance. It just doesn't seem like a nice thing to do. I am not a bad guy here, I am quite a nice fella, or so I am told. The last thing I joined this forum for was to have non-constructive arguments with people. It is almost as if I am saying "this is how our experience was/is" and as you are saying "no it's not". Over and under setting voltages can have stable and unstable effects on systems but I am fairly sure the voltages in this case were set incorrectly due to incompetance as when I spoke to the tech support he said they should have been set at the voltage I said they should have been set at. He admitted they were at the wrong setting. This was a viglen engineer. I didn't need to explain this initially as I didn't think people would start to rip my post apart again. In the end the engineer agreed with me that it seems the incorrect voltage is what caused the CPUs to become unstable now. The same effect that overclocking a CPU for a prolonged period has. CPUs are such a tricky issue to diagnose in my opinion, especially intermittent problems such as random lock ups. I had also tried replacing all over parts of the laptop (test laptop from the suite) and only when the cpu was replaced did the problem get fixed. I can't remember now but I think the computer was set to a p4 voltage instead of a celeron voltage. The laptop was by default a p4 laptop and the voltage for the cpu had not been changed during the installation. ....I don't like to make long posts, honest I don't! I would like to become a valued member of this website and honestly did not aim for this type of reaction. I just thought it would go down as a listed bad experience.

Well I am please some people have had good experiences. I am also please some people have had bad experiences as it is warming to know others have suffered similarly.

How did the servers fall apart? Cheap components, mobo failures, cheap memory. Just cheap in general. The price tag wasn't. CD drives in classrooms are just asking for trouble. The abuse they get means they last no time at all. The kids never seem to mess on with the CD drives here. Just the drives viglen use are again cheap and tatty and aren't up to the job. I use cd booting for imaging and it is a real pain. What were the wireless access points inferior to? Better wireless access points. One's that work. From day one our wireless network didn't work like I explained in my initial post. Viglen failed to fix it after 6 on site attempts and in the end they just shrugged their shoulders! Absolute disgrace if you ask me. They recommended us the kit to do the job and turns out we needed better kit. As you know, primary school money doesnt grow on trees so we can't just go and replace them with better kit. I have used cisco units in other schools and I must say they work flawlessly. The faulty kit is d-link. Even had d-link engineers out to look at them and they just gave in too. How much can you push something? It was becoming a full time job changing up account managers and tech support at viglen. They sacked 3 account managers in the space of 12 months, how can you get problems solved when thye do that. We also had our IWBs installed by Viglen who at the time didn't have enough staff to do the install so they subcontracted and the company who came in were cowboys and basically destroyed the place. Luckily it is getting knocked down next year! Viglen admitted the fault and did minimal to correct this. All of our whiteboards were condemned by health and safety a week after they were installed due to dangerous wiring. Three yeears for a laptop that's being used in an educational environment is good. I wouldn't complain about that. I disagree, I think 3 years for laptops is a disgrace and 5 years is more appropriate. Yes I admit they will get knocked around but the reason these laptops are inoperable now is Viglen's incompetence when building them. I know how they made the mistake, because they buy chassis in and add the parts themselves, just their staff have not been told to change the mobo voltage to match the cpu therefore all cpu's are now damaged. What does 'I swear down' mean? I didn't realise this was a local phrase, always thought it was common around the country. If you swear down it is a way of catching yourself before going into a rant or swearing. Usually it would be followed by a rant for example "I swear down that if I see you round here again I will...." Sorry for not being clear here. I worked in a school that had Viglen kit and the customer support (on the very few occasions we needed it) was always excellent. The fact they didn't fix any of the problems above leads me to believe their support is terrible. I have had some good experiences with them but the bad outweigh the good many times over. Perhaps he learned to be objective about all things. Nothing is ever always good, or bad. Maybe if you learn that too there will be hope for you yet. Is this forum not about 'Bad Experiences' sorry I will post about good experiences here. I know people have good ad bad experiences and it is not normally the good that you hear about, it is almost always the bad, but I am new to the forum, saw the Viglen thread in Bad Experiences and thought I would post about mine, very sorry for being so negative. Perhaps I will be more upbeat when complaining in future! ...Also I did not realise this was such as old post as I got into reading it. Sorry for digging up the past!

I love working in primary schools and hate it too! I work in 4 primary schools, 2 infant schools and 2 full primary schools, used to be 3 infant schools but 1 shut down. My biggest complain is of course lack of a base. My bases comprise of... 1. IT Suite 2. Standing in hall all day at a check height bench! 3. Staff room if it is not in use 4. Library if it is not in use The worst thing is getting kicked out of the IT Suite for guitar lessons and getting kicked out of staff rooms for special needs things and getting kicked out of the library for exams and other stuff. I am always moving around. What I refuse to do though is to work in any of the server rooms and these are usually cupboards with cleaning stuff in, I would rather be in the hall! I am a bit gutted as one of the schools is moving to a new site in the summer and there is no ICT suite! That's right! someone high up in education is tell schools not to have it suites in their new buildings. It is a stupid idea, means we rely 90% on wireless laptops, and we all know how reliable laptops are! Other than that I enjoy the everyday tasks and it is a challenge to fix everything in the field. ...And yes it is sad but very cool nontheless when the kids gasp in amazement when you open computers up before their very eyes!

anyone know any companies that do this in the North East? I can only find manchester based ones that cost the earth. We did have a local company that removed each item for £4 each and all cabling and what not was free and they even gave us a document with all the serial numbers of equipment disposed of. Shame but they've shut down now.

I also think that the Viglen hardware is tosh! Wireless laptops not working wirelessly. Servers that start to fall apart a few months down the line. CD drives breaking in desktops all the time and half of the drives wont allow booting from CD anymore! Sold us inferior wireless access points. We also had a laptop suite of 12 laptops and after 3 years they all started to lock up, every single one. Nothing had changed! I did an investigation and took some apart and turns out that the voltage was set wrong on every single laptop and it had fried the processor and made it unstable! I swear down, if I ever see another Viglen machine!.... ...and you know what Viglen's answer was to all our problems? To keep us holding on and waiting for as long as it took for me to give in and stop ringing and complaining. Not one problem was sorted. They tried to fix the problems onsite and return to base but in the end after all the backwards and forwards I simply gave in. There is only so long you can spent chasing stuff like this up, in the end I just replaced all the Viglen tosh. I have no idea how Sir Alan Sugar is so rich when he provides services like this. There's hope for me yet!

I found limewire on a few laptops and lots of games where teacher's obviously loaned the laptop to their families! I clamp down it and uninstall anything like this. We are only just getting an AUP into effect now as our LEA is forcing us to make them. Personally though I think the LEA should make the AUP not the school as it can get quite in depth and how do you know you have covered every eventuality? I think it needs a security expert to write an AUP. I have tried my best with what resources I had but I still think there is holes in it. I should not be lying in bed thinking about things to put in the AUP, there should be a set of AUP rules set out from the LEA, if they want us to have them, then they should provide them! What software do you guys use to restrict teacher laptops? Do you just prevent them installing software and changing settings? Another issue we find is laptops being used on the net at home, when people use a school laptop at home on the net they bypass all our filtering and security in school, surely this is a massive threat to the network when it is reconnected. Personally I think that any laptop connected to the net outside home should be checked over before reconnection at school, but you can't possibly do this every day. If I put in our AUP that people can't use their laptops at home, all hell will break lose, but I won't have any viruses or spyware to worry about in future.

I hate report assist. We get it every year in one of my schools. Previously it was made by a company called Simple-Logic. Personally I don't think the software is either 'Simple' nor 'Logic'. What I do with it now is set up the new 2007 RA up to backup to the Report Assist folder, which is bizarrely in the program files folder instead of My Docs like it used to be! I thought it made more sense nowadays for software to use folders in my docs for their saves rather than in the program folder??? duh! Anyway I have it set up to backup to the hard drive and then use our backup software to include this folder so the teachers never have to use an USB memory stick (we dont have any dedicated usb sticks for report assist) or floppy (non of our laptops have floppy drives now and USB drives would be took much of a chew on.) What's wrong with doing reports in word like everyone else?

I have nothing but trouble with APs. Viglen installed our network and the engineer didn't test all 20 laptops connecting in 1 classroom as he didn' have access to 20 people to log them on at the same time. So when he left all worked well, as soon as we came to log on 20 at one all hell broke loose. This was 2 years and only half of the machines could connect. Bandwidth bottleneck. I tell complained about how useless the access points were and then a new update was released for them and this took the number of connected machines up to 12 out of 20. I then complained some more and got the APs changed for better ones (old and new were dlink). 16 out of 20. Then there was an update for the intel wireless pro internals cards inthe laptops. 20 out of 20! It was the cards all along! But I am sure the new APs helped a lot too. But even now we will have 2 or 3 laptops that suddenly decide to not connect to the wireless profile prior to log on which needs an admin to log on locally to connect the profile then it works again for weeks and then bam, happens again. This chew on has lead me to believe that wireless networks are a bit of a black magic and have a mind of their own. All we can do it try to make them work as well as possible. I would love to hear from people who have a wireless network working 100% fine. If so I need their hardware!

I am installing some new Vanilla client server networks in 3 of our schools. We will be running XP Pro with Server 2003 and using Ranger Primary for user management and profiles etc... To make my life easier I was wanting to run pretty much all of the software from a shared drive on the server rather than locally install it on every machine. I suppose it would be similar to a think client set up but have windows installed locally as some of the software needs decent hardware. None of the software is big enough for me to think it would run too slow. The max number of clients in any of the schools is around 40. Some schools have laptop suites, other's don't. My primary concern of doing this would be a bandwidth bottleneck at the wireless access points if a suite of 10 laptops are trying to run software over the network from the server. We run a 10/100 network with decent switches, one of which is a managed switch. The server spec is the following: Dell Power Edge Dual Core Xeon 2.13 1gig Ram 2 x 146 SCSI hard drives The client spec varies from P3 up to P4. 256 to 512 memory. Could anyone give me their experiences of running a network with minimal sofware installed on the clients. The main reason I want this is that we have a huge mix of different computer hardware and I don't of any hardware independent disk imaging method. I know another option would be to install windows on all the clients and use RIS or MSI files to install software to clients but this would take too long to set up I think. Thanks John

I was considering this a while back but for the same reasons as you I decided against it and went for ranger. It looks amazing, everything you could want all built in, but i think it is too good to be true. If it was a good as they say it is then they would be throwing at you but instead there is no pricing etc. Perhaps you have to buy through a reseller like ranger. The website and everything seems very amateur though in my opinion.