jmak

Out of interest does that mean you think it's a good or a bad idea? Some people would say 10% failure is quite high, others would expect higher attrition than that in schools.

I came across LPO.exe which is an official MS utility for recording and importing local group policy settings. I just wondered whether anyone had any hints - or heinous warnings! I'm used to a Windows domain with full group policy and deployment using MDT/WDS but am now working in an environment with neither. I'd like to steer them towards Intune, but that won't be overnight so I'm looking for some quick wins which is why I'm hunting around for ways of quickly adjusting settings. I've made a few .reg files, but they're not so easy to change back for other people.

Your file name says it all really...

I'd second the recommendation for ICT Direct - I've had some really good value kit from them. £1500 isn't enough for 10 devices that will survive 3 years in school. And if you're buying 2nd hand kit, you need a plan for what to do when they're not supported on Windows 11 and windows 10 gives out of support in three and a half years.

At my new place we have lots of client machines that aren't and never will be part of AD. We have Intune available through Microsoft 365 subscriptions, but it's never been used. First question: can we use it without a domain? (potentially several different domains, some LDAP, some BYOD and some (internet connected) standalone machines) Secondly: any particular guides you recommend?

If I had excess solar, I'd just hang it up outside!

Charging by fuel duty used to work quite well. Less efficient car or drive it more means you pay more fuel duty. I now have an electric car and electric heating. I pay much less duty on fuel for my car than I used to, but much more than I used to on my heating (VAT is the same but there's an environmental levy). Per mile charging would depend on either GPS tracking of all vehicle movements (no thanks) or a transponder of some kind sending information on distance travelled to "the authorities" and some kind of charging mechanism. Not sure how people would take to being sent an invoice at the end of the month for the miles they'd travelled.

(of) trust

And notoriously unclear terms and conditions are intended to make it as easy as possible to claim... [/sarcasm]

Looking at https://rippleenergy.com (community owned windfarm). Slightly more per kW from what I can see, but my electricity usage is ⅓ electric car (nighttime, so I'd need to factor in a home battery to get the maximum benefit from solar panels) and ⅓ heating (winter, so less solar available). I know you can sell your solar back to the grid, but from what I've read, to get best value you need to use what you generate. Ironically, I suspect on a day like today they might have to turn them off because of too much wind!

Chocolate

Email from Amazon:

^^Second this. When we looked, Ricoh were on the framework and we ran them for 4 years while I was at the school. Problem free and excellent maintenance service. It was a step down in price and up in quality from the Konica we had before - but these things do change.

Returning to my earlier response suggesting making friends.... Scratch that. This looks like war! More seriously, that is a management issue and needs to be stamped out.

Trap ..

Couple of questions regarding sharing: 1) If I have a project where I'm working with the same group of external people (consultants, employees of an organisation with M365 accounts on a different tenancy), can I make a group so that I can share a SharePoint site or OneDrive for business folder with them so that I don't have to individually add them as external users every time? 2) Does MS Stream (on paid M365 tenancy) allow video sharing with external people? I've found MS answers from 2018 saying no, but they're working on it and answers from support companies from 2021 saying it's now stored in SharePoint or OneDrive, so you have the same sharing options as any other file type. Thanks in advance.

Tricky has six letters [emoji12]

Exact details will vary depending on what RAID controller you're using, but I think* you will need to initiate the rebuild from the controller. Some controllers have an option to auto-rebuild, but even if yours does, it might not have been set. It is possible to set a hot spare, but that's for a scenario where you have the correct number of drives plus one. *Citation needed...

Piste [emoji57]

Tar ...

Playing devil's advocate - you all know me by now - how often are there posts on here about stuff being left on unnecessarily and teachers thinking electricity is free because they don't pay for it? There's absolutely no way servers or network equipment should be turned off, but instead of starting a fight, maybe try and make an ally? I wouldn't be surprised if he's been set a target to reduce electricity use - or he might have thought of it himself. Electricity prices have increased by 50% recently which will have a noticeable impact on school budgets.

You mentioned phones as hotspots. Does that mean you're also missing internet access from your site or do wired devices still have access?

Catastrophe

Seven (layer OSI model)

Hospital