CamelMan

Groan... What's ET short for ? he's only got little legs

Doesn't that invalidate warranties and open up them up for additional virus / hacking?

Try Meraki - Just looking at it now (signed up yesterday). Looks like it might do what you want.

We dont use Ipads here (at the moment at least) but ICloud / Dropbox / Emailing themselves could be options. Good luck!

We have Axis cameras and and Axis server here. My impression is that it works -> quality is OK -> expensive (you need licences for each camera). We had another part of the build being covered with external CCTV (the traditional non IP route) worked out a lot cheaper and better quality picture.

Blocked here by LEA - Reason P0rn0graphy. What kind of trees are they???!

The two for me is the network and PAT testing. Nothing should be plugged into the network without your say so period. There was a major virus (Sasser) released around all the schools in our area because someone brought a laptop in from home, therefore bypassing the firewalls and LEA protection. I always trot this story out if any questions the policy. Not sure if it a legal thing or just our school however there is a policy that nothing electrical should be plugged in if it has not been PAT tested by the school. People obviously ignore this with kettles and phone chargers etc - however it gives you an angle. Oh and if the Interactive board has software you could always try the licensing angle.

Your right - you cant throw monitors and pc's in the bin - you also cant take them to a skip (well if you take one at a time and pass off as your own you can but thats not the point). We've used Ecosystems in the past -> they pickup for free and they clean it all up and try to sell it on. Any profit is then (in theory) split between them and you. The picked up the lot from us (mice, keyboards, box of old bits etc) and there are various options like getting the HD's drilled through. Main thing is they dont charge you for pickups like alot of companies seem to be trying. Hope that helps!

I think this was the point behind my side note - gender specific (or ethnic or what ever else *ic) encouragement or advertising is one thing. Discrimination is discrimination is discrimination. Not giving someone a job based on their gender is wrong. Giving someone a job due to their gender is wrong. Maybe I have a weird view of the world - but surely skills, compentence and suitablility are what should get you a job - not "he is a bloke so is better" or "We havent met our quota of <> they will have to have it". It depresses me a bit that peoples solution to discrimination is more discrimination.

I can answer a bit on behalf of my wife if thats of any help: 7 years in IT Excluding straight after school stuff (pick up put down jobs) she went into IT Private IT support company, major line IT sales company, IT Tech, Lead Tech, Network Manager 2 interviews No - in "the office" she'd feel excluded from some banter (nothing against her directly -> just guys talking guys stuff) out in schools it helped as alot of staff are female and they liked having a female come out to see them. Could argue minor sexism on both counts but overall it never bothered her. Being female had never worked against her getting a job in the first place. She said that most people in the industry actually went out of their way to help her (lifting boxes etc) Never considered IT at school - she just kinda of fell into it afterwards. Hope that helps As a side note a group of us went to look around a university when we were applying (basically lets go check the uni and city out and have a few beers) and one of our other friends (not applying for any uni) tagged along for the ride. When we were speaking to an admission's guy about grades etc - he turned to our female 'tag along friend' and basically told her that obviously the limits would be lower for her to encourage more girls. Now Im all for encouraging but this basic sexism (your a boy you have higher targets than the girl sitting next to you). Thought it might be useful as a look from "the other side" of the sexism debate. Would be interesting if this kind of "encouragement" makes up part of the debate.

Thank you - thats the site I was trying to re find!

I looked into education copyright and it does differ a little from regular copyright (btw Im no expert and found myself going around in circles at times) My understanding is: A: Depending on where the music came from it might be ok - there is a term used called "fair use" which excuses alot of things for education. If the teacher is ripping CD's and sharing them with the kids I'd say thats a no no. If they are allowing them to use bits of music here and there this might be considered fair use* B: I'm guessing youtube -> this is against the T&C's of the use of the site so would be a no without permission. *might be of help: Education World: Is Fair Use a License to Steal? Good luck - its a mine field!

Wifi + IPads = answer to all educational issues. Apparently...... Good point by OP - so you stick £15,000 worth of wireless infrastructure in - then what? What about all the wireless equipment for the students to embrace their "digital learning", BYOD infrastructure and policies. A carefully planned and managed steady introduction of integration of IT into all levels of education as well as training and additional funding to support existing and future developments? Nah cut the funding then tell them all they just need more wireless everywhere. Wifi is great - but IMHO not as vital as people seem to see (as in you don't need it to teach - better equipment and teacher embracing of current tech would be as benificial for students. Some of our teachers think its magic when you show them how to freeze a projector for crying out loud)

Have to say "Industry Standard" is absolute cr@p. Which industry? - Teaching nope, Sixth Form nope, university nope, big bad world nope. We have a music suite which is all mac - simply because they wanted Logic. The costs to bring it all in and set it up just from 1 piece of software is ridiculous (I wasn't here at the time). Again the argument is always "its music and you have to do it on a mac as its better and the industry standard" - absolute rubbish - the innards are the same and you are running a program - the OS is pretty irrelevent at this stage. I have no problem with Apple (I'm MacOS Support trained and used one at home for a few years) however I cannot see why a 6th form would need Macs - our 6th form use their PC's for surfing the web and working on assignments in Office - nothing that needs a specific OS. If you have an AD infrastructure I cannot see the logic in putting in a Mac suite. Save yourself the money and time and stress. Macs are very good machines and are pretty - just not cost effective in most circumstances.

I've noticed that when you plug them in first time they can take a while to install as it tries to go off to Windows Update to pull the latest drivers down (which it cant get to) so it'll wait for a time out before continuing. Unplugging the network (if installing mouse) or clicking on the Skip text in the installation window will speed it up. Shouldnt be doing it on every boot though - are you using deep freeze or similar?

Ah - but look on the bright side: if you ever go for a job where the "technical task" is replacing a HD / DVD Drive / Mobo you've seen the worst! Had a couple to do with Dell optiplex's - if you've never seen one before then it could throw you. Luckly I'd been working on Dells for the previous 2 years

The great thing about IT is that you can "have a blonde moment" and no one will know (unless you post it on Edugeek!). Lost count of the amount of times i've scratched my head over things - why isnt the PC starting (plug the effing PSU in), my remote connection to the server dropped (I've changed network details) etc etc. On your note - can you not boot into something like BartPE and tinker with reg settings? might save some time over a fresh rebuild.

One thing to point out (if you havent used SSD's before) - be gentle with them! The power and Sata connections at the back tend to be thin plastic and snap easily! "I'll just balance this here to build before screwing it in... B0#&%>$S!!" (x 2 )

I've used YouSentit before for something similar - you basically upload a file and they send the target an email with a link and password to download it. Has come in useful for sending a few huge documents!

Have been using OCZ agility and Vertex's, Intels and Verbatim's for around 6 months across the site and for personal use - no faults or failures. I think one of the OCZ'd won a TomsHardware award as well. Also there can be difference in speed and stability - depending on the type, age etc. - however as Zag said - in real world terms most of the newer drives will be much of a muchness.

If your stuck for stuff like this - I normally check out Tomshardware and look for the latest comparison run. They tend to break to into price brackets - decide on your budget and check out the sort of thing you get for your £'s. Might not give you "the one for you" but might point you in the right sort of direction.

If your going to do it - concise and clear is probably best - if its aimed at teaching staff any technical term is "techno babble" so simple would be the way to go. If you were to be sent a 5 page, text heavy document about the goings on of the history department (no offence to history)- would you read it?

When I first started here I setup a monthly email IT newsletter - basically outlining what we had coming up, new innovations, notification of work, what we do, how to book stuff, a "Dont forget" section for common issues etc. Trying to push the whole communication thing, break down barriers and have the whole open and transparent vibe. I ditched it after 6 editions as it was clear hardly anyone was reading it - the final straw was a teacher saying "oh we're getting that - you should really tell people about stuff like that before doing it" in a patronising way. It. Had. been. in. 3. newsletters. Its a shame as there was one teacher who always thanked me for it - its just a shame the other 115 ignored it.

This is a big point for me - I have seen several forum entries previously with "The school / Head/ SLT/ has just bought.." or "I have just been told to order.." - There appears to be a case of "we are a school - we have to have ipads!" rather than - this is the problem and the IPad is the most appropriate solution. Evangelists are targeting Heads and SLT and telling them that they have to go down this approach - often citing Essa - and they are then blindly obeyed. There appears to be no evaluation, planning, product research, testing or financial feasibility study involved. I have no problem with innovating or changing approach on things if needed - but I am seeing more and more "get the shiny thing in and make it work" rather than we have this problem / we need to do this - what is the best solution. If IPads are the ideal solution for you then great - however there appears to be this myth in education that everyone has to have IPads to learn in the modern era. We seem to be bringing in a device because of what it is then altering or installing all the systems around it to make it work in the way we need - as opposed to identifying what we want to do and tailoring the solution into our existing system.

We've jumped from Serco Facility / Eportal to SIMS in September and (touch wood) had no major problems so far. I think you will have problems with any complex system like an MIS - it all comes down to support and cost IMO.