dgsmith

Just installed this over and weekend, and after fixing a few minor issues in the config file, got it working fine now. I am not too happy with using basic authentication though. I tried switching over to digest but now it seems only domain admin accounts can authenticate and it won't accept the credentials of non-admin accounts. Am I naive in thinking it is that easy? Is there a reason why we should be using basic and not digest? Is there a reason why only domain admin accounts only work on digest, but any valid account will work on basic? I also tried to enable forms authentication but got an error about an invalid/non-existant login script file, so reverted that for the time being. All I need now is to get our LEA to open up access to it externally and we're ready to go, but just a bit concerned about using basic authentication! Also quite annoying that you need to close the broswer to log off - can this be improved upon in a future release to have an actual logoff procedure? I see it has been discussed already but merely stating the point I am making!

Our white toner comes from the sky - enough outside at the moment to last us past Christmas I think! I think everyone else has the same idea though as there seems to be less and less as each day passes..

Hey, they're really good! By posting these, are you giving permission for other schools to use them too (i'd really like to put them on our VLE!) This is rather cheeky, but do you have just a blank background icon so we can add our own pictures to create additional icons we'd need? Also, if you could let us know what font the text is, that would be great

Ok, but this has been a problem since the PCs were new, not a developing fault over time. Would this simply be a case of getting the batteries replaced or is it the mobos that aren't sending proepr charge? I must say there has never been a problem with the system time on the computer resetting or anything like that though.

Would this effect normal operation of the computer though, should this be the case? I suppose when we get a few moments we could check a few, though the operation of the PC is unaffected once it is in normal use. I suppose it's one of the few things we haven't checked yet, and not many other options open other than trying to get some PSUs swapped.. Just checked several on cpu-z (one that experienced the issue this morning and some others), and they all seem to have the exact same RAM, right down the manu, part numbers and speed. Bummer, as I thought there may have been some in this then!

USB mice and USB keyboards only, with no other USB cables/connections. Some are PS/2 mice though it happens on the PS/2 and USB connected machines.

Looked through the BIOS on a few countless times (I do it every few months when it gets very annoying) but never found anything obvious in there. One machine could be fine for some time, this will happen, then be fine again. There isn't any consistancy. Interesting note about the PSUs - they're under warranty but how would we justify getting some swapped to test this?

We've had what I assume is a hibernation problem with a particular batch of PCs for some time (like, 2 years) and it really is getting frustrating now. I'll come in of a morning and find a handful are powered up, but are in an indefinate sleep/hibernation mode and not even a reboot will bring them out - you have to physically cut the power to the machine and plug back in to bring these back. We have tried updating the BIOS and even the drastic action of physically swapping the entire classroom with another suite of machines but the same thing happens in either room. Rather annoying as you see the power light on the chassis lit up so at a glance you think it is on, although the LED light on the mouse is not lit up and it is effectively "off". These can not be woken by WOL or keyboard input or by off/on (other than the physical power cut as noted above). The computers where custom built by a company some here will know of, although as the components inside are very industry standard I don't think it's fair to blame the company who assembled them (as it could be a simple issue). Needless to say, it's very frustrating. They boot up and and can be used through the day, so it seems some just decide to go to hibernation for no reason when the majority of the others are fine (and which ones it happens to is random).

Confirmed that it is just 3yrs unlimited (so unlimited within the 3yrs), which is what I expected but not let to believe. I thought it was too good to be true! Needless to say the same model with the free lamp which is £15 cheaper is the better option!

We're looking to get a new Epson projector and tend to always seek projectors that have a free lamp. Insight have a good price however upon contacting them, was told that Epson provide an "unlimited" lamp warranty to education customers, meaning we'd never need to buy a replacement lamp for the projector for as long as we own it. I've never known this before, and other suppliers who have quoted on this for us have mentioned either 3 or 4 year lamp warranty, but no mention of an "unlimited" one. Anyone have any experience of this and could maybe shed some light as to whether this is genuine or not? Is it just via certain suppliers or anyone? I don't doubt for a minute that Insight would exaggerate this and I am waiting for some literature on this to have it in writing, though hearing it from someone else would be good too! Seems too good to be true in some ways..

Mind poking Tom and seeing how my "filter hold release queue" feature request is getting on? =)

Well he did say < 500m, so that could mean 400 or even 300m, either of which is less than a quarter of a mile and in an "emergency" situation you're likely to test your physical fitness so I guess you could run that distance in 3mins =) 11 miles for me. 20-25mins to get there, 35-40mins to get back (I come home in during worst peak time traffic). Quickest I have done the journey is just shy of 20mins during the middle of the night!

You're not a HP employee undercover are you, trying to pursuade those of us with compat toners to go HP OEM? It could have been a duff chip (some printers with LCD screens can show the error message associated with bad chips, so I guess those without LCD screens just have a colour combination).

Pretty much every conceivable foreign website TLD, and whitelist those that teachers ask for, which isn't many and very rarely. You will find alot of game sites in foreign languages with a non-english word for "game" (which we block) allowing them to bypass it.

False economy is an interesting one, as it depends how new or how powerful the refurbished computers you are getting are. The ones we are getting are near enough in-line with the current specification of new ones (we got a bunch of DC7900s 2 months ago with the E8400 CPU, which is better than most of the brand new core 2-based offerings still on the market currently). These DC7900s where at most 18 months old (a few where just a year old) yet it works out we're saving more loosing that year than we would paying for brand new and gaining that extra year. If you're getting a 3-4 year old computer then fair enough it is false economy and likely not going to last long at all. I think the term "refurbished" is used loosely - probably more accurately just to say "2nd hand/used", although I think to classify as refurbished it has to be in or close to the same state it was when it was brand new, but not actually being "brand new" (although it could cosmetically be as such).

Seems fairly mixed then. Whilst we have proper replacement plans in place (purchasing new for the old), we doubt they'll actually be active again until the budgets start to improve. We were fortunate to find SCC selling refurbished DC7800 SFF units via ebay for £150 each exc VAT, so naturally snapped them up and they're fantastic - quite hard to justify paying new when you can buy a 2yr old refurb, 2.6Ghz core 2, 4GB ram and 250GB HDD for £150. The only thing that concerns me is that, should going down the refurb route prove a wise move in our time of financial desperation, the powers that be may not see a need to revert to the "new" route once finances start to improve. For us, it's a massive shift away from a 90% RM hardware network 2 years ago to an increasing number of non-RM machines but still fantastic spec. Only downside is the warranty, given we're used to having a minimum of 3 years on any desktop computer, whereas these HPs have less than a year left. May have to start looking at projectors on ebay too - we run an "as and when it dies" scheme which is never good when one actually does die! The bulk of ours are from 04-05 and I highly doubt any en-masse replacement of these will take place any time soon, and I wouldn't trust a refurbished projector like I would a desktop!

Up until 18-24 months ago, the term "refurbished" wasn't one that was thrown around too much in our school (in fact, I don't really think i'd ever used it when referring to hardware procurement). Now though, we're buying desktops and monitors with this classification and I anticipate this trend ongoing for the foreseeable. I'm curious as to how other schools are managing with budgets that could barely buy a packet of crisps (ok, slight exaggeration, but you catch my drift). Recently for us, it's been some HP DC7900s from John @ ICT-Direct and some HP DC7800s from SCHTrade (affiliated with SCC). Monitors are pretty much all coming from ebay these days! Are there any schools that are still able to source hardware at the same price-point as they did 2 years ago or has the axe come down pretty much everywhere now? What's quite laughable is that we'd easily spend £550 per student laptop about 2 years ago, but now we're struggling to find approval for netbooks with 2yr warranty extension and 2GB ram for literally half the price! Refurbished all the way? Some refurbished? Starting to consider it? I'm curious..

I grabbed a design from oswd.org and fiddled with it to get a really nice looking layout. It uses tables but with alot of CSS in there. I can't see how you can keep things looking uniform and consistent without some amount of tables. The approach I took was the minimum amount of picture-based links (school website, booking areas, common links etc). With the common links part, clicking it uses javascript to popup a context menu and all the sub-links are in there with a little icon next to it - really neat, tidy, compact and incredibly easy to add a new line to create a new link.

Well firstly, can I thank Arash from Cartridge Stockroom on his very thorough explanation of their business model and spending in excess of an hour to me on the phone yesterday(!) There were a few unhappy staff when they eventually did manage to get through to us though, however that is another matter! The fact I wasn't desperate to hang-up says something I guess! On the subject of the free printer offer, I do get the impression it is a genuine offer; however on the HP printers under this offer, for us at least, the cost-per-page still can't compete with the cheapest prices we're already getting on our existing printers with existing reman cartridge suppliers that we're happy with, so for the time being for us I don't think that is an avenue we'll explore. In saying that, we'd instantly save money if we replaced our CP1515n printers for example, although jumping in to a 2yr contract isn't something you do quickly! Didn't go enough in to it to know the ins and outs about price fluctuation etc. On the quality of the cartridges, I am assured their toner "quality" (not quantity or quality of the remanufacturing process) is the same as the OEM cartridges. Of course, we haven't bought any of Cartridge Stockroom's cartridges so I couldn't possibly verify or vouch for that. For us, this is rather meaningless as we have to put cost at the forefront as opposed to toner quality, and generally speaking we're already satisfied with the cartridges we receive now, even if they probably use the inferior mechanical power that I guess most remanufactured cartridges use (again though, can't possibly verify that as I'm not an expert in the field)! All I know is generally speaking they work for us. I suppose what I was most intrigued about was the extra-high yield claims, most particularly on the HP 2600n range. The issue of the drum isn't a big one, as I already know most remanufactured cartridges use the same drum to do another cycle for possibly in excess of 4000 pages (except on magenta), so a cartridge claiming to do 3500 in that respect won't be negatively affected by the drum. I think as I understand it, and as explained above, toner quality/efficiency plays a factor in waste percentage and also whether the toner hopper can actually fit this amount in. I still have reservations about this though, despite the very long explanation on the phone, so I suppose the only way to really test this is to get one and see (disappointed my request of a freebie was turned down though ). The good thing for us on this range is that, if the 3500 yield is achieveable without compromise and risk, the cost per-page works out equal to that of our cheapest standard yield remanufactured cartridge we can buy, so if we get the full 3500 yield amount compared to 2k, we're not financially losing out. I think the push from this company in terms of their cartridges is about quality of toner and an extra premium on top of that to get the same "quality" OEMs use. Unfortunately for someone like me, i'm very price-driven (both professionally on behalf of our school but also outside school too), so it'd take quite alot to convince me that paying more for something to essentially achieve "roughly" the same result is better! Somehow, I don't think management would be happy if the consumable bills went up again because we're now using cartridges with a better powder! Anyway, thanks Arash for your time yesterday (I know you'll be checking this thread). As the company isn't a sponsor, i've tried not to sound in any way promotional or favouring (I don't see how I could be mind as we only spoke yesterday), though i've just tried to give my own opinion, whether that helps anyone reading the thread who like me are skeptical about the offers/claims! If I do bite the bullet and buy 1 or 2 of their cartridges, i'd be sure to either verify or dismiss the claims!

My thoughts exactly (relating to insufficient space in the hopper causing a risk of leakage when it gets too full) which is what I noted to them yesterday; the response I got was: As Vicki said too, the drums are only designed for 2000 so there are so many factors which make this claim (especially on this range) really concerning!

I took a call from them yesterday after reading this post. Must say i'm not keen on the "free printer offer but tied in for 2yrs" although apparantly, they do "marathon" cartridges which are meant to print alot more than the cartridge is designed for. My opinion on this is that the physical toner hopper (and waste hoppers) are only designed to hold so much toner, so surely it's a physical impossibility to make extra-extra high yield? An example I was given was the HP 2600n range, colours typically 2k yield @ 5%, with their cartridges allegedly doing 3.5k yield with a different chip. Personally I don't buy into this and i'd welcome someone from the company to "properly" explain to me how this works, although given the above post outcome i'm not sure if that'll happen. What's the general feeling here about that claim? As it turns out the price per-page still can't price-beat what we're paying already but still, i'm intrigued how this claim can be made when i've never heard of a a high-yield for these before!

That still doesn't work (at least for us) - I find kids just press print and sometimes if our printer mappings are out of sync a room the other side of the school gets loads of printoffs before the kids even notice it's the wrong printer! Seriously, look at papercut scripting or some kind of scripting - any type of dual queue setup really isn't the way to go. We still have some rooms with this and I am forever finding tons of mono printouts abandoned. You either set mono to default and waste mono toner and paper, or set colour the default and see barely any mono usage. However, dual print queues I think *could* work if colour was default, and a script asked the user if they'd rather print to a faster/cheaper black only printer, but the default would always have to be colour; I think (but can't be sure) that papercut can automatically transfer a job to an appropriate mono printer nearby - i'll have to check this out for ourselves too!

In fact, papercut allows you to script a message when someone prints to a colour printer, and give them the option for example either to transfer the job to a mono one or print it in mono instead. Can't say I have used this feature yet but sounds like the ideal setup for you. Personally, and this is from experience, but separate mono and colour printers is a disaster (this includes 1 printer with 2 drivers/queues). Kids still either print full page stuff to the colour and if they want something in colour but the mono is default, they'll resend to the colour therefore wasting paper and mono toner. It cost us more than just having 1 colour printer alone. My opinion is don't go down that route - you need some clever scripting.

Unfortunately it won't print without that bit in place! Further studying suggests it goes either on the top of the tray chassis or directly underneath the main printer chassis. Quite annoying! But hey, process of elimination and at least we know where it doesn't go now

Ah, interesting. That's actually a really big help, because it must suggest that thin black bit goes somewhere else! We have the standard tray 2 above with this thinner piece right next to the big black bit, however the trays differ slightly so it wouldn't go in the same place. No idea where the thin piece goes then - total mystery! However, at least I know now it doesn't go in the tray. Thanks for your pics, much appreciated