DrBeaker

Hi All, Just after the advice of the community here. I'm after a UPS for some of our systems. It's going to have at least 1x 4-bay NAS connected and 1x backup HDD. The NAS is a QNAP TurboNAS TS-459 Pro+ and the HDD is an external mains-powered 3.5 HDD. Looking to connect both of them up to the UPS. I've done my UPS research and it's either: - APC Smart-UPS SMT750IC - UPS - 500 Watt - 750 VA - with APC SmartConnect (SMT750IC) - APC Smart-UPS SMT1000IC 700 Watt / 1000 VA with APC SmartConnect (SMT1000IC) - APC Smart-UPS SMT1500IC 1000 Watt / 1500 VA with APC SmartConnect (SMT1500IC) As always cost is an issue, but I seem to be getting conflicting info from the APC UPS load calculator to boot. It needs to be able to safely shutdown the NAS in the event of a power failure, that's the main concern. I don't want to skimp on UPS time but don't want overkill on something that's only got a NAS connected to it. If there's enough capacity on the UPS, we might connect one of the other identical NAS and HDD equipment to it in the future so it does them both. Is it just worth going for one of the higher capacity units and have done with it? Or would then 500 watt unit (SMT750IC) do the job? Would anyone more experienced than me in these systems mind letting me know what they think? Thanks

Proper server room/MDF and several IDFs around the building, not used as cupboards but as proper IDFs with locked-down access. UPS on edge cabs too. Seperate power suply/board for the server room and a generator? 10Gbps fibre backbone to the edge switches and 1Gbps to the desktop from there. We lost our "workroom" to a classroom and from then on nothing could be worked on in our tiny office shared by 3x people.

Been there, done that and got the T-shirt. All to no avail. Even when caught red-handed, SLT and the powers-that-be did absolutely nothing about it. Yet were quite happy to moan about computers not working. Daily checks - no time to fix the issues we'd uncovered due to having approx 30x seconds to check each computer. Me and a colleague did this for other a month, with a spreadsheet shared to IT and SLT. Nothing done about it. Spot checks - even with people found and caught red-handed, nothing was done CCTV - caught several times, including one time we'd sorted out laptops for the teacher to then let the kids move then all about, tangling the power, network and security cable leads all up as "they wanted to sit by their mate" . You would have thought the teacher would say "NO you sit where I've put you", on the CCTV you could clearly see he didn't and let the kids basically do what they wanted - lack of teacher-to-student discipline and classroom management somehow translated to an IT problem? Funny how this never happened in the business world I worked in for nearly 10x years. Only in education it seems or it's ghosts as "it's always been like that" or "it's been like that for ages" are the typical excuses.

True. Not every solution here is going to work for the wide variety of schools and areas. Not sure to be honest though, I suspect SENCOs have more of a support network than us IT pros, probably get to go on more training courses and spend time with other SENCOs in other schools.

+4 I think this is the right approach. Too often we're all trying to be helpful to staff but it backfires on us. E.g. It ends up as something they didn't want, or get told it's not possible, miscommunicated by them etc then we get accused of being unhelpful etc and it's all downhill from there. These comments above are spot-on. The SENCO is trained and experienced (I assume) in this area, not IT personnel.

Did you go with any of these devices in the end? If so what was your opinion of them?

Thanks. I would if we had a D&T department any more. They got rid of it before I started I can bodge it with a bit of foam tape but want it doing properly.

Hi All, Anybody have a decent supplier or ideas of where to get SSD drives spacers i.e. the bit of plastic for 7mm to 9.5mm that fits on top, when upgrading computers with an SSD. We have some laptops that just don't fit the drive properly. We used to have the Kingston 240GB SSD drives and they came with a spacer included. The newer versions don't seem to include it however. Can't really get them off eBay due to finance rules, so struggling to find a proper supplier.

We had Google come in at my last place once and demoed some kit apparently. We weren't that involved with it though. From a lot of schools point of view - we're still using kit that should have long been retired out of use. So I can't see the VR aspect of "edtech" becoming a reality anytime soon, when the "new" computers I have to install are already over 5x years old.

It was all handled by the SBM despite me asking for updates on it. I'm cynical (maybe unfairly) and suspect they just sat in a warehouse somewhere for weeks on end. We had all of them returned and our PAT tester failed about half of them when he tested them, but the rest passed. Just want to make sure that due diligence has been done for Health and Safety etc I've expressed from my viewpoint that for each of the units, their reliability and safety is now in question when put back into a production environment and personally I'm still not convinced, they should have been written off. Especially if some were returned as "passed" but our PAT tester failed them.

I think it's a bit unfair where again the minority are ruining it for the majority. Might be showing my age here but I remember using my digital watch in exams. Setting the countdown timer and counting down from the 2-hour exams I had, showing me exactly how many minutes I had left and that helped me out. I remember taking that off and putting it on the desk, can't say fairer than that.

Okay folks, Long story short - We had a flood from a room above one of our IT suites. The computers in the IT suite were affected by this and had water damage/covered under water over the weekend. There were decent PCs (Dell SFF, 4th gen i5, 8GB RAM) and were all in working order before this happened. The PCs were taken away and "tested" by some company involved with the insurance. They've had them for a few months and just returned them to us after the "testing" they've done. A lot have come back as "passed" from whoever this company was and they haven't been replaced under insurance for whatever reason. I've no idea who this "company" are, what they did to test them etc. I've expressed my concerns about reliability of using this kit now due to this water damage, but I've been told to set these computers that were returned up and use them. What steps or advice would people give? Anyone else been in the same situation? Anything to test them out and verify they work? Any thoughts or ideas from the community welcome.

Have you NOT met some of these teachers?

West Midlands

I've tried in a couple of rooms... 1x TFT connected via Displayport-DVI cable to the PC PC VGA output to VGA splitter, to 1x TFT and 1x projector Total of 2x screens, 1x teacher and 1x classroom. Used what I already had to hand and lying around, reused old kit and only thing was to order the Displayport-DVI cables for about a fiver each. Mixed feedback from staff, some love it and some don't. The Smartboards and screens play up in this config though so it's in the R&D stages as we all know staff don't like change. But they're willing to moan about the TV not having any freeze function (well I didn't buy it).

Google, Microsoft or Apple...take your pick.

More info please?

Did they provide you with the updated driver?

Yes thanks, would be good.

Only time I've seen this myself is with some software from our Trust. Whatever idiot wrote it actually hard-coded the Windows Key + P combo into a shortcut that works when the app is open and it actually overrides those Windows key functions. I'll be honest - I didn't think crappy software could do that, but I was wrong. Exit that app and Windows key + P works as normal.

We've had electrical work during the summer. Ours wasn't shutdown as I asked our MSP to do, but the UPS ran until the batteries were depleted. Then it came back on with hardly any reserve in the batteries once power was restored.... hmmm. Ours popped a UPS during all of this electrical work.... and a new copier too.

I'm sure I got one of these off eBay earlier this year, tried it but couldn't get it to work properly.

Important to YOU (the teacher) - not to us and NOT in the wider scale of things (IT/wider school issues). Who's approving the cost for reprinting a perfectly fine and working badge, just for vanity reasons i.e. change of title? Recharged to the faculty etc? Does the fact they have a wrong title on their badge stop them from teaching, or does the fact the computer isn't setup in the classroom? I know which is the priority in my book.

New staff started that nobody told me about so no accounts due to no data to sync! Electricians turning off projectors at the socket on the ceiling and only finding out after the "projector doesn't work" Projector suddenly goes off in the middle of a SLT meeting, due to electricians turning off the board to that socket. Other people thinking they know better and undo all my hard work installing computers during the summer by moving them to "suit their needs". etc. etc. etc. Let alone when the kids are back in tomorrow!

Nice , but at some point though teachers have to move into the present time and realise not everything will be carried across. E.g. How many of us still use VHS tapes etc instead of DVD, Blu-ray or streaming services. So information moves to a superior delivery platform or system. I know Canon once stated for scanner support that they couldn't support their products "ad infinitum" on newer systems despite the fact they worked on older ones. They simply said, tough - buy a new scanner. So we can't possibly support systems "ad infinitum" either as the support costs, time and labour etc will just be ridiculous.