DrBeaker

Had a demo from Every and PS Assets. Personally I preferred PS Assets but they've gone with Every, which frankly looks like a pile of . Used PS Assets before and it was good enough for what we used.

+1 for this. I would personally object and wouldn't support that unless it comes directly from the Head. I know it's 2019 but it's not unreasonable to assume some people don't want or have a mobile phone. I know some elderly people that have never been online on the internet, as they don't want to. I've made a conscious choice that due to abuse by people in a previous role, not to use my personal phone for anything work-related in another role. They want me - buy me a phone, end of. Expecting staff to use their personal devices for a system that's work-related and needs 2FA in my book, means that's a school problem. Especially with employee wellbeing e.g. https://www.expressandstar.com/news/local-hubs/dudley/stourbridge/2019/05/11/work-related-stress-linked-to-stourbridge-mans-death/ being in the news. This is a a very dodgy area. I don't care even if it's just a 2FA app. What would happen if that staff member lost their personal phone and couldn't login to CPOMs due to this and there was a safeguarding incident. Is the employee going to be blamed? The school made a conscious choice to use that system. They have to foot the cost for any additional kit required to get it to work. E.g. Would you be expected to supply your own toner for the printer in a school, but the school would supply the printer?

Missed a chance there - Windows Lite ... is Lite Years away

+1 for an excellent succinct summary. I think the over promising is key, as it will only come back to bite you in the ass. From my experience they'll just blame you and never the SLT for not agreeing to a replacement plan and finding the budget, your name will be tarnised but never the SLT or key stakeholder. I agree that IMHO those devices are not fit for purpose. They barely meet the minimum specs for Windows 10 and as MS have stated "These are the basic requirements for installing Windows 10 on a PC. If your device does not meet these requirements, you may not have as great an experience with Windows 10 and might want to consider purchasing a new PC." https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows/windows-10-specifications Basic requirements means basic functionality. I myself have simply had enough of fire-fighting issues and having to bodge things. I've started pushing back and saying No, can't be done without X, Y and Z etc.

My bad. I'm not perfect you know I do have other things I do between thread updates Why the 2x for yourself?

I'd still go with APC to be fair. Can you rack-mount the UPS? Do you have free space in the rack? Or have they got to be tower units?

You know how you've said that you report to someone else despite actually working by yourself - what's their opinion on the devices?

Normally with companies the "quality assurance purposes" is an excuse for an "arse-covering exercise"

As we know most schools are well behind the times when it comes to technology. What phone system do you use on yours? On your system how would you search for a recording from a parent for example under GDPR subject access requests?

This is it, all technology has a lifespan. Beyond that it's all down to calculated risks if you want to keep using stuff. Remember even the USS Enterprise only had a 5-year mission!

I'm interested to see this - I wonder how this works with GDPR etc and voice recordings? As your voice can be used to uniquely identify you. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-48150575 That will add to your workload perhaps? Is there anyone more versed in GDPR who can weigh in on this?

Linux Mint ? Ubuntu's LTS ? The problem is the weak CPU - the earlier ones were single-core 1.6GHz CPU's. They struggled to run Windows XP or 7. You'll spend more time waiting for the CPU to catch up than you will on actually using the device. I had 4x of the damm things myself and got burnt buying them/using them. Even a dual-core atom one I had was slow to use.

We had loads of similar netbooks - Asus, Toshiba, Samsung ones. The ones we could we upgraded them to 2GB RAM. That's all we could do. The Asus ones were non-upgradable. Even on the upgraded ones the performance was abysmal. After that they ended up in a cupboard. That seriously limits your available options. How old is the kit in terms of age? Anything older than 5x years you can say is no longer serviceable or feasible to use. The ones I had were 3-5x years old when I started. The netbooks thing was a big con. Your phone has more power and storage nowadays than those netbooks. That's really the only option. Bear in mind when these netbooks came out they all had Linux on them. Then as people couldn't figure out how to use Linux, they all went to using XP (which is what prolonged the life of XP). So if you use Linux, you will encounter the same problem. Then in terms of CPD, training etc I think that's unreasonable to ask you to install and support Linux on the things, if you've had no training on it yourself.

What was the file size in the end then?

What sort of problems did you have with it? Just tried on a Vanilla Windows 10 Pro x64 1803 build and: 1) had to download .net 3.5 framework first 2) it failed to install first time around so disabled internet, installed and tested OK.

Sorry the latest is that they MIGHT have to reuse these monitors after all!

Useful info thanks, I didn't know that either. It's symbolic of how much of a mess Microsoft have made Windows 10. Whatever happened to Home and Professional versions of the Os? Wasn't that simpler and straightforward enough?

Unless they have a SEN or other need that can be proven through an assessment - isn't that technically disadvantaging the students sitting in the halls with the rest of them? I'd say that is really bowing down to the snowflake generation then putting them in a quiet single room. Another argument is that's not preparing them for the real world either of open-plan offices where quiet no longer exists.

I wonder what their licensing model is going to be? Site or user? If Serif keep it up, I can see them becoming a serious contender for Adobe (I hope they do).

That's what I was thinking. But then if you end up with a lot of students who need this, sometimes for SEN reasons etc. You end back up at square 1 with roaming profiles again!

+1 for PowerPoint. Prezi? Nooooooooooooooooooooo. Everytime I've seen a Prezi it was pretty much: 1) style over substance. 2) By someone who "needed a Macbook" but didn't REALLY need a Macbook. It was just because it was shiny and looked good. PowerPoint is pretty much 99% what I've used in multiple roles in multiple schools. Had a few issues but generally due to the media, the person not setting up their links or content or making sure the weblinks are actually valid etc! That's pretty much what I've done in the past. Got everything into a PowerPoint, videos, music etc and got it all working. Works with a clicker. Then it's over to whoever is actually presenting to control the content, not me. I'm can't do it all for them! I've done countless events successfully using this method. The one time it didn't work - was because the person presenting didn't press the damm button!

For me a lot of it was old hardware, neglected hardare, no upgrades etc over the years prior to me. As well as a lot of RM crap running in the background and Trend being CPU-intensive. But especially is a point of interest for me.

For me.... Wireless is for me a personal preference. I wouldn't use it due to reliability mainly. I've removed flaky "wireless" solutions and installed wired ones, the issue simply didn't happen ever again. Existing wireless - depends if there's existing wires in the first place. A lot of times (see below,) there's simply not. Generally... signal issues, cable length issues, compatibility etc. Cat5e is used for loads of things that aren't IT-related. I've used it for sending an IR signal down a hall that was a loooooong hall. There's a load of equipment that plays up and has intermittent issues when the signal is poor or unreliable. I.T. a lot of the time: 1) Doesn't have a choice 2) Isn't involved in the design or layout of rooms until it's too late to do anything properly with it. e.g. I've seen posts on here, where in a new school build they didn't even put a room for the servers! Try these. https://www.lindy.co.uk/usb-thunderbolt-c4/50m-usb-1-1-cat-5-extender-p439 https://www.lindy.co.uk/cables-adapters-c1/usb-c449/20m-usb-2-0-active-extension-p510 https://www.lindy.co.uk/usb-thunderbolt-c4/50m-usb-2-0-cat-5-extender-p7307 I've used similar to this https://www.lindy.co.uk/audio-video-c2/extenders-c181/450m-cat5-ir-extender-for-4-devices-p7294 from them in the past with pretty much 100% reliability.

That's the point I made to staff etc - the content in them is static, doesn't get updated and any PowerPoint files which have any "boardworks" content in. Some of the content itself is now at least 11x years old if not older and runs on Adobe Flash which after 2020 will not work.

I remember reading something similar, was this it? https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4294935/folder-redirection-not-available-for-appdata-roaming-folder-win-10