AlanD

Just came across Magellan. Wondered how it compared (functionality and cost) with RMs Unify Product. Not sure I would be running RDP into my school network at all. Sounds like an easy target for any ransom ware attack from an external PC.

So... because its great.... we can overlook the fact that there are pictures of adults having sex with babies? Not much point in blocking adult sites with an expensive web filter if we going to allow Pinterest.

Well I've done it. I keep promising myself to take them out again and run some extra cables...I've also added the odd network card to a PC and put it in bridged mode (saves an extra PSU and box with cables). Again my promise to myself is that its temporary. My concern is that their MAC tables are usually small - something like 2000 devices....which can you can very quickly get up to - especially if you have a relatively flat network. Not sure what happens when the MAC table is full, but I'm guessing that you might see (or rather not see) all the connectivity you expected.

I don't see any problem - as long as you tell them. They are school devices. They are not intended for personal use - so any personal use is understood not to be private. Staff often don't understand this - and don't understand that we have backups. So it has been possible to recover deleted files and emails which they had not intended to be found (under guidance and instruction from SLT of course). They assumed that because they had been deleted there was no evidence....Students don't understand this either... and are surprised - sometimes even alarmed when you recover deleted material on devices to show them the evidence.

Just had my renewal for Symantec - £1500+vat for 475 desktop PCs for one year. In 2013 I paid £1900 for 3 years. I know the pound has sunk 20%, etc but this is a ridiculous increase. Is it just like insurance costs - which just go up anuualy hoping that customers don't notice or lack the motivation to change? Can't even remember the last time it picked up on any Virus at all. (Yes, I know its all malware and ransom ware now). Wouldn't want to be without such protection of course. Anyone using Sophos? Or Trend? Anything else that is good that I should be looking at? Needs to cover servers too. (I seem to pay much the same for Symantec Mail security on top - can't help think I should get a heavy discount when I use both)

I can't see the logic of "We block porn".....but we allow pinterest where you can see pictures of adults having sex with a baby. I don't think its moderated in any way - and doesn't have reporting. Yes - I can possibly see that in a VERY closely monitored situation - possibly with the likes of "Impero" running you might allow it. It wouldn't block any unsuitable material - but if they did any search for some Impero would pick it up...and at least you could make a fuss about the search. ...but, I 've never quite seen the point of having any filtering when they can use 4G on their mobile to see whatever they like. I'd like to see Government/Parents insisting that any device brought into school needs to be monitored by the school. No monitoring - take the device off them. ASD

...well you can certainly do stuff with VBA....you could have a timer for every exam....and extra time for those that are allowed it. But frankly - it sounds like technology gone mad. A dry marker board with times written on - and a quartz controlled physical clock seem like an ideal solution.

...and Iwould never advise messing about with GPOs without RM's say so....chances are that you could really mess stuff up - not least of all because you will end up with conflicts. When using RM CC4 - you MUST use do it the RM way - or be prepared for a lot of grief - which it sounds as if you are getting - and to be honest when I hear what you are doing - I'm not surprised. I note and earlier post saying that you do not need to install the printer on the server. This is true....but if the PC with that printer can't be found (because PC is turned off) when other PCs boot the result will be frustrating and confusing for users. (I think you are also limited to 10 connections per printer this way too). No; you SHOULD install the printer software on the server (but extract the proper drivers first - don't just run the install or you'll end up with a lot of stuff that would not be appropriate on a server - especially when the printer is probably not connected directly to the server. I agree with earlier posts that the RM veneer does put some load on the server - but its not going to affect usability as most servers are more than well enough spec'd - often with multi CPU, multi core Xeon CPUs and more than enough memory. (I would check the memory use though...as I have seen memory leaks - and RM could not fix it for me - so we ended up adding 32GB into the server). To be honest - I would say the RM system is just the kind of solution that primary school need, and the last thing that primary needs is someone with muddy boots trampling all over the setup because they don't understand how to make it work. Phone RM. Do it now. Its what you pay for. Why are you wasting time on it? (And please stop making me defend RM...)

I hate jumping in on this....because there is a lot I would be happy to moan about to RM - especially the above inflation increase in support costs. That alone would make me get them on the phone and say "you fix it". In fact...why haven't you done this? Its what you are paying for. Make them work for their money. We have perhaps a 100 printers - tens of different types - all connected through RM CC4...and all I can say is that it does all work...or at least it works for us. Yes its sometimes a hassle "extracting" the driver in the right format to be able to add the 32 bit driver into the otherwise 64 bit server. (nothing to do with RM of course - just that some printer manufacturers like to distribute a single zipped exe file which automatically extracts either the 32 or 64 bit driver on the fly when run ) Yes _ we sometimes mess up - and forget to tick the "windows" box to share the printer - and/or to list it in the directory (nothing to do with RM....)....Or don't stick to a sensible naming convention. Once listed you can allocated it from RM console to a sensible"location" or parent location - and subsequent logons at PCs in those locations will see the printer. Sometimes we forget to allocate a reserved DHCP address and at some random later time are surprised the printer doesn't work. We quite like the RM printer credits...not necessarily to limit printing (we usually allocate a very large to all staff) - but as a way to monitor it. (We prefer to allocate small weekly amounts to students) . Weird things do happen to printer credits - they often seem become a large negative number...and less often...we do see printing stop - and its necessary to restart the printer services on the server.

I can't see how it could be justified allowing unrestricted access to this - certainly not for younger students. We put a "soft block" - with a warning on this site for staff. In fact we try to do this for any page that we allow staff to get to but not students. This way the staff are aware that they won't be able to ask the students to use it. We are currently having a debate as to whether to allow older students to be allowed - but with the same block. I'm thinking this is OK...but if you can search for and see the same images on this as you can on a "sex" site (which everyone agrees should be blocked....I'm not sure why it should be OK.

I rather dislike sales pitches when you are told it can do this ...and that.....only not told they are optional extra features which cost more. Like "ac" wireless access points - yes they can work off a 802.11af PoE...... but they don't tell you that is only if you disable the second radio....or limit the streams...

Is it just a firewall you need - or do you want it to do filtering? I always think that filtering and firewall are best done together because its not just filtering web traffic any more, but allowing or not allowing "App" traffic for which you need signatures and you need to combine that with URL permissions.

Palo Alto = the Ferrari of the web filter world...including when it comes to pricing! And the last time I looked they (American...) seemed to know nothing about the prevent strategy. Made Smoothwall look really cheap when I took a look. But I would agree its a really nice piece of kit - but well out of our my schools budget allowance unless I stop buying replacement PCs.

I remember a similar issue I had....and a simple circuit continuity tester did not pick up the fact that two cables where shorting....but pin to pin everything looked fine. ...but you are certain its not the switch ports themselves "black listing" the MAC address is some way? I'll assume you tried connecting a laptop to one end....

Netgear - not working with a browser. Yes, you sometimes need to add the "web site" address of the netgear switch to the "compatibility View" mode in the browser to make it work. And some of the really old ones need JAVA on your PC....No reason to throw working kit out because of this....but I agree it adds to the hassle of the day....

Netgear - not working with a browser. Yes, you sometimes need to add the "web site" address of the netgear switch to the "compatibility View" mode in the browser to make it work. And some of the really old ones need JAVA on your PC....No reason to throw working kit out because of this....but I agree it adds to the hassle of the day....

I'm sure everyone, at one time or another has bad experience with _EVERY_ manufacturer's kit....and sometimes its the user rather than the kit (although sometimes its because the kit has allowed the user to do something stupid). On the odd occasion - when I have had to take up the "life time" guarantee offered by netgear (..I think it was when a firmware upgrade stiffed the switch) they were extraordinary helpful and ready to courier me a replacement switch for next day. In the end - I offered to set up a TFTP server and see if I couldn't reflash the boot code - as long as they took the risk this wouldn't further invalidate any warranty. They were happy with this - and hey presto, it worked. I counted this is Netgear's favour rather than counting the failed firmware upgrade as Netgear's failing. I had upgraded identical switches, from identical previous versions of firmware without issue. Maybe there are some poor netgear switches out there, and I would say I've not seen any - but actually there is a "GSM7224" or something like that which is prone to losing a heat sink off a chip if you knock it about. Where there are network problems in a school, contractors usually cover themselves and replace all the kit with premier division stuff, rather than look to fix the single issue causing the problem. So the myth is then born that the premier stuff is better.

We are entirely Netgear (Cue: laughter from those using Cisco and HP). I've never really understood the disparaging comments thrown about Netgear. I have found them excellent - and brilliant value for money. We operate a vastly over specified 24GB virtual stack at the core - with aggregated 1GB links to around 30 edge switches with 1GB to desktop - with VLANs for BYOD and projectors and other stuff that we need to control access to. Most of our switches are second hand off ebay. Never paid more than £100 - and we use really cheap third party fibre modules (£10 each) - which unlike the genuine Netgear ones (that cost a fortune and regularly fail) never seem to give any trouble. Obviously at that price we can afford to keep a couple of spare switches on hand for instant replacement should a switch go down....and of course - while you have a spare on site - nothing ever fails. Yes - I hate the fact that the Web interface looks differently on each model. Yes maybe the switch capacity (packets) is not as high as the premier makes. But they do a really good job. I always think that schools need to find the "ford Mondeo" solution rather than the "BMW" one....and I think netgear does well to fit this requirement. I guess doing things on a shoe string budget with second hand kit is not everyone's vision - although most people seem happy buying second hand cars. Oh...forgot to mention - yes, the fans are noisy.

We have a separate VLAN running off a smoothwall firewall/filter. Uses AD credentials with a RADIUS and DHCP running on smoothwall - so smoothwall "knows" who they are without using captive portal - or even needing a wireless key. And we advertise the fact that users need to install a certificate to use https (although its kind of surprising how many fail to do this and then moan it doesn't work). My current moan is that smoothwall is not friendly when it comes to "apps"..and its a nightmare even trying to get common ones to work - without bypassing the interception - and not being able to see anything...in which case you wonder what smoothwall is there for. I'm not sure other filters are much better though.... I'd rather have students and staff using our WiFi - and I can see (to some extent) what they are using and doing - and when and how much time they are using it - rather than force them on to 4G where I get to know nothing.

Every time I see school debating a school internet connection - they always seem to be using leased lines. I can't understand what they require the upload bandwidth for. I've looked time and time again at our traffic graphs and our upload speed is always well under 10Mb/s (usually under 1Mb/s) and nobody complains about the speed with a potentially contended FTTC line at 80Mb/s. In fact we have a 200Mb/s Virgin cable (again a contended asymmetric line) for redundancy and load sharing...and both together they are 1/10th of the cost of a leased line. And yes we use both Office 365 and google docs. No doubt those same schools will be complaining about the lack of budget for ICT stuff. I can understand that in the early days with ADSL a school needed a dedicated leased line, but that is really not true any longer as far as I can tell. And before someone mentions it contention is barely noticeable, rarely any impact during office hours (yes it can be 20% in the evenings...but still liveable with when needed for night school etc)

Its nearly always possible to build any "standard" PC into RM CC4. Yes, you have to add the drivers (as you would on any automated build) - although CC4 has its won way of doing this. Sometimes - particularly if you can't get the drivers in the normal ".inf" format (graphics drivers can be a case in point) then it gets a bit messy - but you can extract the drivers from a PC which already has drivers installed and there are free tools to do this (drivergrabber or something like that). I always buy a single PC first and test its going to work before buying 50 of them - just in case. Never bought PCs directly from RM of course - far too expensive.

Its nearly always possible to build any "standard" PC into RM CC4. Yes, you have to add the drivers (as you would on any automated build) - although CC4 has its won way of doing this. Sometimes - particularly if you can't get the drivers in the normal ".inf" format (graphics drivers can be a case in point) then it gets a bit messy - but you can extract the drivers from a PC which already has drivers installed and there are free tools to do this (drivergrabber or something like that). I always buy a single PC first and test its going to work before buying 50 of them - just in case. Never bought PCs directly from RM of course - far too expensive.

I, for one, have never said that RM CC4/support is not worth anything...far from it. I think its very simplistic to simply take the view that its cheaper to go "vanilla". Fine, perhaps if you find and ICT manager with all the right Microsoft boxes ticked (although...that doesn't always prove anything it does give some indication of likely competence) but I am guessing any ICT manger will negotiate a deal which includes continued his ongoing training costs which should be taken into account when assessing the value of RM's CC4. My beef is that progressive and disproportionate increases in support costs are unjustifiable and shouldn't be used to make up for loss of sales and shrinking markets. In 2008 they cost £3740. Today they are over £5000. That's an increase of 2 or 3 times the rate of inflation...at a time when wage inflation has been completely flat - and most if not nearly all support costs are surely labour costs. Its beginning to feel like...now RM has us as a customer and are probably tied into them for the life time of the server RM can extort ever increasing support charges from us at will. And I'm not sure about RM's subscription charging either. I suspect this is an attempt to help school mitigate against periodic capital costs that they are essentially unprepared for. I'd be tempted to think about giving away CC4 for free - because supporting school systems with CC4 is probably much easier and cheaper, and there must be a very nice profit margin on the support costs given the record levels they have now reached.

First, a thank you to James, for sticking his head above the parapet, and secondly for his recognition that budgets are tight...indeed almost non existent in some schools. It is true that Cloud Computing has the potential to offer schools a way of delivering ICT at a budget price. The problem is that while it might deliver 80% - when for example using chromebooks, there is 10% (such as technology with CAD and CAM stuff, or music notation programs, MIDI editing etc and accounting software if not MIS systems) which are probably not going migrate. Maybe with 5G networks straight into google we won't require wireless and other network infrastructure - and I suspect the need for on site ICT staff will (albeit slowly) evaporate. But as you say, we are not there yet - and right now we still have to maintain if not install a lot of kit. My concern is that RM seems to be moving to extort larger and larger annual fees from its customers to make up for the inevitable fall in capital costs made by schools rather than trim their costs to match. It seems like you have your existing server customers over a barrel on this. It seems a bit like an airline flying you away - only to decide they are going to charge an increased fuel charge to bring you back....even though the fuel costs the same. I don't think this will win you many friends. I've always found it difficult to purchase stuff though RM - not because of the process, but because prices are often significantly higher than competitors. I have never understood why RM pursues this strategy. Perhaps there are lots of schools that don't get competitive quotes. Take for example recently. I need 4 new replacement SAS drives for a server. RM's price for an engineer to do this on site is almost £1000 for day - which is probably the going rate - and almost certainly provides a nice profit margin. BUT - the cost of the disk themselves - which apparently I have to get from RM are £400+vat each when nearly every other supplier I have looked at sell them for £200 each. Even for loyal customer, this is a bitter pill....especially when there are above inflation support costs too.

Our Support contracts are up 6.7% this year. Did your salary go up by that amount? Did the salaries of the guys who do the support go up that amount? Did the school income go up at all? Who gets this money? Bosses at RM no doubt.....Always thought RM was expensive....very expensive....indeed perhaps too expensive now.