Cazale

The one that's gone was 1400 VA. It only had one server plugged in, so should be fine I think? Did you find out what batteries yours uses?

Thanks Katy. Even if it needs batteries it's cheaper than them buying a new one (you know how school budgets are at this time of year).

One of our school's UPS just went kaput. Anyone got a spare/old one they're wanting rid of (for not a lot of money)?

RDP for Windows/VNC for Mac OS. Already built into both.

We've taken over schools like this. Does the school need and have the budget for new servers or are you running VMs? If so, now is a good time to start unpicking things and migrating stuff over (to the way you'd like it). Even if you just do it slowly, as needed. Try not to enforce too many changes on users at once though, particularly as you're new (they'll blame you because they can't do things the same way they're used to doing!). Get a phone number or e-mail contact for the last tech if you can. You'll need it someday. We thought we were flying at one school; we had the password list, and were making gradual changes as we unpicked things (which is all you can do sometimes), then suddenly ran into the Trust Relationship issue on a PC and realised we didn't have the local admin account for that machine, and it just refused to play with the usual "unplugging it from the network and using the domain admin account" solution). That was a long day! (for what's usually a 2 minute fix, very annoying!). The priority is probably checking backups/disaster recovery. Don't assume it all works if you didn't set it up yourself. Do a full test on a backup set, and double check everything needed is being backed up (and that you have things like the correct decryption password/key, etc). Talking of which, go through the password list and check everything (assuming you have one). If you can't get hold of the former admin I'd start resetting things now. Things like 2-factor authentication for Google Apps/Office 365/Apple School manager, etc can be a right pain to reset (I think, from memory, Google takes 4 weeks to reset 2FA for the admin account. Apple usually contact the school directly to make sure you have their approval, and that can take a good week). It's better doing stuff like that now rather than when you actually need them! If none of the network cables are labelled (grrr! Who in the hell does this???) you can buy cable testers with remote identifiers (you plug in all the identifiers on one end of the network, take the tester to the other end, and it will tell you which identifier is on the end of each cable). Again, do this when you get time, you'll appreciate the effort you put in when something goes wrong and you need to trace a cable back. I'm sure more will come to me when I think about it!

Not sure what the difference is? We still have complete control over the laptop: We install the OS from an image with local security policies set (much the same way you'd apply them from Group Policy). Anti-virus, etc installed and managed by us. We're the only ones with admin accounts. We're the only ones who can install or remove programs, etc. They're as secure as domain PCs.

We manage primaries, and laptops are generally taken home by staff (and we hardly see them again, unless there's an issue) and are used by a single user. Also, the vast majority of things we set in GP just don't apply to the user or the computer. I can appreciate not every environment is like this, but it sounds similar(ish) to the OP. Ironically, the majority of times we saw domain laptops coming back was due to domain username/password caching expiring or some other domain issue. So now we just set them up with 2 admin accounts (a generic account we can pass on to other support companies if the school ever decides they want to move on + one for our company) & then give them a user account. Then create shortcuts on their desktop for staff shares and their files on the server (i.e. \\server\staff\ and save their network credentials) for when they are in school. It works a treat. It's not something we do, but I've also seen this done on pupil laptops that live in schools (just a generic "pupil" username and a fileshare setup specifically for that user).

We never put laptops on the domain (not even school/staff ones). The only exception being if they live in the building 24/7 (as a couple do). You can still access network shares from a non-domain PC (there are various methods, but browsing the file server and using \\domain\username + password works by default) if that's your concern? BTW, you can use Windows 7 keys to activate Windows 10 (i.e. if you have a Windows 7 Pro key enter it during the Windows 10 install and it will activate as Windows 10 Pro).

The old free version. Which would explain that!

I've just set up a load of new iPads, managed by Meraki (all DEP registered). I've got them all looking the way I want. Apps are being loaded through Meraki. I've locked out FaceTime/messages/etc. Renamed and update them all. But every iPad is getting frequent (i.e. multiple times per day) spam messages saying "Finish Setting Up iPad - Apple Pay is ready to be set up in Settings". I'm guessing this is something new in one of the recent updates, because I've never had this issue when setting up Pads previously? It's getting very annoying (and ridiculous because, of course, being a class set of iPads we'll never use Apple Pay!). I can't see anywhere to suppress or control this in Meraki. Anyone got a solution to this? Edit: I've turned off notifications for Apple Wallet on each device, as suggested elsewhere, that hasn't worked.

Note sure if it helps but you can pick up iPads for <£260 with education discount. <£290 with a heavy duty case. But yes, as someone else said, the limitation (or feature, depending on your POV) of tablets is that they store Office documents in the cloud.

Any laptop with a TPM chip (most do have them these days) and at least the Pro version of Windows (for bitlocker), unless you're using Windows 7 still, in which case you need to use Enterprise. You can encrypt laptops without TPM, but you need to enter a password every time it boots. You can also encrypt iPads. We do this out of routine for all iPads and laptops we supply to schools. I always think it's better to treat every portable device as though it contains confidential information.

I always advise schools to install short-throw where possible too. The problem with longer throw projectors is that whenever a teacher is looking towards the class they are staring into the beam (a health and safety no-no TBH). I find it headache inducing if I accidentally look into a beam, can't imagine the pain from standing in front of one all day. There's also the issue that they cast a shadow over part of board when they're stood near it. Appreciate they are more expensive, but unless there are installation issues I'd push short-throw projectors to them for the above reasons.

I use a hacksaw

We support schools who use both. In fact one school just moved from Konica to Kyocera. Support from both is good (although a word to the wise: as soon as you get them installed e-mail them and tell them you can't ring premium rate numbers and ask for a geographic support number. Both companies use revenue sharing numbers ). I don't know if we're lucky, but we have very local support engineers for both companies, and can often get a visit hours after calling, although we are in a big city. I've found they both do pretty much the same things. If I'm being really picky the Kyoceras feel a bit more plastic and not as robust as Konicas. YMMV.

VGA, but no reason it wouldn't work with HDMI (I think? I know each VGA slot has a corresponding audio input. Not sure about HDMI without looking at one. Although thinking about it logically, maybe there isn't one for HDMI!). I'll have a look at one in the morning and post again.

This is what we do with Clevertouch's btw. Mini-jack to mini-jack straight from the PC to the TV.

Why not just add a cheapo graphics card (something like a GT 710 should do)?

Do you let them (5/6) chose their own passwords? If so, do you also have complexity requirements? Also, just wondering, do you get many passwords reset requersts?

The heads of two separate schools (so yes, heard the same thing on a safeguarding course). A lot of schools in our area, including these schools, have moved over to Smoothwall. From what I can gather, the rationale is that with individual logins we can match individuals with the safeguarding reports. TBH, the system we have now (being able to match a year group, time and IP with an incident) is far better than anything we had previously. I kind of understand the reasoning for them recommending this. I'm just wanting to implement it in the least painful way possible (for all involved, including the pupils and myself!).

A couple of our schools have been told that junior age pupils now need individual logins, having previously had a generic year-wide login (for safeguarding reasons; so they can tell who is accessing what through Smoothwall). We've been told they can't all have the same password, nor can they use anything that might be guessed by another pupil (so no sort of thing like initials followed by year of birth). Just wondering what other schools do? Allowing children this age to select their own password seems like a minefield (or, at best, potentially leads to an on-site member of staff having to constantly change passwords at the start of ICT lessons?). I had a search on here for fingerprint readers, the consensus on the thread I found was that they often don't work for young children. Anyone using this or another (fairly inexpensive) method for domain logins? Is there a way to perhaps use QR codes (I'm thinking we can maybe print them all out and stick them into a book), or something similar? I know you can use USB sticks (with software), but talking to the staff, they thought they'd just get stolen or lost. Open to ideas (either password based, or using some kind of hardware login system), also happy to hear of experiences from those who've have implemented this kind of thing for this age group before. Systems are all Windows 7 Enterprise.

One of our schools has been told they need move sensitive safeguarding data over to an encrypted share, that nobody apart from safeguarding staff can access (i.e. no administrator or IT access, just two named non-technical staff). I have to be honest, it's making me a bit nervous. I'm worried about being asked to make changes that I can't reverse (from the point of view that I'm responsible for data integrity for something I have no control over). Not to mention the headache of ensuring backups are present and correct (and how to even achieve that). Has anyone else done this, or been asked to do this? How have/would you achieve it? Does anyone else think making this short of change is a bad idea from a technical viewpoint? Not sure how relevant this is, but this is an external school (i.e. I'm not a direct employee of the school, we contract to them). None of our other schools have requested this.

Just a warning: Microsoft's systems seem borked at the moment. I was trying to activate a PC for a couple of hours and just getting errors, tried the smartphone option and it just kept kicking me out, finally tried the telephone activation option and after entering the entire ID number twice it just kept crashing and chucking me out. The last time, it threw me into a telephone support queue (which took forever to answer), only to be told they are having issues, and to ring back another day! So there's definitely something up their end. The entire activation system seems to be down. Just thought I'd give you a heads up in case anyone has been banging their heads on the table (like I have!).

Had this start happening randomly at a school at the start of this week. Most strange, I hadn't made any changes to the proxy settings (for months!), and suddenly Chrome refused to work unless users started IE first. As above, forcing the proxy through the Chrome GPO worked.

wait, sorry, for a single directory of files it would be: "\\hades\2013intake\13BAJAND\MXC Test/*", "read" or, if you wanted it to be recursive through directories (e.g.): "\\hades\2013intake\13BAJAND/-", "read" (/- is like *, but it applies to "all files in the file system under this directory" rather than "all files in the current directory"). I suspect you want the latter, but thought I'd clarify.