[Landos Mustache]

Replacement for eMac. Guess it is cheaper to go about it this way.

"Apple® today introduced a new $899 configuration of the 17-inch iMac® designed specifically for education customers featuring a 1.83 GHz Intel Core Duo processor, a built-in iSightâ„¢ video camera and iLife® ‘06, the next generation of Apple’s award-winning suite of digital lifestyle applications. The 17-inch iMac for education is available immediately and will replace the eMac®, Apple’s last CRT based computer, providing students and teachers everything they need to learn and create in today's digital classroom, all in the ultra-efficient iMac design."

And please, we have gone over the GMA thing a million times already so lets try to skip it this time.

[willed]

How much was an eMac?
And GMA is ideally suited to this environment, so it isn't an issue. Plus, if users want to they can get better graphics for more money (which isn't the case with the MacBook).

[Gossamer]

If I remember right I think Apple advertised an eMac 8-pack for $5000, so that's $625 a piece.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by Landos Mustache

And please, we have gone over the GMA thing a million times already so lets try to skip it this time.

Since you brought it up...

It's not an issue, because there are iMacs available with X1600. And of course, that's the whole point of the GMA 950 arguments in the past. People just wanted more choice.

Anyways, here is my post on the new iMac in the original thread in the iMac forum, and here is the screengrab I took:



Pricing is in US$. So far it hasn't shown up on the Canadian online education store.

Originally Posted by Gossamer

If I remember right I think Apple advertised an eMac 8-pack for $5000, so that's $625 a piece.

You didn't have to buy an 8-pack. Also, the cheapest model was with a CD-ROM, and 40 GB drive. They also had a combo drive model and a SuperDrive model. The combo drive model was $799 CAD. I dunno what the pricing was in the US, but CAD$799 is about US$720, so I'd guess the US pricing of that combo drive model with 80 GB drive was about US$699.

Thus, when it comes to budgeting, that low end iMac still seems expensive for some institutional buyers, but OTOH it's hella less expensive than the $1199 17" iMac.

[Landos Mustache]

I think it is a great config and deal. I know lots of people who would want it. Heck, doesn't it make it a better value than the Mini?

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by Landos Mustache

I think it is a great config and deal. I know lots of people who would want it. Heck, doesn't it make it a better value than the Mini?

Yes.

The stupid part is that you can't buy it outside the education store. In addition, you can't add a SuperDrive to it. Also, neither the remote or Bluetooth are included. The remote is not an issue since it's cheap to add it later, but the Bluetooth is, since adding it would require a dongle.

[Cody Dawg]

Yes, it does make a great value...

Now who should I give my kids' eMac away to...

[Landos Mustache]

Originally Posted by Eug Wanker

Yes.

The stupid part is that you can't buy it outside the education store. In addition, you can't add a SuperDrive to it. Also, neither the remote or Bluetooth are included. The remote is not an issue since it's cheap to add it later, but the Bluetooth is, since adding it would require a dongle.

I don't see why it is stupid to only have it on the education store as it is an EDUCATION computer that they only want to sell to schools. Apple can't make much off it and really only do it to hold onto the market in hopes students leave and buy one for home.

Who cares about a superdrive. A room of 30 iMacs every unit does NOT need a DVD burner and usually one computer in the room has a "teachers computer" that you can burn your projects to when the time comes. I remember iDVD getting the ability to burn over a network years ago.

Bluetooth is also worthless in that environment as schools would rather have the keyboards and mice tied down.

I can't image why they would need the remote.

But once again, you throw all those things in and you got the regular config which makes it sorta pointless.

[Gossamer]

Originally Posted by Landos Mustache

But once again, you throw all those things in and you got the regular config which makes it sorta pointless.

Except for the HD and RAM configuration. Also I think he wanted the OPTION of a superdrive, not one standard, because right now the only option is to go for the $300 step up or get an external one.

[ort888]

Originally Posted by Gossamer

Except for the HD and RAM configuration. Also I think he wanted the OPTION of a superdrive, not one standard, because right now the only option is to go for the $300 step up or get an external one.

He does have the option of a superdrive. Spend $300 more and you have one.

[Landos Mustache]

Originally Posted by Gossamer

Except for the HD and RAM configuration. Also I think he wanted the OPTION of a superdrive, not one standard, because right now the only option is to go for the $300 step up or get an external one.

The RAM is the same just 2 sticks.

Honestly, if you are buying a room of computers it isn't a big deal to get one normal config at an education discount to get that stuperdrive and other goodies.

If the superdrive was BTO then it would drive the cost up and lower margins even more.

[Duracell]

Seems like great value for money for what it is - I'd imagine these will be pretty popular too!

The iMac has such a small footprint, it'll be a great pro for schools that need both cost and space effective machine for their pupils to use. A shame a lot of places will still get dragged into getting a 'cost effective' pile of crap for $300

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by Landos Mustache

I don't see why it is stupid to only have it on the education store as it is an EDUCATION computer that they only want to sell to schools. Apple can't make much off it and really only do it to hold onto the market in hopes students leave and buy one for home.

Who cares about a superdrive. A room of 30 iMacs every unit does NOT need a DVD burner and usually one computer in the room has a "teachers computer" that you can burn your projects to when the time comes. I remember iDVD getting the ability to burn over a network years ago.

Bluetooth is also worthless in that environment as schools would rather have the keyboards and mice tied down.

I can't image why they would need the remote.

But once again, you throw all those things in and you got the regular config which makes it sorta pointless.

Hmmm... More Apple apologism from SWG.

These were the same arguments made for the original eMac... And then everyone complained, and Apple released it to the public.

This is the machine for grandma, etc. ie. It's a perfect low end machine for a significant chunk of the non-education population, and a much better setup than the Mac mini for many of the same.

I agree the remote and Bluetooth are not crucial here, but it's still stupid that non-education individuals can't buy the machine.

P.S. Cody, how are you going to buy it? Is somebody in your family a teacher or something?

[Gossamer]

Originally Posted by Landos Mustache

The RAM is the same just 2 sticks.

So when the school wants to upgrade they end up having to throw out half their RAM chips, seeing as they have NO resale value. And 512MB will cripple any iLife apps.

Honestly, if you are buying a room of computers it isn't a big deal to get one normal config at an education discount to get that stuperdrive and other goodies.

If the superdrive was BTO then it would drive the cost up and lower margins even more.

Good point.

[production_coordinator]

I just keep battling this hole in Apple's offerings.

iMac:
Don't like the monitor being connected to the CPU, expandability problems for extra HDs. (I don't like the idea of having a bunch of external Firewire drives)

mini:
Expandability problems for extra HDs (I don't like the idea of having a bunch of external Firewire drives) I want some graphics card... (doesn't need to be anywhere near the top of the line, but better than GMA)

PowerMac:
I really don't need the higher end CPU or GPU. Price of $2000 for the baseline is a bit high. Also, this unit should be able to hold 4 HDs standard.

Solution: Mini Tower
Cost: $1499

Specifications:
- 512MB 667 DDR2 SDRAM - 1x512
- 250GB Serial ATA drive
- ATI Radeon X1600/128MB VRAM
- SuperDrive 8x (DVD+R DL/DVD+RW/CD-RW)
- Keyboard & Mighty Mouse + Mac OS X - U.S. English
- Accessory kit
- 2GHz Intel Core Duo
- AirPort Extreme
- Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR
- Remote

[Landos Mustache]

Originally Posted by Eug Wanker

Hmmm... More Apple apologism from SWG.

I NEVER apologize for Apple and you know that.

This is more Eug "I want everything the high end model has but I am too cheap to pay for it so it is apples fault".

BTW eug how many school computer environments have you worked in? I worked in 3 different ones for 6 months doing tech support and adult education and see exactly how they work.

Not only that but for the past 8 years I have been brought into a high school to recommend new purchases and set them up.

[Landos Mustache]

Originally Posted by Gossamer

So when the school wants to upgrade they end up having to throw out half their RAM chips, seeing as they have NO resale value. And 512MB will cripple any iLife apps.

What do you expect for $899.

[Gossamer]

Originally Posted by production_coordinator

- 512MB 667 DDR2 SDRAM - 1x512

Eh....

[Stratus Fear]

Originally Posted by Gossamer

So when the school wants to upgrade they end up having to throw out half their RAM chips, seeing as they have NO resale value. And 512MB will cripple any iLife apps.

So when was the last time you've seen a school upgrade computers without replacing the entire machine? I know I've never seen it. I imagine it won't be an issue for 90-95% of school admins out there. If they really need the 1GB, chances are they'll do it at the start, and if not, they'll suffer with somewhat slower speeds due to less RAM. No one will really care in the end (at least at the K-12 level).

[Landos Mustache]

Originally Posted by Stratus Fear

So when was the last time you've seen a school upgrade computers without replacing the entire machine? I know I've never seen it. I imagine it won't be an issue for 90-95% of school admins out there. If they really need the 1GB, chances are they'll do it at the start, and if not, they'll suffer with somewhat slower speeds due to less RAM. No one will really care in the end (at least at the K-12 level).

Exactly. Most students and schools are happy as hell they can have anything at all. In private or catholic schools they have more money so they can buy the normal config iMac's with an edu discount.

[Stratus Fear]

Originally Posted by Landos Mustache

Exactly. Most students and schools are happy as hell they can have anything at all. In private or catholic schools they have more money so they can buy the normal config iMac's with an edu discount.

Hell, my district's old elementary school had Apple IIe's and 486s until about 2002, after which they remodeled and renovated the old building. They bought a bunch of Dells after that. Even though what they had before was old and slow, it got the job done for the K-6ers.

[Landos Mustache]

Originally Posted by Stratus Fear

Hell, my district's old elementary school had Apple IIe's and 486s until about 2002, after which they remodeled and renovated the old building. They bought a bunch of Dells after that. Even though what they had before was old and slow, it got the job done for the K-6ers.

Ya most schools I still go to are on those damn Molar Mac's whatever they were called. Not only that but they boot of OSX server netboot.

The higher end ones have CRT candy coloured iMacs and they are thrilled to have them.

I am sure they paid more than the cost of these $900 iMacs.

[Gossamer]

Originally Posted by Stratus Fear

So when was the last time you've seen a school upgrade computers without replacing the entire machine? I know I've never seen it. I imagine it won't be an issue for 90-95% of school admins out there. If they really need the 1GB, chances are they'll do it at the start, and if not, they'll suffer with somewhat slower speeds due to less RAM. No one will really care in the end (at least at the K-12 level).

Well...my old high school for one. Not every school can buy new machines every year. It seems the pattern was to upgrade a lot of them, and replace one lab/year, usually in the high school. Then all those machines got passed down to the next lab, etc. I do think that a lot of times upgrading the RAM is much more cost-effective for improving performance than buying and setting up all new machines.

[Landos Mustache]

Originally Posted by Gossamer

Well...my old high school for one.

Private school? Public? Catholic?

[Stratus Fear]

Originally Posted by Gossamer

Well...my old high school for one. Not every school can buy new machines every year. It seems the pattern was to upgrade a lot of them, and replace one lab/year, usually in the high school. Then all those machines got passed down to the next lab, etc. I do think that a lot of times upgrading the RAM is much more cost-effective for improving performance than buying and setting up all new machines.

Most schools don't replace machines every year, and in my experience, they don't upgrade either. Upgrading the RAM on 500 machines isn't long-run cost effective, and it takes a good bit of time. Usually the benefit isn't going to be enough to be worth it, even if you're talking iLife on a 512MB iMac. The kids generally don't care if it's a little slow, nor do the teachers.

Hell, when I was in high school, we used iMovie on an old iMac that had something like 128MB of RAM, and in A/V I did all the image creation on an old 90 or 100MHz PowerMac running Photoshop 3. That was about five years ago. Honestly, for us it was great to just have that stuff, and there was no reason to upgrade machines or parts it as it was beyond our means, and the hardware we had got the job done. I'd say most (public) schools are in that boat. For any school getting a fleet of these new iMacs, it's probably going to be faster than they even need, and they'll be happy for it. Waiting a little longer to process scenes in iMovie isn't going to be a big deal compared to whatever old machines they ran. I just don't see why any school would do an interim upgrade -- seems like a waste of money.

[Gossamer]

Originally Posted by Landos Mustache

Private school? Public? Catholic?

Sorry, public high school in Iowa with about 300 students in a town of just over 2000 people.

[Gossamer]

Originally Posted by Stratus Fear

Hell, when I was in high school, we used iMovie on an old iMac that had something like 128MB of RAM,

That would make sense as 128MB was the stock configuration for the iMacs back then (actually the base model had 64MB)
iMovie's requirements have changed a TON since five years ago so there's really no comparison. iMovie HD ('06) is sluggish at best on my iBook G4/1.33/768MB. Definitely not unusable, but I spent a LOT of time waiting for the playhead to catch up to where I told it to go, or waiting for renderings. But iMovie 2 would SCREAM on my iBook.

[Gossamer]

Dual 2.0 G5 w/ stock 64MB graphics card and 4 gigs of RAM (blue) vs Intel Developer Transition System with 2.66GHz P4, 1GB DDR2 RAM, and intel GMA900 (red)
click for sweet gma comparison pic

[Stratus Fear]

Originally Posted by Gossamer

That would make sense as 128MB was the stock configuration for the iMacs back then (actually the base model had 64MB)
iMovie's requirements have changed a TON since five years ago so there's really no comparison. iMovie HD ('06) is sluggish at best on my iBook G4/1.33/768MB. Definitely not unusable, but I spent a LOT of time waiting for the playhead to catch up to where I told it to go, or waiting for renderings. But iMovie 2 would SCREAM on my iBook.

Yeah, but your iBook is a much faster machine than what I used. I know 128MB was standard back then (like 512MB is now) but the machine probably would have done better with some more RAM. Nonetheless, it got stuff done for us.

I'm not surprised the iBook has some issues with the newest release of iMovie. Even though it's not very old, that's tech from 2003-4 pretty much, plus moving around that amount of compressed data isn't easy on a machine, especially with a laptop hard drive.

[Eug Wanker]

Gossamer, prepare to be tookinated.

Originally Posted by Landos Mustache

I NEVER apologize for Apple and you know that.

Actually you apologize for them all the time. Do you deny defending Apple's choice to charge $150 for black enclosure for the MacBook?

This is more Eug "I want everything the high end model has but I am too cheap to pay for it so it is apples fault".

I will quote myself:

"I agree the remote and Bluetooth are not crucial here, but it's still stupid that non-education individuals can't buy the machine."

BTW eug how many school computer environments have you worked in? I worked in 3 different ones for 6 months doing tech support and adult education and see exactly how they work.

Not only that but for the past 8 years I have been brought into a high school to recommend new purchases and set them up.

I guess you really did miss that post. I repeat:

"I agree the remote and Bluetooth are not crucial here, but it's still stupid that non-education individuals can't buy the machine."

[Gossamer]

Originally Posted by Stratus Fear

I'm not surprised the iBook has some issues with the newest release of iMovie. Even though it's not very old, that's tech from 2003-4 pretty much, plus moving around that amount of compressed data isn't easy on a machine, especially with a laptop hard drive.

This is why I'm looking forward to getting my new machine working...darn SATA controller being dead. But soon.

[analogika]

Originally Posted by Eug Wanker

Actually you apologize for them all the time. Do you deny defending Apple's choice to charge $150 for black enclosure for the MacBook?

Off topic, I know, but I still don't see the problem.

It looks better to many (most, IME) potential customers; it has the appeal of (slight) exclusivity; some people are willing to spend extra money on those factors, while some aren't. Apple can afford to charge more. Result: profit.

Nobody gets hurt.

Except of course the psychological damage from the whining of those people who can't accept capitalism as the most profitable balance between setting prices as high as possible, while still being able to sell enough by making products desirable.

End of story.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by analogika

It looks better to many (most, IME) potential customers; it has the appeal of (slight) exclusivity; some people are willing to spend extra money on those factors, while some aren't. Apple can afford to charge more. Result: profit.

True, but it doesn't make it any less of a ripoff.

Whether or not others are willing to take the hit for that ripoff is a different question.

[analogika]

Why ripoff?

It's nicer.

[rickey939]

Originally Posted by Landos Mustache

Replacement for eMac. Guess it is cheaper to go about it this way.

"Apple® today introduced a new $899 configuration of the 17-inch iMac® designed specifically for education customers featuring a 1.83 GHz Intel Core Duo processor, a built-in iSightâ„¢ video camera and iLife® ‘06, the next generation of Apple’s award-winning suite of digital lifestyle applications. The 17-inch iMac for education is available immediately and will replace the eMac®, Apple’s last CRT based computer, providing students and teachers everything they need to learn and create in today's digital classroom, all in the ultra-efficient iMac design."

And please, we have gone over the GMA thing a million times already so lets try to skip it this time.

Mods, what is going on with the registered® symbol? I'm scared.

[TETENAL]

Registered®
Service markâ„ 
Trade markâ„¢
Sound recordingâ„—
Copyright©

Since when does the copyright© not work any more?

[Doofy]

Not sure I'm fond of the idea of letting a bunch of kids anywhere near a TFT. Kids tend to point at stuff on screen via pretty heavy-handed physical contact.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by Doofy

Not sure I'm fond of the idea of letting a bunch of kids anywhere near a TFT. Kids tend to point at stuff on screen via pretty heavy-handed physical contact.

Well, TFT computers are quite common here at the university, public library, etc. They survive just fine.

[goMac]

Actually working in IT in education, here is my opinion:

• Cut the iSight. Why would we want an iSight in all our machines? All it means is the students have yet another thing to break when they get bored. It's just something else for them to stab with their pencils. Besides, the last thing we need to worry about is the kid who decides to video chat with some 40 year old person they just met on mySpace.
• Cut the optical drive. We have student servers that are home accessible. Students have jump drives. We load software on over the network, and we image machines over the network, or in target disk mode. What is the point of an optical drive? We don't want kids loading stuff on anyway. If they need to burn something, we could just buy a few roaming external burners, or set up a few non-edu iMacs as burning stations.
• Needs a single stick of memory. We keep a big pile of memory for upgrading machines as they come in. We almost never order the machines with more memory from the factory. By using two sticks upgrading the RAM becomes difficult, and afterwards we now have a small stick of memory we have no use for. Great.
• GMA950 is fine. Keeps students off the Halo matches.

Edit:

• Cut Airport from the base configuration. These would replace machines already on Ethernet anyway.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by goMac

Actually working in IT in education, here is my opinion:

• Cut the iSight. Why would we want an iSight in all our machines? All it means is the students have yet another thing to break when they get bored. It's just something else for them to stab with their pencils. Besides, the last thing we need to worry about is the kid who decides to video chat with some 40 year old person they just met on mySpace.
• Cut the optical drive. We have student servers that are home accessible. Students have jump drives. We load software on over the network, and we image machines over the network, or in target disk mode. What is the point of an optical drive? We don't want kids loading stuff on anyway. If they need to burn something, we could just buy a few roaming external burners, or set up a few non-edu iMacs as burning stations.
• Needs a single stick of memory. We keep a big pile of memory for upgrading machines as they come in. We almost never order the machines with more memory from the factory. By using two sticks upgrading the RAM becomes difficult, and afterwards we now have a small stick of memory we have no use for. Great.
• GMA950 is fine. Keeps students off the Halo matches.

Edit:

• Cut Airport from the base configuration. These would replace machines already on Ethernet anyway.

I suspect there may be another option that will show up later only for large institutional purchases. It would cut out the optical drive and iSight.

Apple has been known to do stuff like this for large purchasers.

P.S. Wouldn't Airport just be the standard Intel chipset? If so, how much savings would there be to get rid of it?

[Gossamer]

Originally Posted by goMac

Actually working in IT in education, here is my opinion:

• Cut the iSight. Why would we want an iSight in all our machines? All it means is the students have yet another thing to break when they get bored. It's just something else for them to stab with their pencils. Besides, the last thing we need to worry about is the kid who decides to video chat with some 40 year old person they just met on mySpace.
• Cut the optical drive. We have student servers that are home accessible. Students have jump drives. We load software on over the network, and we image machines over the network, or in target disk mode. What is the point of an optical drive? We don't want kids loading stuff on anyway. If they need to burn something, we could just buy a few roaming external burners, or set up a few non-edu iMacs as burning stations.
• Needs a single stick of memory. We keep a big pile of memory for upgrading machines as they come in. We almost never order the machines with more memory from the factory. By using two sticks upgrading the RAM becomes difficult, and afterwards we now have a small stick of memory we have no use for. Great.
• GMA950 is fine. Keeps students off the Halo matches.

Edit:

• Cut Airport from the base configuration. These would replace machines already on Ethernet anyway.

When the original iMac G5 came out, there was a no optical drive option (I was thinking about getting it, but go my iBook instead, this was around Nov. '04). I agree about the iSight and the pencils. Almost all of the eMacs at my old school had their speaker grills damaged/ripped off and the speaker dust cover jammed in.
HA! Somebody DOES upgrade the RAM!
And the GMA would actually be wonderful for Halo 1. My iBook plays it just fine and my GMA-equipped machine XBenched about 4 times better than my iBook for OpenGL.

[Eug Wanker]

Xbench is useless for comparing Intel Macs to PPC Macs, and it's also useless for comparing ATI vs. nVidia vs. Intel GPUs. In fact, it's useless for just comparing G4s to G5s.

[Gossamer]

Originally Posted by Eug Wanker

Xbench is useless for comparing Intel Macs to PPC Macs, and it's also useless for comparing ATI vs. nVidia vs. Intel GPUs. In fact, it's useless for just comparing G4s to G5s.

Frames per second isn't a good measure?

[goMac]

Originally Posted by Gossamer

Frames per second isn't a good measure?

Halo uses Hardware Texture and Lighting. XBench does not. See the 10.5 screenshots thread for this discussion.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally Posted by Gossamer

Frames per second isn't a good measure?

Nope. Unfortunately, the results in Xbench vary wildly when comparing across architectures/designs.

For example, the Xbench score could be much higher on a slow older nVidia GPU than a new mid-range ATI GPU.

[production_coordinator]

Originally Posted by goMac

Actually working in IT in education, here is my opinion:

• Cut the iSight. Why would we want an iSight in all our machines? All it means is the students have yet another thing to break when they get bored. It's just something else for them to stab with their pencils. Besides, the last thing we need to worry about is the kid who decides to video chat with some 40 year old person they just met on mySpace.
• Cut the optical drive. We have student servers that are home accessible. Students have jump drives. We load software on over the network, and we image machines over the network, or in target disk mode. What is the point of an optical drive? We don't want kids loading stuff on anyway. If they need to burn something, we could just buy a few roaming external burners, or set up a few non-edu iMacs as burning stations.
• Needs a single stick of memory. We keep a big pile of memory for upgrading machines as they come in. We almost never order the machines with more memory from the factory. By using two sticks upgrading the RAM becomes difficult, and afterwards we now have a small stick of memory we have no use for. Great.
• GMA950 is fine. Keeps students off the Halo matches.

Edit:

• Cut Airport from the base configuration. These would replace machines already on Ethernet anyway.

I'm guessing they will offer a lower end version in time. No iSight, optical, etc. I think removing the Airport may actually cost more... so they may keep that there.

They should also consider a hard plastic cover for the LCD. Kids generally don't know that you shouldn't jab the screen.

[Gossamer]

Originally Posted by Eug Wanker

Nope. Unfortunately, the results in Xbench vary wildly when comparing across architectures/designs.

For example, the Xbench score could be much higher on a slow older nVidia GPU than a new mid-range ATI GPU.

Is there a good benchmarking utility?

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by Stratus Fear

So when was the last time you've seen a school upgrade computers without replacing the entire machine? I know I've never seen it.

When I worked at a university Mac lab last year, we upgraded the computers all the time. Adding RAM, taking out faulty RAM that was making them crash, replacing a hard disk when it went bad, replacing a hard disk when we had a bigger and nicer one sitting around, swapping out a SuperDrive from a G4 tower that's going to some technophobic prof who will never use it for more than e-mail and putting it into one of the G4 towers in the lab where we could actually use it (we had only one Mac with a built-in burner, and it was a royal PITA with multiple students wanting to do stuff at once), and putting the CD-ROM from our G4 tower into the technophobic prof G4 tower, etc. We worked on everything from towers to Cubes to sunflower iMacs (the latter are a real pain).

In fact, the easy access to the internals of the Rev. B iMac G5 was the primary reason that the G4 towers in the lab eventually got replaced with iMacs. It's really a shame that they sacrificed this ability in the Rev. Cs and the Intels.

This was all in the computer lab for the music department - a department that is not usually the most tech-savvy around.

Originally Posted by goMac

Actually working in IT in education, here is my opinion:

• Cut the iSight. Why would we want an iSight in all our machines? All it means is the students have yet another thing to break when they get bored.

Here's why. With built-in iSights, you can rig the Macs up with a little program that'll take a snapshot every minute or so and send it to a central server. Set it as a startup item. This way, if a thief breaks in and steals one of the iMacs, if he's ever dumb enough to fire up the machine from the hard disk even once (and remember, it's hard to get around doing so if you've set a firmware password), then bang, you've got an e-mail containing a picture of the thief. You can rig the script to also send you the IP address he's currently at, and you've got a bunch of info on the guy. If you're worried about excessive network traffic, you can rig your script so that it checks the IP address, and only sends the e-mail if the address is different than what it's supposed to be.

You can also set up a few iMacs in strategically placed positions in the lab with webcam software to take videos of any movement in the lab without the obviousness of having iSight cameras set up. You can leave it on during hours the lab is closed to just get pictures of possible break-ins, or you can leave it on during the day and find out which prof keeps forgetting to lock the door when he/she leaves.

Lots of possibilities. It's not so bad that Big Brother is watching you if you get to be Big Brother.

[Stratus Fear]

Originally Posted by CharlesS

When I worked at a university Mac lab last year, we upgraded the computers all the time. Adding RAM, taking out faulty RAM that was making them crash, replacing a hard disk when it went bad, replacing a hard disk when we had a bigger and nicer one sitting around, swapping out a SuperDrive from a G4 tower that's going to some technophobic prof who will never use it for more than e-mail and putting it into one of the G4 towers in the lab where we could actually use it (we had only one Mac with a built-in burner, and it was a royal PITA with multiple students wanting to do stuff at once), and putting the CD-ROM from our G4 tower into the technophobic prof G4 tower, etc. We worked on everything from towers to Cubes to sunflower iMacs (the latter are a real pain).

In fact, the easy access to the internals of the Rev. B iMac G5 was the primary reason that the G4 towers in the lab eventually got replaced with iMacs. It's really a shame that they sacrificed this ability in the Rev. Cs and the Intels.

This was all in the computer lab for the music department - a department that is not usually the most tech-savvy around.

Some of those things you listed aren't upgrades, like fixing broken things. Repairs I understand completely -- you can't just leave broken things sit around. I don't really know how schools work with computers at the university level, but pre-college level, most schools I've seen don't do too much of their own fixing work/upgrading their machines, especially if they're still under warranty period. No sense in voiding the warranty I guess.

[Eug Wanker]

In our dept, the main machines simply get replaced, but the old machines often get recycled to secondary spots, with upgrades.

For example, a P4 1.6 with 256 MB RAM, 20 GB HD, and combo drive may get replaced with a P4 3.0 with 512 MB RAM, 80 GB HD, and DVD burner. However, that old P4 1.6 goes to someone else with an even older computer, and in the process gets another 256 MB RAM, and sometimes an additional hard drive too if necessary.