Re: [K12OSN] Anyone quantified savings using LTSP?

["Terrell Prudé Jr." <microman cmosnetworks com>]

James P. Kinney III wrote:

Of course, it's not that hard to come up with donated PCs, so that's a
bigger savings.
    

Old PC's are the way to get the thin client process _started_. The are
large, hot, heavy and often come with the old CRT monitor. All power
hogs.
  

I have to disagree somewhat here.  Old PC's actually don't use much juice at all if you just pull the hard disks (the power cable to the HD is sufficient) and use LCD screens with them.  CRT's are going to suck power whether you hook them up to a new Northtec-style thin client or an old PC. 

We once got a bunch of donated 15" LCD screens at one school, and they got put into a lab full of Dell OptiPlex GX1's.   Once I flashed the BIOSes to the latest revision (took 5 minutes per box), things went smoothly as wet ice...and saved a nice wad of cash, too.

--TP