School using Linux

[Leo J Mauler]

On Wed, 11 Feb 2004 09:00:28 -0600 "Brian Kelsay" <BLKELSAY at kcc.usda.gov>
writes:
> >>> Leo J Mauler <webgiant at juno.com> 02/11/04 04:53AM >>>
> 
> > I can't find the answer to this question on the 
> > k12ltsp website, so I thought I'd ask it here.
> > 
> > What is the minimum spec PC to run an older 
> > PC as a thin client on such a network?  
> > Minimum RAM and processor speed is what 
> > I'm thinking of here.  
>
> You can run a thin client image on a pentium 100 
> with 64MB or more ram.  Just use a 100mb NIC 
> and a decent video card (2-4MB or vram).  It's 
> going to depend a lot on what you want to run on 
> the thin client.  If you run Icewm, fluxbox, xfce or 
> other minimal WM, you can use a slower, older 
> PC with less ram.  If you want to run KDE or 
> GNOME consider using more ram.  

I guess I'm just not comprehending how much of the X system (including
the desktop manager) actually "runs" on the thin client.  I'd think there
would need to be some base system on the thin client concerning X. 
Nothing but X would be the lowest RAM hog, but could you still run
KDE/GNOME on a 64MB thin client (100Mhz Pentium) without tearing your
hair out at the (lack of) speed?

Also, say you're running IceWM as the window manager on a Pentium 100Mhz
with 64MB RAM.  The application server (lets say a PIII with 512MB RAM
and only three clients) serves up OpenOffice.  How fast is OpenOffice
going to run?  Will the speed of the thin client make any difference in
the speed of OpenOffice?  Or is the thin client just serving essentially
as a video feed from the server (with the only speed consideration being
the keyboard and mouse inputs on the thin client, as well as the network
bandwidth to deliver the inputs).

I'd like to see OpenOffice run fairly quickly on a Pentium 100Mhz system,
just for once.  No more StarOffice 5.1.

> If you are not putting a HDD or CDROM in the PC, 
> use the saved $$$ to add more ram.   128MB would 
> be nice.  You DON'T need a P4 3GHz with a gig of 
> ram.  A P-II 300 up to P-III 800 would be nicer, but 
> better as a stand alone PC.  That might be the high 
> end of your users.  Then again, I'm thinking of what 
> you might get from the used PC pile to refurb and put 
> in this situation.  If you get your hands on 1GHz and 
> higher PCs (a lot of  them) at a reasonable price, you 
> can build your thin clients from there.  Makes it more 
> likely that you can use KDE, OpenOffice, etc.