Schools District Ditching Macs

[djnes]

But, in either endeavor, you'd want to make sure you had your full climbing gear in the event you fell in a crevasse.

The only crevasse she has is between her ears.

 

[Crow T. Robot]

The only crevasse she has is between her ears.

I would say that she was as dumb as a bag of rocks, but that would be mean to the rocks...and the bag.

 

[HardOCP News]

I just want to give props to Crow T. Robot.

The guy registers today, states his opinion on a hot topic like this and defends it against the crush of PC users and hasn't lost his cool. Not an easy thing to do around here.

 

[Joves]

Well I actually think that the students are under served, by not having both. For those kids who want to excel in comp sciences, they would be best educated by having both OSes and, systems. I see it as the school systems narrowing choices in an area where we need to become better, than the rest of the world. Just my opinion.

 

[w1retap]

I've had quite a bit of Mac using over my years of schooling.

My first computer I ever used was an Apple II GS. I used them all through elementary school. They were fine because we just did learning, spelling, and oregon trail on them.

From there, I went into middle school where we had G3's. They seemed slow compared to my home AMD powered system, and both were new at the time. On the application subject, I did a little web development where I learned to make my first website. I was just beginning to use the internet heavily around this time and get into gaming. This is where the problems began. Most of my PC games weren't mac compatible, especially with aftermarket mods, so I did not buy one. On top of that, they always had internet plugin issues and could not offer me some programs that I used on my PC.

In high school, we had all PC's, and I had no problems.

In college now, I'm in engineering. We have a mac lab, a Sun Computer lab, and a pc lab running XP and Vista. Most of the engineering applications don't work on a mac, so we have to use PC's or Unix. I hate Mathematica on the Macs because it never works. I type in the right commands, yet it doesn't process and I have to restart the progam, then it works fine again. I choose the PC version of Mathematica.

In work, I work at a TV studio. We had Apple reps come out with some of their non-linear editing systems for us to try out for a month. Needless to say, we refused their offer and told them not to come back unless they could give us something that worked. When we captured footage on the Mac Quads via firewire, it would just randomly freeze up, but work fine other times. There was no way I could figure out what was going wrong because there was no error log or indication something went wrong. For our live studio capture, their genlock cards were WAYYYY overpriced, and they would lose genlock half the time for some reason causing us to lose the capture ability. I preferred using Adobe Premiere on the Mac instead of Final Cut. Adobe was a little more technical and easier to navigate and edit with. For the price of their edit system they wanted to sell us for our studio, I built 3 other windows non-linear editors that do the same job, only better and with more storage, plus they are HDV ready for when we transition next year. The professional quality HDV studio capture card for the Mac was another $1500 on top of the price.

That's my story with macs.. not too great of experiences, but I guess for some people they are fine.

 

[CopyCat]

I just want to give props to Crow T. Robot.

The guy registers today, states his opinion on a hot topic like this and defends it against the crush of PC users and hasn't lost his cool. Not an easy thing to do around here.

So true, hahaha.

I think this is a good idea btw. The removing Apples from school idea. I don't even see a reason to own an Apple anymore. There was a reason for awhile though.

 

[GMoney42392]

I am arguing right now with an acquaintance about Macs. She has a 4 year old G4, and told me it's better for her graphics work than any PC ever built. I laughed and explained what the new Core 2 Duos are capable of. More comments back about how I don't know what I'm talking about.

I think asked her if Macs were so wonderful, why they switched to use PC hardware platforms. Dead silence...every freakin' time. In my opinion, if it's not an Intel based Mac, it's an overpriced, underpowered piece of shit.

What really pisses me off is how most older Mac users aren't technical at all, but still feel qualified to argue with people about the hardware capabilities. I'm starting to realize I don't hate Macs...I just hate Mac Zealots.

QFT times a million. if i had a dime for every time some idiot at school praised macs for being "more secure" and "undeniably faster" than a good pc, i'd be chillin in the bahamas right now. its not that macs are bad (they're a lot better than pcs for publishing, graphics design, and the like), but the mac zeal needs to stop. most of it isn't even true. as a few people have stated, os x is about as holey as swiss cheese. what people needs to figure out is that there is a BIG difference between more secure and less exploited. one big virus that can completely wreck macs and buyers will turn away in droves. and since when can a mac outrun a similarly priced pc .

 

[Crow T. Robot]

I just want to give props to Crow T. Robot.

The guy registers today, states his opinion on a hot topic like this and defends it against the crush of PC users and hasn't lost his cool. Not an easy thing to do around here.

Thanks, Steve. I'm always up for a good debate, and I don't hesitate to say when I'm wrong... this just isn't one of those times...

BTW - I'm a PC user, too. I have a custom-built gaming rig that runs 24/7 and is way more powerful than any Mac that I own...it just isn't as much fun to use.

Thanks again, everyone - I appreciate the lively discussion. Now, if you'd all just get a Mac, we could live in peace and harmony...

 

[theelectic]

If kids are getting most of their computer time at school (i.e. they have no computer at home), then I might tend to agree that it would be best for them to learn and use what's most common: PCs.

OTOH, working with students aged 12-18, I can attest to the fact that for most kids, it really doesn't matter what OS is used, they will tend to get the hang of ANY program or OS they're interested in. I brought my iBook in one day to give a math graphing demo, and half the class had the equations down pat without ever using the program before, though the single mouse button did throw most of them for a loop. Older people who've never used anything but Windows or MacOS their entire life, I don't know.

 

[Team Obi Juan]

Good.

Real World > Ideal world.

I'd hate to have limited knowledge in Windows then try and get a job in the GIS field... a field dominated by a Microsoft-like entity called ESRI. They've just begun coding for systems other than Windows late this year.

Public schools already suck enough at preparing students for real world (who's to blame), least they can do is get them fluent in the technology they'll be using when they do hit the real world.

 

[Team Obi Juan]

If kids are getting most of their computer time at school (i.e. they have no computer at home), then I might tend to agree that it would be best for them to learn and use what's most common: PCs.

OTOH, working with students aged 12-18, I can attest to the fact that for most kids, it really doesn't matter what OS is used, they will tend to get the hang of ANY program or OS they're interested in. I brought my iBook in one day to give a math graphing demo, and half the class had the equations down pat without ever using the program before, though the single mouse button did throw most of them for a loop. Older people who've never used anything but Windows or MacOS their entire life, I don't know.

Then those kids ask "How long till we can start pwning noobs in CS:S, teacher?"

"Never on these computers. Lets make a photo album or create an uber audio mix instead!"

 

[ComputerBox34]

I'm a sophmore at highschool and we use XP on all of our machines.

Personally, I'm glad that we use XP because a majority of my friends use XP at home and I never could get used to the feeling of a mac. I just simply like windows better as an operating system.

I've also been using Windows ever since I was very young (5 or 6) and switching to mac now would be like a culture shock for me. I also prefer the OS that is most widley used rather one that's used by a few.

 

[ComputerBox34]

Then those kids ask "How long till we can start pwning noobs in CS:S, teacher?"

"Never on these computers. Lets make a photo album or create an uber audio mix instead!"

lol, another reason why I don't like Macs

 

[Nasty_Savage]

You guys are all hammer heads. I admin k-12 schools. Microsoft, Novell, and Macintosh. Higher education MAY have a point, but I am yet to see any curriculum that teaches getting around a computer, maintenance, etc. All you really learn is how to use Office or do other applications. Its pretty much THE SAME THING ON EITHER PLATFORM! It doesn't fucking matter which is deployed, or even a mixed environment, the fundamental skills are the same.

Good techs can lock down Macs with OSX or using Mac Manager for an OS9 based system. All they wind up doing is clicking an icon to launch the program. Is there a HUGE difference between Word on a Mac or Windows? No. Policies in Windows environments or Zenworks for Novell do the same thing as Mac Manager. The desktops and OS are locked so they can't fuck them up and the icons can't be switched around or accidentally deleted. All of you crying about it like it was gospel that clicking an icon on a desktop will make a difference in the 'real world' haven't ever actually BEEN in the real world. Unless you are IT or the school offers an IT training course it doesn't matter one bit what platform is deployed. In the REAL WORLD, you sit at your computer and you do your fucking work. You don't futz with shit and break it or IT reports you and you get fired. Maybe its different in Yahoo Texas Steve, but you would think a bunch of gun toting, death penalty express lane law making citizens wouldn't spawn such wishy washy IT departments in their corporate sector

If you are able to run willy nilly on your corporate computer, your IT department sucks. The little shit monsters and booger machines can't even change the fucking wall paper on my networks, be they Novell, Mac or Windows Its launch App, do work and STFU. Kinda like what your mods do, anyone outta line = bansville. Oh, and for the record, deep discounts you get for yourselves from Dell don't usually translate to Educational purchases for a school...it goes by state contract...significantly more expensive then Dell coupons or personal educational purposes...

 

[nray]

How did Apple end up where it is at today with 3- 4% marketshare?

Are 95% of the people using PCs just stupid?

Your question is easily answered. People using PCs are not stupid. Apple ended up with 3-4% market share for two simple reasons:

1) How IBM was perceived in the marketplace, followed by how clones of IBM computers were then received and perceived

2) Games

IBM had been in business for decades, had a highly developed sales force into all major businesses, wanted to sell their mainframes, saw personal computers as a minor threat to their mainframe sales, created a low-budget project to create their own personal computers to both take advantage of consumer interest and to promote personal computers as terminals for their mainframes which they saw as the future of 'real' computing. IBM underestimated both the demand for personal computers and what that would be like combined with their brand name. They also didn't look closely enough at the license agreement they had with Microsoft (who had bought a company who made a clone of CP/M for their OS deal with IBM), and later when Compaq reverse-engineered the IBM PC and it's BIOS from the published ISA spec, was sued by IBM, and IBM lost the lawsuit and the doors were opened for legal IBM PC clones, it allowed Microsoft to step up and supply their CP/M clone operating system MS-DOS to other computer makers. The diversification of the PC marketplace, the rise of the mom-and-pop boxbuilders, the trickle-down technology over the years from the workstation market... I could trace it all, but I'll stop this tangent. Point is branding + being in the right place at the right time (i.e. being luck) is the potent combination to win in a marketplace.

Anyone who thinks marketplace winners are marketplace winners because they have the ideal product are deluding themselves (yet it is *such* a common mistake...)

I'll leave the history of games and their importance to computers as an exercise for the reader - I don't have enough time to expound on all that, but it played a very key role.

And of course Apple made a lot of mistakes, with the simplest one being underestimating the importance of games (ironic, since Steve Wozniak had created the hardware specifications of the Apple I around his desire to play the arcade game Breakout, i.e. color, sound, and joystick/paddle controllers).

 

[nightelfmaster]

I guess I'm one of the lucky ones in my school. In my school, we have a whole mess of Windows, OS X, Debian and Ubuntu. I guess that it does make support kind of hard in my school, but I can say that high schoolers have the ability to pick up anything technologically related. Its also kinda cool that all of our computer science classes use Linux and all the macs are used for graphic arts.

 

[Team Obi Juan]

I guess I'm one of the lucky ones in my school. In my school, we have a whole mess of Windows, OS X, Debian and Ubuntu. I guess that it does make support kind of hard in my school, but I can say that high schoolers have the ability to pick up anything technologically related. Its also kinda cool that all of our computer science classes use Linux and all the macs are used for graphic arts.

I think it would be a GREAT compromise to have a mixture of OS's in public schools. Everything from Macs to popular distro's of linux, to Windows.

Problem is, to have a staff that is versed and can maintain all of the OS's and their apps isn't cheap. It's also not cheap to purchase the Macs and the Windows boxes, and then also home made PC's and throwing linux on there. Since that apparently can't be completed (at least by the schools I've attended), the best way is to either use just Windows, or if financially possible, Windows and Mac.

 

[dualblade]

I think it would be a GREAT compromise to have a mixture of OS's in public schools. Everything from Macs to popular distro's of linux, to Windows.

Problem is, to have a staff that is versed and can maintain all of the OS's and their apps isn't cheap. It's also not cheap to purchase the Macs and the Windows boxes, and then also home made PC's and throwing linux on there. Since that apparently can't be completed (at least by the schools I've attended), the best way is to either use just Windows, or if financially possible, Windows and Mac.

i think if i was the admin, i wouldn't worry so much about absolute lockdown. i'd put on some security measures, but i'd like kids to tweak a bit. trying to learn and beat a system encourages critical thinking not found in many other classes in school. i'd buy macs, and have a tri-boot with osx, vista, and a linux distro so people could work in whatever environment they liked. every night, systems would receive a ghost image from a main server, so whatever mess kids had made that day would be undone. this also would make it so much easier to do application installs. you'd load the image onto a computer, add the apps you wanted, make a new image, distribute it that night. kids would save all their work on usb disks, so data loss wouldn't be a problem.

 

[nightelfmaster]

i think if i was the admin, i wouldn't worry so much about absolute lockdown. i'd put on some security measures, but i'd like kids to tweak a bit. trying to learn and beat a system encourages critical thinking not found in many other classes in school. i'd buy macs, and have a tri-boot with osx, vista, and a linux distro so people could work in whatever environment they liked. every night, systems would receive a ghost image from a main server, so whatever mess kids had made that day would be undone. this also would make it so much easier to do application installs. you'd load the image onto a computer, add the apps you wanted, make a new image, distribute it that night. kids would save all their work on usb disks, so data loss wouldn't be a problem.

This is actually what my school does. Our computers in our library have a sort of hardware based imaging system where it doesn't commit any changes forever. On reboot, it reloads from the image and its as good as clean. (from spyware, viruses, etc). It also helps since people can get admin level access without having to worry about messing up the computer.

 

[Team Obi Juan]

i think if i was the admin, i wouldn't worry so much about absolute lockdown. i'd put on some security measures, but i'd like kids to tweak a bit. trying to learn and beat a system encourages critical thinking not found in many other classes in school. i'd buy macs, and have a tri-boot with osx, vista, and a linux distro so people could work in whatever environment they liked. every night, systems would receive a ghost image from a main server, so whatever mess kids had made that day would be undone. this also would make it so much easier to do application installs. you'd load the image onto a computer, add the apps you wanted, make a new image, distribute it that night. kids would save all their work on usb disks, so data loss wouldn't be a problem.

You also bring a good point. I learned more about computers in the time I was living in the dorms bypassing Resnet's security features on P2P'ing/refreshing more than 40 servers/being able to use a router than I did all the time I was computing in high school.

Those days are long gone now though... only a man with steel balls is still P2Ping in this day and age, especially at a college!

[/ot]

Windows in school! Kids need to see outside!

 

[Nasty_Savage]

i think if i was the admin, i wouldn't worry so much about absolute lockdown.

liability and lawyers puts an end to that pipe dream.

 

[dualblade]

liability and lawyers puts an end to that pipe dream.

i'm not so sure about that

students couldn't sabotage other students' work, because each person has their work on their own usb drive. also, just because i'd leave the machines with some degree of flexibility doesn't mean that i would completely lock down the network. i don't want my servers hacked. i wouldn't allow p2p ports, or most ports for that matter. if i completely lock down the network and refresh the operating system and all data each night, what problems do you predict that i would be liable for, and that would require lawyers? i just feel like i'd rather give kids computer experience than an application terminal. they're supposed to be there to learn, and at least in the learning stages, a computer shouldn't be an appliance. when you need to get work done in the workplace and you have sufficient operating system knowledge, that's when you have the ability to simplify your pc into an appliance.

 

[dualblade]

edit:

doesn't mean that i would completely lock down the network

would should be wouldn't

sorry, but it doesn't seem that we can edit posts in this forum.

 

[c0ex]

At my high school, all the labs and the library have Windows PCs. The yearbook, journalism and video production class's all have Macs in them. In our cisco class we just got a G5 server + a 2005FPW for a G4 which we traded with the yearbook. Our cisco classroom has about the same amount of macs as windows machines. Also the network is windows xp pro so the admins have limited all the accounts to not be able to change any of the settings aswell as created private folders for each student to store there files on the network.

 

[Nasty_Savage]

Here's an example.

Kids parents are divorced/custody battle ensues/kid talks to exiled parent via instant messanger or e-mail...BAM, lawsuit.

Kid gets access to proxy server and bypasses internet filter, goes on myspace...stalked by kid toucher/ BAM Lawsuit.

Kid goes hog wild and activates a DHCP server on a linux box and fucks up the network during grading and the student management system can't be accessed, state deadlines get screwed up...BAM loss of state aid.

There's a million and one different scenarios you couldn't even possibly imagine which can turn into lawsuits or damage. Most schools can't afford a loarge IT team so the admin, much like myself has to take care of 700 workstation, 6 servers, network switching, installations of new equipment and security mostly by himself. Lock downs are a necessity, even by law. In New York certain standards need to be met by law...its not an even an option.

 

[FlatLine84]

I don't see what the big deal is. My computing days started with the Apple IIe in Kindergarten, then evolved into some of the early Macs up until prolly 92 when my parents first bought a PC. I think at that point I had to have been 7 or 8. I remember learning DOS and making boot disks and crap at that age to be able to play Duke Nukem and Doom. Maybe there wasn't a learning curve for me cause they were all new at that age. To me this doesn't seem that difficult....

 

[dualblade]

You also bring a good point. I learned more about computers in the time I was living in the dorms bypassing Resnet's security features on P2P'ing/refreshing more than 40 servers/being able to use a router than I did all the time I was computing in high school.

Those days are long gone now though... only a man with steel balls is still P2Ping in this day and age, especially at a college!

[/ot]

Windows in school! Kids need to see outside!

as an admin, i would take this idea a step further. there's nothing geekier sounding than a computer club, and nothing cooler sounding than breaking into somewhere you're not supposed to be. i'd hold challenges, and offer prizes for being able to get past different types of security measures. this sort of thing would get people involved in computer systems who might not ever look at them otherwise. also, by being able to get past basic security measures, it would make people more security conscious for their own systems. i bet you would patch an exploit that you yourself used to get into a system.

all the challenges i'd create would be more proof of concept (put a hello world text file somewhere) as opposed to damage based. you don't have to destroy a system to have fun breaking into it.

if people actually showed interest, i'd love to pit students against each other in a lab - a few people set up a linux firewall/router, a few others try to break it. this is the sort of learning that i never received in high school, and have received basically none of in college. this experience is the sort that not only makes you a good computer person, but makes you a much smarter person in general. logical critical thinking is crucial in the real world, regardless of what career you pick

 

[dualblade]

Here's an example.

Kids parents are divorced/custody battle ensues/kid talks to exiled parent via instant messanger or e-mail...BAM, lawsuit.

Kid gets access to proxy server and bypasses internet filter, goes on myspace...stalked by kid toucher/ BAM Lawsuit.

Kid goes hog wild and activates a DHCP server on a linux box and fucks up the network during grading and the student management system can't be accessed, state deadlines get screwed up...BAM loss of state aid.

There's a million and one different scenarios you couldn't even possibly imagine which can turn into lawsuits or damage. Most schools can't afford a loarge IT team so the admin, much like myself has to take care of 700 workstation, 6 servers, network switching, installations of new equipment and security mostly by himself. Lock downs are a necessity, even by law. In New York certain standards need to be met by law...its not an even an option.

i do believe that there are a lot of things that could come up, but there are security measures for much of them.

duplicate dhcp server issue: servers on one subnet, teachers on another, students on a third. teachers machines are dhcp, but assigned by mac address from the dhcp server. servers are static ip. not that there aren't plenty of other fixes, but this means that a student can only basically affect the student subnet. by subnetting and creating routes, you can setup a lot more security.

for student subnet, only port 80 and 443 are allowed. http traffic heavily filtered. no email, youtube, myspace. no reason to use a proxy if you can filter via subnetting.

the traditional method in schools (at least that i saw) was to put the security on individual machines. if you put it in the network instead, it allows the kids more freedom, and still keeps everyone safe. a linux router with well set up iptables is good enough to secure most businesses, and i think it would do pretty well in a school setting.

 

[[Spectre]]

I am both upset and thankful for the loss of macs at my old university. Mainly because I did the OSX rollout.

 

[Nasty_Savage]

i do believe that there are a lot of things that could come up, but there are security measures for much of them.

duplicate dhcp server issue: servers on one subnet, teachers on another, students on a third. teachers machines are dhcp, but assigned by mac address from the dhcp server. servers are static ip. not that there aren't plenty of other fixes, but this means that a student can only basically affect the student subnet. by subnetting and creating routes, you can setup a lot more security.

for student subnet, only port 80 and 443 are allowed. http traffic heavily filtered. no email, youtube, myspace. no reason to use a proxy if you can filter via subnetting.

the traditional method in schools (at least that i saw) was to put the security on individual machines. if you put it in the network instead, it allows the kids more freedom, and still keeps everyone safe. a linux router with well set up iptables is good enough to secure most businesses, and i think it would do pretty well in a school setting.

Its obvious you've never sat in the chair, you'r optimism would be smashed by daily priority changes, implementation of retarded technology that would go to your security budget by tech 'coordinators' as dumb as the one in the article and top that off with aging machines that were not replaced in 7-8 years that are 3 past their scrap date and what you have is less then no time to daydream about how you would manage to sweepingly implement anything other then locking it down tighter then a frog's ass in a pond.

 

[dualblade]

it's true that i've never been an admin, but i have worked in a school district. none of the computers were older than 4 years old, and the tech director had ultimate say in everything that happened. there was plenty of budget - so much extra that they even started working on this terrible waste of a video conferencing system for administrator meetings (several million dollars). i'm not sure where you've worked, but on long island at least, schools don't have trouble getting budget for technology. basically any software or hardware that they need is provided. the problem is that the teachers are never trained on anything, and no learning software was really used in the classroom after elementary school. also, the tech people (including the admin), were only partially competent, as well as the admin being a completely self centered nazi and just a generally horrible human being. it was obvious that if the tech department had the knowledge in their field and the desire to help those kids learn, money and time was not going to be a problem. this wasn't even some rich private school; it was a minority public school system.

 

[Axdrenalin]

Let's just say I agree 110% with Apple owners:

• PCs and Macs all started out at the same time / same place (roughly)
  
• Microsoft stole the idea for Windows from Apple
  
• Macs are clearly superior to PCs in both hardware and OS

How did Apple end up where it is at today with 3- 4% marketshare?

Are 95% of the people using PCs just stupid?

I'm not a huge Mac fan, but I'm going to say it was marketing that caused the issue. I was big into the Commodore Amiga line of computers when they were out (1985-1994). Especially in the mid 80's, the Amgia was superior to anything that the IBM / Compatible world had to offer, and was even superior to Macs is several areas, but they didn't have the marketing and software support behind them to advance them into the mainstream like the PC / MS Windows camps did.

Betamax or VHS? Who's pushing the most money into the market?

Ax

 

[Nasty_Savage]

it's true that i've never been an admin, but i have worked in a school district. none of the computers were older than 4 years old, and the tech director had ultimate say in everything that happened. there was plenty of budget - so much extra that they even started working on this terrible waste of a video conferencing system for administrator meetings (several million dollars). i'm not sure where you've worked, but on long island at least, schools don't have trouble getting budget for technology. basically any software or hardware that they need is provided. the problem is that the teachers are never trained on anything, and no learning software was really used in the classroom after elementary school. also, the tech people (including the admin), were only partially competent, as well as the admin being a completely self centered nazi and just a generally horrible human being. it was obvious that if the tech department had the knowledge in their field and the desire to help those kids learn, money and time was not going to be a problem. this wasn't even some rich private school; it was a minority public school system.

Yer kind of lucky then, I have computers still on Windows 98 on GX110's with 64 Megs of Ram, hundreds of them. We're working to get rid of them, but we need a new Mail server and need to replace the switches first. Disk space is always an issue as well. I'm in Suburbia. As for teachers learning how to use the computers...that's give and take...most of them wouldn't pick up a book to save their lives and none really follow the instructions here.

Even if they say they are willing, I find its mostly talk...they want the computers to be toasters and more or less all of them don't go beyond creating word documents, popping in grades and attendance in the Student Management system, and e-mail. Even the computer teachers are lacking, they teach how to make Powerpoint files. Whoopie! I had to teach them how to use network shares and they had to write down the most simplistic of instructions....what's so hard about opening the Share drive and making a folder for your class? This took a half a page of notes by the guy I was explaing it too. I set the permissions, its as easy as 'save as' and drill down to the appropriate folder.

One of these days I'm going to build a George Jetson computer....no keyboard, no mouse...just one big red button in the middle and they'll still complain! Computers are just an excuse for people not to do any real work, lol.

 

[Youri Carma]

Macs are expensive and slow the,ve always been....more marketing than muscle thats why everybody is using the PC and not the Mac today.

Only recently the Macs have been upgraded to compete with the real world PC.

 

[Nasty_Savage]

There was a performance gap with the tail end of the G4 for sure, which handcuffed Apple for a long time since it lost after scaling eventually trampled it. but again, unless you are doing heavy duty computing/encoding in every classroom the platform should make no difference. This is just clap trap.

 

[djnes]

Only recently the Macs have been upgraded to compete with the real world PC.

I will give Apple credit, though. They finally did reach the point where performance wise, they couldn't compete...and they did something about it, besides their usual marketing spin. Switching to the Intel hardware platform was the best thing they've done. I hate their new commercials, however, because they portray PCs as being boring calculators.

 

[GMoney42392]

I hate their new commercials, however, because they portray PCs as being boring calculators.

as ive said before, those commercials make me wanna put my foot through my tv when they come on. my personal "favorite" (as in easiest to make fun of due to inaccuracies):

mac douche: hello, im a mac
pc douche: and im a pc
md: i like doing fun stuff, like photos, music, movies.....
pcd: and i like fun stuff, too, like spreadsheets and word documents

notice the pc never gets to mention how much more game support it has. you walk into an apple store and look at the games on display, the newest one is the sims 2!!!!! sure, fun stuff, right, except for that pesky, ~$6 billion-in-revenue gaming fad thing.

 

[LoneWolf]

it's true that i've never been an admin, but i have worked in a school district. none of the computers were older than 4 years old, and the tech director had ultimate say in everything that happened. there was plenty of budget - so much extra that they even started working on this terrible waste of a video conferencing system for administrator meetings (several million dollars). i'm not sure where you've worked, but on long island at least, schools don't have trouble getting budget for technology. basically any software or hardware that they need is provided. the problem is that the teachers are never trained on anything, and no learning software was really used in the classroom after elementary school. also, the tech people (including the admin), were only partially competent, as well as the admin being a completely self centered nazi and just a generally horrible human being. it was obvious that if the tech department had the knowledge in their field and the desire to help those kids learn, money and time was not going to be a problem. this wasn't even some rich private school; it was a minority public school system.

If you're in a state with high-dollars-per-student, that's great. I don't know how much money is allocated per student in NY, but I'm guessing it's above the national average. If you're not in such a state, things aren't so rosy.

So far, I've agreed with everything NastySavage said. In my state, the budget is so far down the drain, states are cutting anywhere they can, and that includes school spending. Schools who were lousy with finance are in deep holes; school districts that have had great financial management like where I work are bleeding the money they've managed to save for a rainy day, and for many of them, that money is nearly gone. Enrollment is down because anyone who can put their kids in a private school is doing so (or they're moving to a wealthier suburb with a high-end parent-supported public school district) which takes student enrollment (and therefore money) away from the schools that need it the most, and perpetuating a cycle of failure where only the poorest and/or most troubled students remain in a school. Staff cuts get made due to the lack of money, increasing class sizes and workload. And it's hard to justify spending large amounts of money on new tech programs or teacher tech training when a school district has to look at it in the light of job losses and budget cuts.

Limited budgets mean admins need to make do. 5-6 year computer life cycles are common. Admins start keeping network equipment together with spit, bailing wire, and prayer as ports or even blades in switches fail and out-of-warranty replacements on obsolete hardware balloon in cost. They look to Ebay to find spare parts. And, they do the things that have to be done, rather than the things they'd like to do. Some start becoming reactive rather than proactive (even though they don't want to and hate the thought of it) because being proactive requires money, and it needs to be approved by someone else who might not approve it until disaster actually strikes. Some admins stop focusing on innovating, because innovating costs money that budgetary people can't quantify and likely won't approve, and concentrate on just maintaining what they have. This does vary from district to district, but it can be a very real situation.

In light of all of this, a budget for having a huge multiplatform network often isn't there. Hardware is bought with the plans in mind that it has to last a minimum of five years. Note that it's far easier and cheaper to find out-of-warranty replacement Dell parts on Ebay than it is for Apple; don't even ask what the parts cost direct from Apple, as it's often 2-3 times what new replacement parts cost from Dell (having been Apple Certified Tech, trust me, I know).

We still use Macs for multimedia courses, and they're great for it. But there is a lot more to being an admin for a public school district than meets the eye, and if you haven't been one, chances are you won't know it.

P.S. Savage: We're using GX110's too. Keep the faith; at least they don't die easily.

 

[CopyCat]

as ive said before, those commercials make me wanna put my foot through my tv when they come on. my personal "favorite" (as in easiest to make fun of due to inaccuracies):

mac douche: hello, im a mac
pc douche: and im a pc
md: i like doing fun stuff, like photos, music, movies.....
pcd: and i like fun stuff, too, like spreadsheets and word documents

notice the pc never gets to mention how much more game support it has. you walk into an apple store and look at the games on display, the newest one is the sims 2!!!!! sure, fun stuff, right, except for that pesky, ~$6 billion-in-revenue gaming fad thing.

haha so true. On top of that PCs do everything the mac guy mentions and the mac guy can do most of the shit the PC guy mentions (except gaming)...so the commercial is just stupid to begin with.

 

[theelectic]

notice the pc never gets to mention how much more game support it has. you walk into an apple store and look at the games on display, the newest one is the sims 2!!!!! sure, fun stuff, right, except for that pesky, ~$6 billion-in-revenue gaming fad thing.

And consoles completely kill the PC in terms of game revenue and support. We all know how superior PC gaming is, though the typical kid "gamer" thinks consoles when they think video games. Gaming on a computer, yeah, Macs suck. Gaming in general, both platforms are dwarfed completely by consoles. Again the relatively tech savvy 12-18 year olds I teach constantly talk about XBox this or PS2/3 that. Most don't know what WoW is (good for them).

Besides you shouldn't be playing games in school anyways