[school-discuss] Re: UMPCS - what is the attraction?

[Richard Andrews <bbmaj7@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

--- On Thu, 5/6/08, Daniel Howard <dhhoward@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> The thing is, for a $250 diskless node or chubby client,
> plus $150 at 
> least for the LCD monitor, you're not far from the
> price of an ultra 
> mobile PC.  That solves power, space, and multimedia
> issues, plus adds 
> mobility.  If I was going to spend that much, I'd look
> seriously at UMPCs.

I'd like to know what the attraction of UMPCs is.

The K6 school my son attends is rolling out Intel UMPCs and to me it seems that they have been sold on the "Next Generation" new and shiny without thinking it through. They are rolling Windows and MS Groove which also irks me no-end.

From what I can see the screen and keyboard is restrictive. The processing power and visual/audio outputs would appear to prohibit quality of multimedia. The units can be moved, lost, stolen by bullies, damaged in transit. Any work stored on them would need to be backed up somewhere else.

How do you repeair a UMPC? Would they be simply replaced? At what cost per year?

How do they really perform? Does anyone have a first hand account of using them in a class setting?

If you rolled out UMPCs what hardware would you favour and why?

--
  Rich



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