Re: [seul-edu] Typical costs paid by school districtsfor software?

[Doug Loss <dloss@suscom.net>]

Chris Hobbs wrote:
> 
> Through this program, we buy media, docs, and licenses separately. So, for a
> site, we'd at a minimum need one copy of the CD, and how many ever licenses
> are required. I'll take a 30 computer lab as an example, with one file
> server.
[...]
> or, $59.86/workstation. This of course compares to the cost of, hmm, $0.00
> for Linux based solutions (download a Linux ISO and StarOffice). However, if
> you back out the cost of Office 2000 and decide to use the Win32 version of
> StarOffice under NT, the cost per station for just the OS drops down to
> $23.70. If the average cost of a new computer is $1000, then the cost of
> running Windows is only 2% of the purchase price. Is this enough to make
> your school board consider Linux? Probably not, which is why a broader based
> argument is neccessary (ease of administration, reliability, etc.).
> 
Do you typically buy (or build) computers with no software installed and
then install from these media?  I'm curious about when these OSs and
programs would be purchased and used.  If you buy commodity boxes that
already have some software installed and then reinstall over that, you'd
have to include the cost of the initial software in the mix, wouldn't
you?

-- 
Doug Loss                 The difference between the right word and
Data Network Coordinator  the almost right word is the difference
Bloomsburg University     between lightning and a lightning bug.
dloss@bloomu.edu                Mark Twain