Jim,<div><br></div><div>As always, I appreciate your insights and advice. I will check into the items you suggested especially the Altiris Deployment Solution.</div><div><br></div><div>Not sure if this is just a demo, but our new public PCs appear to have a disc for Altiris Clent Manager version 6. </div>
<div><br></div><div>It doesn't say anything on it about being a demo, but it doesn't have any licensing info either, so I'm betting it is.</div><div><br></div><div>thanks</div><div><br clear="all">Eric Maynard<br>
Head of Information Technology,<br>Holmes County District Public Library<br>Millersburg, OH 44654<br>Email [<a href="mailto:emaynard@holmeslib.org">emaynard@holmeslib.org</a>]<br>Phone [330.674.5972 x.224]<br>Fax [330.674.1938] <br>
<br>"Failure is only the opportunity to begin again more intelligently"<br><br><br>
<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Fri, Dec 4, 2009 at 1:19 PM, JKENZIG <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:JKENZIG@cuyahogalibrary.org">JKENZIG@cuyahogalibrary.org</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<div lang="EN-US" link="blue" vlink="purple">
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D">Hi Eric,</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D">I have looked
into a lot of different possible solutions. You hit the caveat when you ask
about printer/workstation management software. It depends on what you are
using but, most of the products out there use the workstation name to configure
themselves. So you need a product that on image it is going to be able to give
you the ability to assign a specific machine name to the imaged computer and
not some random one. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D">We have always
used Altiris Deployment Solution and it has served us well. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D">The problem of
course you have with these types of broadcast imaging software to multiple
devices is bandwidth. You usually can only do a few at a time and it is a
long process. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D">I’ve
spoke of it before but I will suggest you look at it again and that is Citrix
Provisioning Services for Desktops. This product uses a single virtual
disk VHD image that all computers Pxe boot from it. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D">It has an admin
console that lets you assign a computer a name and ip address if necessary by
the use of its MAC address. This will resolve the printer workstation
management dilemma. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D">You pick the
image from the console that you want the computer to have and on boot it will
load it. You could easily switch a computer from XP to Vista to Windows 7
to Linux just by changing to a different VHD virtual disk image at the console
and sending a reboot. You can have multiple images on the server and
switch at will. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D">The image stays
on the server and it can be set up so no changes are made to it. Eliminating
the need for products like Deepfreeze, antivirus etc even. A reboot
reloads the image. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D"><a href="http://www.citrix.com/english/ps2/products/product.asp?contentID=1297541" target="_blank">http://www.citrix.com/english/ps2/products/product.asp?contentID=1297541</a></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D">I seriously
believe that this is the future of delivering desktops in organizations. The
product once owned by Ardence and purchased by Citrix has matured quite well
over the years.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D">Search Ardence
or Citrix Provisioning on Youtube and you will see some amazing videos.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D">This one being
my favorite.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moIuHqIc-PQ" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moIuHqIc-PQ</a></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D">Regards, </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-autospace:none"><b><span style="font-size:16.0pt;font-family:"Freestyle Script";color:#1F497D">Jim Kenzig</span></b><span style="font-size:11.0pt;color:#1F497D"><br>
</span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:#1F497D">Network Manager</span><span style="font-size:11.0pt;color:#1F497D"><br>
</span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:black">Cuyahoga County Public Library</span><span style="font-size:10.0pt;color:blue"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;color:#1F497D"> </span></p>
<div style="border:none;border-top:solid #B5C4DF 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in">
<p class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-size:10.0pt">From:</span></b><span style="font-size:10.0pt">
<a href="mailto:oplintech-bounces@oplin.org" target="_blank">oplintech-bounces@oplin.org</a> [mailto:<a href="mailto:oplintech-bounces@oplin.org" target="_blank">oplintech-bounces@oplin.org</a>] <b>On Behalf
Of </b>Eric Maynard<br>
<b>Sent:</b> Friday, December 04, 2009 12:20 PM<br>
<b>To:</b> <a href="mailto:oplintech@oplin.org" target="_blank">oplintech@oplin.org</a><br>
<b>Subject:</b> [OPLINTECH] PC Image Broadcast Techniques</span></p>
</div><div><div></div><div class="h5">
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Looking for input from the list on any imaging
products/techniques that might be in use out there for supporting public (and
staff) computers. More specifically, I am interested in the potential
for using "broadcast imaging" or some other semi-auto means of
updating whole PC images.</p>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal">I personally have tried a variety of imaging
tools using everything from open source utils to Ghost, but I have settled
on Acronis True Image for last few years. I would like to consider taking
this a step further and be able to just blast a periodic update to all of our
public PCs. Acronis' Snap Deploy sounds like the perfect product for
this, but I was hoping others might have some input to offer on this or similar
products.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal">Questions I am interested in exploring:</p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal">How often to broadcast updates? </p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal">Is it practical to do this once a month for OS updates and
AV?</p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal">What impact does configuration play into the frequency?
</p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal">What impact does re-creating a PC have on other management
software such as time or print management?</p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal">What advantages/disadvantages does this have over central
update control via a thin client solution? </p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal">Thanks in advance for any insight or comments you might have
to offer on the subject.</p>
</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt"><br clear="all">
Eric Maynard<br>
Head of Information Technology,<br>
Holmes County District Public Library<br>
Millersburg, OH 44654<br>
Email [<a href="mailto:emaynard@holmeslib.org" target="_blank">emaynard@holmeslib.org</a>]<br>
Phone [330.674.5972 x.224]<br>
Fax [330.674.1938] <br>
<br>
"Failure is only the opportunity to begin again more intelligently"<br>
<br>
</p>
</div>
</div>
</div></div></div>
</div>
</blockquote></div><br></div>