Re: Greetings and introduction...

["Chris Hobbs" <chobbs@silvervalley.k12.ca.us>]

Ray Olszewski wrote:

> If I read your Web pages right, you haven't actually set up a prototype
> XTerminal yet.

Looks like I need to rewrite part of my pages then :-) I have set up the
prototypes, though not with the separate file server and app servers - i.e., one
box handles both duties currently. I've had as many as 12 terminals connected to
the server at once, with no noticeable performance degradation.

> So far, I've been disappointed with performance, even on the 32 meg 486/40
> I'm using for my tests. But then, I haven't been using Jacques' package, and
> he may have done some optimizing that deals with the speed problems I've
> seen. And I've been trying somewhat different models from the one you're
> using - making the machine a standalone Xterminal, not getting a lot from a
> server, and trying to run a VERY limited set of apps directly on the same
> box. (The performance killer, as you probably already know, is Netscape.)
> The original posting that motivated my tests involved a school that had a
> roomful of 486s and NO money -- so I've not considered solutions that
> require buying servers and am trying even to avoid the need for NICs.

Performance has been stellar on our set-up. You would not know you were using a
486 were it not for the 4/50 or 4/66 plastered on the front of the Compaq's I
used for the testing. Of course, these 486's are attached to a dual Pentium II
400 machine with 512MB ram, so they scoot along pretty nicely on that. I took
sometime one day and charted out memory usage on the machines, just to see how
much room I really had. The short version is, that 512MB should handle about 35
machines running their window manager (KDE) and Netscape, with about 100MB left
for buffers and cache - not too shabby, since we're building around a 20:1
ratio.

The _only_ app that runs on the 486 is the X server, vanilla package right from
RedHat 6.0 CD. Jacques' package merely handles setting up the NFS root
filesystem for them, so they have a place to load the software from.

As to the cost of networking, you can buy the Hawking Tech PN1700T's for $9.95
each from buy.com, and run coax for the networking, as opposed to having to buy
a hub for twisted pair wiring. That would certainly be the most economical, but
you may suffer network congestion with too many nodes attached.

> Anyway ... when you get to doing the actual setups, let me know. We may have
> things to learn from each other.

Let me know if I can help, and I look forward to your insights!

--
Chris Hobbs chobbs@silvervalley.k12.ca.us|Network Admin | Web/Postmaster
Silver Valley Unified School District    |MCP - TCP/IP  |       J.A.P.H.
http://www.silvervalley.k12.ca.us/chobbs |A witty saying proves nothing.
                                                              - Voltaire