UK education agency says no to Vista, Office 2007

“The British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (Becta) has published its final report (PDF) on Windows Vista and Microsoft Office 2007. The agency is largely sticking with its interim recommendations that schools steer clear of Vista in existing deployments and Office 2007 altogether.”

“…Becta recommends against deploying Vista in current setups, saying that the upside of such upgrades aren’t worth the cost. According to Becta, only 22 percent of school PCs in the UK are capable of running Vista “effectively.” Read the full story on ArTechnica.Com

Microsoft ousted, 23,000 Linux PCs For Filipino Schools

“Providing high school students with PCs is seen as a first step to preparing them for a technology-literate future, but in the Philippines many schools cannot afford to provide computing facilities so after a successful deployment of 13,000 Fedora Linux systems from a government grant, plans are underway to roll out another 10,000 based on Ubuntu.”

“We wanted to use Fedora 5 and it went all the way to office of [the Filipino] President and they kept passing it around saying ‘why would they offer something for free, and how would they support and teach it’,” Gonzalez said. “The project dragged on for four to five months to a point where Microsoft matched the price by offering Windows XP for $US20 a copy and throwing in Office for $US30, but we still came out cheaper. Microsoft was also providing free training to high school teachers.” Read the full article on ComputerWorld.Com found via SlashDot

California school district getting 1,000 Asus Eee PCs

Seems everyone is loving these new Asus Windows-less laptops these days…

“Students in California’s Fresno Unified school district have a little something to be excited about this week, as officials have just invested $650,000 in 1,000 Asus Eee PCs, set for classroom deployment over the next few weeks. The concept is to use the miniscule laptops alongside good, old-fashioned textbooks, with each student being given the chance to create a “digital portfolio” of essays, drawings, and whatever else they can get away with. The computers will remain in roughly 60 classrooms, and will be shared by students.” Read the full article on Engadget.Com

School happy with switch to Intel Macs from PCs

“When visitors trooped into Iona College’s Ryan Library in the spring of 2007, they were amazed — and delighted — to see 52 sparkling new iMac computers ready for business. Since that first rollout the systems have seen nonstop usage, and requests for more Macs are springing up all over campus — remarkable, given that Iona had maintained a Windows-based computing environment for more than 20 years. With the availability of Boot Camp on Intel-powered iMac computers running Mac OS X Leopard, faculty, students, and all users have the best of all computing worlds.”

“When we started researching Boot Camp, we realized that we could give our faculty the advantages of Mac-based software while supporting our Windows-based environment all over campus.” Read the full article on Apple.Com

A thought from the author: Vista in retail.

I had an epiphany yesterday while I was in the local Best Buy on my lunch break picking up a purchase for myself. I suddenly found myself able to put into words what my gut has been telling me for months.

I was watching mid-day, week-day shoppers as they were browsing around the computer department eyeing desktops, and notebook computers. Most of them looked like Parents or Grandparents shopping for their kid’s school computers or getting a head start on Christmas shopping for the grand-children. As I watched these people toy about cluelessly with the Vista loaded hardware looking like they barely knew how to operate a trackpad, I felt that familiar sinking feeling that I’ve felt so many times before in the same situation.

Yahoo News: Mac OS X Leopard: A perfect 10

“…About eleven years ago, I wrote a column (in another publication) in response to letters I had received that called me to task for hailing the arrival of computers that were performance overkill for the majority of users. I wrote that the reason to look forward to the faster personal computer is that it would have the spare firepower and resources to look after itself, to stay out of the user’s way while being a microsecond away from answering any user demand, and to make sure that the user never has to do anything twice. That’s Leopard.” Read the full review on Yahoo News

Wal-Mart’s $199 Linux PC back in stock.

Wal-Mart introduced the gPC earlier this month but it quickly sold out online. It’s “been one of the top performing desktop computers on Walmart.com,” a spokesman for the company told InformationWeek last week.

Asus’ Window Alternative Notebook sells out, Makes #1 on Amazon’s Best seller list

Asus’ Eee PC has been in the news a lot lately. It’s a tiny $400 USD laptop that’s sold preloaded with a Linux OS instead of Microsoft Windows and loaded with free software that accomplishes virtually everything your average notebook buyer would want to do. 

Kansas City school board buys thousands of MacBooks for Students

“It’s actually here - the day we have been waiting for,” said Mary Stewart, instructional coach at Wyandotte High School. “Classrooms in Kansas City, Kan., high schools will never be the same after today.”The school board earlier this year agreed to purchase Apple MacBooks for all of its 5,000 high school students to use at school and at home.

The project aims to better prepare students for college. Principals have lamented for years about their students not having computers at home, fearing they will be behind their peers by the time they get to college. Read the full story on KansasCity.Com (found on AppleInsider.Com)

It certainly seems schools are a lot more wary of Microsoft and Windows recently.

Another School Switches From PCs To Macs To “Diversify” Computers

…At Cox, the school has installed about 100 iMacs in labs, and there’s dual-boot Mac minis (OS X and XP) at the head of about 30 classrooms. “We’re enhancing and diversifying our computer platforms by keeping Windows XP while adding OS X,” said Allen Gwinn, the school’s technical director, in a statement. “Upgrading to Apple platforms is the only way to do this.” Read the full story at CultOfMac.Com

UK Schools warned off Microsoft deal.

The UK computer agency Becta is advising schools not to sign licensing agreements with Microsoft because of alleged anti-competitive practices.

…a spokesman for Becta said the problem was that Microsoft required schools to have licences for every PC in a school that might use its software, whether they were actually doing so or running something else. Read the full article on BBC News (via Slashdot)

Pic of the day.

Students have enough things to worry about without Vista’s problems. That’s a whole lot of MacBooks!

All schools in Russia to use Linux-like OS by 2009

Russian OS is to be installed on every school computer in Russia by 2009. Furthermore, every pupil will get the opportunity to operate the applied software produced in Russia, Leonid Reiman, acting Minister of Communication stated at a press conference. Experts and market participants consider the terms within which software is to be developed quite reasonable. According to Mr. Reiman, that might significantly reduce Russian dependence on foreign software. Read the full article on CNews.Ru

MA University to Students: Don’t Use Vista!

…With ITS currently being unable to provide solutions for these issues, and still testing Windows Vista and Office 2007 for yet to be discovered compatibility issues, we have decided to not deploy Vista or Office 2007 at this time and cannot fully support either piece of software via the Help Desk or other Desktop Support services. ITS is encouraging the members of the University to avoid purchasing computers with Vista pre-installed or updating their current systems. Read more.

Wal-mart to offer low-cost Linux PC as Vista alternative?

Wal-Mart will sell a sub-$300 “back-to-school” PC this fall pre-loaded with Microsoft Windows Vista and OpenOffice.org productivity software. The Everex GC3502 PC is based on a 1.7GHz Via C7-D processor, and will be available later this year preloaded with Ubuntu Linux.

read more | digg story

16,000 Linux computers delivered - For free

James Burgett is a great guy. He is collecting old computers from companies and individuals, checks and in some cases repairs them, and then gives them away to those who cannot afford to buy. He’s done it for 12 years, and each system is delivered with a free OS. Read more.

Another University moves to Macs

Following in the footsteps of Wilkes University, St. Francis Xavier University in Nova Scotia, Canada, is dumping all of their Windows machines and transitioning over to shiny new Macs. Read more.

Microsoft’s study shows schools prefer Windows to Open-source.

Yet another Microsoft-commissioned study, comparing Microsoft technologies to open-source software, is out, as of June 13. The new report, entitled “ICT in European Schools: a value and cost analysis of Microsoft and Open Source Technology Solutions,” was conducted by Wipro Technologies and paid for by Microsoft. Read more.

New Zealand School System Dumps Microsoft Office for Macs

Microsoft Office programs have been ordered to be removed from about 25,000 Apple Macintosh computers in schools. The Ministry of Education did not renew its deal for the programs, meaning that students using the Apple computers will not have access to common programs such as Excel and Word unless the school buys the software independently. It is thought to affect around 30 per cent of all schools nationwide. Read more.

Apple offers to recycle school’s PCs

The Mac maker let its US educational customers know on Thursday about a special Free Recycling promo which it touted as a way to clear out the backlog of outdated systems at some schools.Capitalizing on the annual spring turnover at schools, Apple said that K-12 institutions, colleges, and universities with 25 or more computers could register before the end of June to recycle their old systems for free. Much like the company’s take-back program for new Mac buyers, the promo doesn’t require that any of the older systems come from Apple to qualify for the exchange process. Read more.