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What the market will bear
Interestingly I had a very similar discussion with a HP Australia
sales person at a conference the other day. I'm a big fan of their
linux based HP t5125 and have used it in a number of designs
(one with windows terminal server (TS)).

Two points: HP will give a discounted bundled price for thin
clients with monitors (but you have to ask). Secondly pricing
decision for thin client hardware is more about what the market
will bear than cost plus.

Thin clients are predominantly use in the enterprise. Enterprises
pay more - fact of life. This is the same reason MS charges
significant money for TS Cals and why you can't use OEM Office
licenses for TS.

Of course neither are a cost for X11 based Linux terminal
servers and OOo (which since v2 deploys beautify to TS
configurations).

So why a thin client when thick is the same price?

i) Simplified updates
ii) No remote data to worry about
iii) Significant increase in availability (no moving parts)
iv) High failure parts can be located in server room

Given the cost of supporting windows PC (which each year are
multiples of the initial hardware cost) thin client designs save a
fortune over the life of the solution.
Posted by: Richard Flude   Posted on: 05/08/06 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use
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What the market will bear  Richard Flude | 05/08/06
huh?  toadlife | 05/08/06
Not at all  Richard Flude | 05/09/06
I did ask  zzz1234567890 | 05/09/06
Sorry Richard  toadlife | 05/09/06
Let's do the sums then  Richard Flude | 05/09/06
Good estimate  toadlife | 05/09/06
It all depends on how you manage your PCs  georgeou | 05/09/06
So if you manage PC's like thin clients  Robert Crocker | 05/10/06
Not the point of rich clients  georgeou | 05/11/06
FreeNX as in Beer  D. T. Schmitz | 05/08/06
Right Carl  Richard Flude | 05/08/06
Yes, but you can buy a cheap PC and do this  georgeou | 05/08/06
Just a thought...  ju1ce | 05/09/06
TCO does not justify price  mosborne | 05/09/06
I really do not like thin clients  P. Douglas | 05/08/06
do not like them in a box. I do not like them with a fox I do not like...  Richard Flude | 05/08/06
I asked a lot of people and they all said thin is good for other people  georgeou | 05/08/06
curious  richvball44 | 05/09/06
This made me chuckle, I must say  mosborne | 05/09/06
History  TonyMcS | 05/08/06
I mostly agree  georgeou | 05/08/06
god gawd  richvball44 | 05/09/06
I'm talking about power users  georgeou | 05/09/06
Real world example  Richard Flude | 05/08/06
And did you factor in productivity?  georgeou | 05/08/06
same for the other side  tombalablomba | 05/08/06
I won't disagree for data-entry folks  georgeou | 05/09/06
Who are these "regular office workers" you speak of  Richard Flude | 05/09/06
To answer  nucrash | 05/09/06
Fine, so 80+% of users are covered by thin clients  Richard Flude | 05/09/06
pretty much everyone --- except maybe you  zzz1234567890 | 05/09/06
It probably doesn't make the most sense...  ju1ce | 05/09/06
Depends on the Application Need  nucrash | 05/09/06
The right application makes sense  grillin_man | 05/09/06
VPN from home  nucrash | 05/09/06
Oh please  mosborne | 05/09/06
Yes, and I assume he has too  Richard Flude | 05/08/06
Again, I'm for thin clients when we're talking about data-entry  georgeou | 05/09/06
Why just data entry?  D. T. Schmitz | 05/09/06
Data Entry is the easiest to replace  nucrash | 05/10/06
Cost and whatever!  Jackbacson | 05/09/06
Weighing in on Thin Clients  nucrash | 05/09/06
In Addendum  nucrash | 05/09/06
Once again, hardware costs DO NOT MATTER  Roger Ramjet | 05/09/06
You're stretching here, and with this stretching, it's breaking  cd2_z | 05/11/06
Thin clients have been around for years ...  mwagner@... | 05/09/06
Two things  Robert Crocker | 05/09/06
Thin Clients were all there was proir to 1980  llundgren@... | 05/10/06

What do you think?

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