[K12OSN] electricity use

Brad Thomas bthomas at bhbl.org
Wed Mar 14 01:57:41 UTC 2007


I am a social studies teacher and I've been building a lab in my classroom
of old, discarded computers over the last two years (I was up to 20). I
have been using small distros like DSL (DamnSmallLinux) to make them work,
but was planning to switch to a k12ltsp setup before the end of the year.
However, my principal just sent an e-mail last week instructing me to
remove all but 6 of the computers from my room implying that they were
using too much electricity. I just got back from a school planning council
meeting where she and an assistant principal said that they called Dell
(we buy all our new fat machines from Dell) and Dell said there should
only be one computer per 20 amp circuit (which translates into one per
room I think). As far as I can tell (using a Watts Up meter) one
computer-and-monitor use a little more than 1 amp of power, so I don't get
this. Can anyone out there give me some guidelines they go by? Or steer me
to a good site? How much planning goes into ensuring proper electrical
flow into your k12ltsp labs?

Brad




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