[K12OSN] usb wireless nics

"Terrell Prudé Jr." microman at cmosnetworks.com
Sun Jun 15 15:55:01 UTC 2008


Actually, I use the K12LTSP 5.0EL normally for my "regular" server
CentOS 5 installs. Works like a charm.

+1, though, to Peter's comment about going with wired on both sides (and
Gig-E on eth0), even if you're just testing it at home. Here's why:

I, too, run K12LTSP at home. One of my tests a few years back revealed
that TuxType will regularly suck up 73Mbit/sec at its default
full-screen resolution. TuxMath and ChildsPlay show similar numbers.

Now, imagine yourself on a hub (no, not switch--I mean a hub) that
speaks, say, 100 Mbit/sec. Understand that collisions are going to slow
down even a single session of TuxType. Now, let's say you add another
TuxType game session on your second terminal. Oops, not only did you
just oversubscribe your server link, but collisions have just made even
your two TuxType sessions nearly unplayable. Now consider a computer lab
of 15 kids instead of two.

Wireless technology isn't switched. It's actually a form of hub. This
means that the 54Mbps that you get from that wireless connection is
shared among all wireless computers that have associated to the wireless
access point. You essentially have a 54Mbps hub. NOT good for LTSP.

Even if it were 54Mbps switched (which it isn't), you'll still
oversubscribe your server NIC--and with TuxType, TuxMath, or ChildsPlay,
your client NIC as well.

Gig-E is cheap and is built into virtually all desktop and laptop
motherboards since 2005. If yours is older, Linux-friendly Gig-E NICs
are $19.95. Realtek 8129/8139 100Mbps NIC's (exceedingly LTSP-friendly)
can be had for $5.

Go wired, man; if you're gonna do it, then do it right. Seriously.

--TP
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Jeremy Schubert wrote:
> I work in the school system so I will want to test this out at some point
> with just a couple clients.  Also, I thought I'd get better support from
> this group as anything I do with this will be slanted towards my school age
> kids.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: k12osn-bounces at redhat.com [mailto:k12osn-bounces at redhat.com] On Behalf
> Of Nils Breunese
> Sent: June-13-08 4:35 PM
> To: Support list for open source software in schools.
> Subject: Re: [K12OSN] usb wireless nics
>
> Jeremy Schubert wrote:
>
>   
>> I'm actually using this for home use.  Only three PCs are  
>> connecting.  I
>> don't think I'll use it as a server for thin clients.  More for file  
>> storage
>> and proxy/firewall.
>>     
>
> If you're not going to use it for thin clients, then why are you  
> installing an LTSP distribution? I'd just do a plain CentOS install  
> then.
>
> Nils.
>
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