[K12OSN] 64 bit ltsp vs. virtualization

[Luis Montes]

Nils Breunese wrote:
> Luis Montes wrote:
>
>> I'm placing an order today for a new server. The school I'm using it 
>> at has about 75 thin clients.
>> Currently we're using an smbldap serer and two dual-core 4GB ram 
>> servers.
>>
>> I'm gonna spend 5 or 6 K today on a 64bit 8-core 16GB ram monster. 
>> (well monster compared to what I have right now)
>>
>> Now I'd like to just add this new box to the network as another ltsp 
>> server using 64 bit edubuntu or fedora+ltsp, but so far my couple of 
>> months with a 64 bit desktop have me thinking this might not be the 
>> best approach.
>>
>> The main problem I have is that Adobe's has yet to get off their 
>> butts and product a 64bit flash plugin. I know I can use the 
>> nspluginwrapper but it only seems to work about half the time, and 
>> when it does work, half the time sound doesn't.  I imagine that sound 
>> through the thin clients will be even more troublesome.
>>
>> The other option I have is to load centos5.1 or ubuntu 8.04 on the 
>> new server and something like vmware server to slice it up with 4 or 
>> so 32bit guests.
>>
>> That second option seems like a waste of resources, but it may give 
>> me less headaches.
>>
>> Surely there are other ltsp users in the same boat right now?
>> Thoughts?
>
> I have a quadcore with 4 GB RAM loaded with K12LTSP 5EL 64-bit. We do 
> run into those issues with Flash being 32-bit only (crashes with 
> nspluginwrapper and 32-bit Flash under 64-bit Firefox, although you 
> can install 32-bit Firefox only) and no 64-bit Java browser plugin 
> being available. You should be able to use 16 GB RAM with the PAE 
> kernel on 32-bit Linux (up to 64 GB according to 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_Address_Extension).
>
Thanks for the reply.  32-bit with PAE seems the easiest route to take. 
I get the feeling I'm not fully utilizing my hardware, though all i 
really wanted the 64bit cores was for the additional ram.

I'll give this route a shot and let the list know how it went. If anyone 
cares :)

Luis