Thin Client effect for the future

[alliknowisnetworking]

I would like to know if Thin Clients are starting to creep back into the mainstream again. I mean they've always been here, but in the past they were supposed to be the next hot thing, then they sorta fizzled out, but now I've seen a few companies going with these thin client terminals.

Does anyone think that thins will take a significant market share in the future. Im talking in the corporate environment. I dont think thins will take the home market.

And what effect will this have on IT employment?

"Users are like Prostitutes,..They need guidance"-Myself
A+,Network+,MCP+2000

 

[johnherman]

With the price of PC CPU's so dirt cheap, I doubt there would be a strong demand. Perhaps for selected (niche) applications.

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The trouble with doing something right the first time is that noboby appreciates how difficult it was.
- Steven Wright

 

[alexhu]

Just replaced half our desktops (PC & green screens) with thin client (about 200). Rest to follow apart from a few users with laptops. Easier to maintain, always backed up (central servers), no user fiddling (!). Used with Citrix, so much more control over what the kit is used for i.e not playing games, showing dodgy videos or files from the internet etc

Alex

 

[johnherman]

Nice explanation alexhu. What is your basic application? (What does the business do?)

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The trouble with doing something right the first time is that noboby appreciates how difficult it was.
- Steven Wright

 

[svanels]

Thin client?

Next step will be thin user, since the user will be regarded doing basic simple things on the computer, no thinking requered, like punching in stock number, and quantity left the store, he will be replaced by mister B. Codereader
No overtime, no raise, no complaining about the hard work and insufficient pay. I see all those managers drooling for this perfect employee.

Where the hell is this any key, the computer told me to press??

Steven

 

[GlenJohnson]

The larger the orginization, the bigger the need for thin clients. If you have 100,000 pc's out there hitting your network, you've got your hands full. If you have 100,000 thin clients accessing the server, your work is much easier. If you have 2 pc's, you have no need for thin clients. Personally, I think it's all relative.

Glen A. Johnson
"Without words, without writing and without books there would be no history there could be no concept of humanity"
Hermann Hesse (1877-1962), German-born Swiss writer
Tek-Tips in Chicago IL

 

[alexhu]

johnherman

Transportation and logistics - if you're in the USA you may have heard of us - Ryder

Alex

 

[MasterRacker]

The definition of "thin" client has changed over the years. One of the limitiations of a web type interface has been how limited it was compared to a fat client. Hence, ASP.NET and Java applets. Essentially a bunch of programs that have to downloaded and run to assist the client with richer displays and controls as well as offloading some processing to the client.

Thin clients have their place but they're not going to replace everything.

[sub]Jeff
[purple]It's never too early to begin preparing for [/purple]International Talk Like a Pirate Day

I was not born cynical - I earned my cynicism through careful observation of the world around me.[/sub]

 

[sostek]

Thin PC's just shift the burden from the desktop level to the server level.

I abhor Citrix products. In short, they're buggy, bulky and not quite ready for prime time.

PC's are cheap - easier to manage these days, and in case anyone hadn't noticed you can pretty much replicate the benefits of a thin client with a standard PC.

 

[alexhu]

and in case anyone hadn't noticed you can pretty much replicate the benefits of a thin client with a standard PC

well that would be a really good idea - NOT!

Alex

 

[strongm]

>that would be a really good idea - NOT!


Actually, quite a lot of people find that it is ...

 

[CajunCenturion]

I too think that it makes a lot of sense. When so configured, you have all the benefits (or perhaps lack of headaches) of a thin client, but also he ability to open the doors if and when you need to. You also have the ability to define thinness optimally for your environment.

Good Luck
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[alexhu]

So you are both quite happy to waste money (please don't try to tell me the cost of ownership of a pc is less than a thin client) just to have this 'extra' ability to change it back to a 'proper' pc if required.

I suspect that 'feature' would be rarely , if ever used.

Alex

 

[strongm]

Yep

 

[CajunCenturion]

Given that the cost is expensed,
Given that distributed processing has its advantages,
Given that thinnable would probably be defined each time,
Given that worker productivity can be effectively targeted,

Yes

Good Luck
--------------
To get the most from your Tek-Tips experience, please read FAQ181-2886
As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein

 

[jrbarnett]

In my current and previous workplace we've had Citrix based thin client systems, mostly for remote access from external sites to the main building, especially via low bandwidth connections (we have some on 56K modems).
Applications run via thin client systems are typical Office type systems (MS Office, Outlook, etc). Mostly they work without problems.

The thing, however, is that thin client implies almost by nature, fat (or certainly larger than otherwise) servers to host the systems and applications.

John

 

[dilettante]

It takes very little to build a WinCE or XP Embedded thin client out of a standard small form-factor PC using an IDE flash memory device in place of the hard drive. Much the same can be done using special Linux builds as well. It is more a question of having enough volume to spread the platform development costs, but these are getting lower and lower.

Such devices can be "converted" to standard desktops simply by adding a hard drive and installing a conventional desktop OS.

The server-based application development costs are still there too, but you have a range of options: Terminal Services to Web to custom thin-client (like Windows Forms or other client frameworks).

I think "thin" can be viable, but the numbers have to be there and your target applications must be appropriate.

 

[Stevehewitt]

Many businesses already use thin client apps instead of a full Win32 Client / Server app.

Until a few months ago I used to work for one of the largest holiday companies in the UK (Technically I was outsourced, but anyway...) and they moved from their superb custom built Win32 Client / Server DB app to a Unix thin client.
The users hated it, the customers hated it and IT Support (who were Windows boffs) didn't know much about it either.

However - the performance and efficiency rate went through the roof.

I'm now at a medium sized finance company and what do they use for their POS system? Red Hat Enterprise and a thin client to connect to it!

Thin clients have their place in the industry, but they'll be hard pushed to replace a full desktop.

Steve.

 

[chiph]

Thin clients are just the modern version of the 80x24 green screen. Say what you will, the mainframe and midrange computers were all about function over style.

If your terminal died, just drop another one on the desk and plug it in. No messing about with networking, setting up the user's desktop, migrating their app settings over. Turn it on, and it just worked.

Chip H.


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If you want to get the best response to a question, please read FAQ222-2244 first

 

[jsteph]

The PC-as-thin client definitely has it's advantages, but like anything, you've got to define what & why you need thin client in the first place.

We just began replacing 300 PC's in various remote locations (remote from hq, that is), with Wyse winterms. At about $300, plus $200 for a decent flat panel, we've now got virually zero pc-tech support headaches. And that was our problem.

With over 100 small remote locations, each having only 3-4 PC's (now winterms), it didn't make sense to have a full-time pc tech on staff at each location, and remote contractors are just not terribly reliable (security is also an issue with that arrangment). The cost of having a few guys from hq on the phone with--or worse, driving around to--different locations every day to fix all the little ankle-biting things that pc's do to you was killing us. Even with Dells, which we found were the most reliable over the years, we still had daily issues, which the law of averages would support.

With winterms, we plug it in and forget about it. The user presses one button then a password and he's logged into our server. We can do citrix, terminal emulation to our vaxes or our unix servers, rdp, anything we really need. It's a beautiful thing.
--Jim