RE: [TCLUG:1551] Anyone feeling entrepreneurial?

["Eric Hillman" <ehillman@cccu.com>]

>...hardware. Again, I'm thinking user-centric:
>
>1. a flat-panel LCD display with speakers mounted on the sides
>2. very small form factor CPU enclosure (laptop-like)
>3. miniumum mess: run cables between components in a single line, rather
>than a million cables coming out of the CPU (mouse -> kbd -> display ->
>cpu ; one giant cable coming out of the display carrying audio, video,
>mouse/kbd and power)
>4. New UI from the bottom up and apps to match

	The Corel systems would fit all of the above -- although I've still yet to
see an LCD screen that makes a good replacement for a CRT monitor (not that
I've looked all that hard).  However, they're designed with video in/out
ports built in, so they could probably be used as set-top boxes...

> ...we'd have to make
> this case convincing to our prospective customers:
> 1. The hardware is made from good quality parts and won't randomly die.
> Also easy to service, in the rare case this is necessary.
> 2. Linux is efficient and that, in combination with the open source,
> means obsolescence works much more slowly. You'll own this hardware for
> longer and get more productive use out of it.
> 3. Your employees will work more efficiently with a user-centered
> hardware and software design.
>
> Think in terms of long-term return on investment and total cost of
> ownership. I think the low-ball, make-everything-as-cheap-as-possible
> approach is ultimately the wrong one to make.

	This is true.  From the looks of it, though, the Corel machines are not
"cheap", though, merely inexpensive (www.corelcomputer.com -- check it
out...  I actually wouldn't mind having one of these on *my* desk, anyways).
	Anyways, the main thing about NCs is that not only is there less stuff that
*can* go wrong at the workstation, but it's not a big deal when it does.
The user never needs to upgrade or patch their software or OS -- this can be
done from the server.  Hardware upgrades are a bit peskier, and I'm not sure
what the best way to work that out would be, but as for fixing faulty
hardware, with an inexpensive, minimally-cabled system like this, it'd
probably be easier to provide an off-the-shelf replacement, and recondition
the faulty boxes at your leisure.  With a server-centric system, this is a
piece of cake.
	Personally, I'm already trying to persuade my boss to let me try one of
these things out.  We've just heard that the terminal emulation software
that gives our employees access to our account-processing system is now
available in Java, which means that our employees could be doing most or all
of their work in a Netscape window -- so why should we be buying our tellers
$1800 computers *plus* NT licenses when they can do their job on a $700
Linux NC?