I administer several Win2K Terminal Servers, with a few hundred clients of various kinds. (True thin clients, MS PCs with TS client software, MS PCs with IE browser and the TSAC plug in for TS connections, a couple of Linux machines running rdesktop and Winconnect.) Let me share a bit about what I've seen. > rDeskTop presents a Linux workstation to MS > Terminal Server as if it (the > Linux workstation) were a MS Terminal Server > Client. True, and I've used it plenty. It is a fair client, but not as smooth as the MS client. It is slower (screen repaints take more time) but not dramatically, and not even worth mentioning if the boxes are on a LAN. Over a VPN or dial up, you notice it, though. It will also garble some screen elements on occasion, and I haven't found a way to fix this. For that reason, I had to go to a better Linux client- WinConnect - but this is $59 for an individual license. It is really nice though. rdesktop has come up with a new version, though -1.2.0 - and I haven't tested that. I'm talking about 1.1.0. (www.rdesktop.org) > > 2 - Citrix runs on Windows Terminal Server to > support thin clients. What > additional features does Citrix bring for the > additional cost over a pure > Terminal Server solution? We do not run Citrix, though we may have to consider it now, as standard Windows TS traffic is bogging down our links, and we understand the protocol Citrix uses ("ICA" I think) is smaller. We are analyzing TS traffic now to determine more specifics, but we know that RDP uses much more bandwidth than what is advertized. That is an issue! > > 3 - What relative horsepower is needed at the > server to achieve similar > performance at the client? I assume Citrix > takes more than Terminal Server > which is more than LTSP. I can't compare because we don't run LTSP (yet - I'm working on this!), but I know that all of this varies so much depending on usage patterns that it is VERY difficult to measure and compare. We use Dell multiprocessor servers, like 4x550MHz with 4GB RAM, or dual PIII 1.13G with 4GB RAM. Boxes like this loaf running W2K and 50 or less users, even with all of them using the MS Office Suite and Outlook. CPU is usually under 5-10%. Perhaps someone has comparable data for an LTSP implementation. (Matt?? where are you??) > > 4 - I have some idea from reading and hearing > what the maintainance effort > of LTSP is. How does the other two compare? TS is fairly easy. W2K comes with it, and installing it is simple. You must deal with the MS tendency to make their machines very insecure, though. Regular users have WAY too much permissions by default. And tightening this down isn't easy. Of course, MOST of the time, MOST users just make their Word docs and read their email, and it isn't a problem. But it is much nicer to have nix machines where the users are all blocked out of the stuff they shouldn't be able to get to. Any TS user on a default install TS server can hose the machine without too much effort, if they really have a mind to. > 5 - We are talking about a system of about 15 > - 20 thin clients, all PCs. > Is Citrix overkill for that? I would think Citrix would be overkill for just 20, especially if everyone is on one physical LAN, or unless you have need of some of the specific things Citrix offers, which others have already discussed. TS works fine. > > There is a commercial (not free but much less > $$$ than MS) equivalent > > (Linux) to MS Exchange. (per others) > > OpenMail shows promise. There are actually several trying to enter this market. Communigate Pro is another contender - www.stalker.com. And check out Insight Server at www.bynari.net. There are more. > > Okay I know that if I'm on a Linux box I can > pull a window to wins if I > > use rdesktop. But what about the other way? sure. use vnc. Also, I would say my experience with Open Office shows it is very close now. For most users, they can't tell the difference if you set it up to save docs by default to MS formats. There are still some diffs, though, and as has been pointed out, sometimes reading complicated docs (with tables, etc) from the MS Office suite doesn't work quite right. Sometimes the best way to introduce non-MS stuff into a company is not to go into the board room and try to convince the shirts and ties that OSS is better. Often just setting up something and letting them try it will win the day. It's not so scary then. Just hand them a laptop with Open Office on it and let them open a Word doc. Hope this helps, Scott . __________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now. http://mailplus.yahoo.com