What is the cheapest and best way to get hard drives for PCs at a Kid's centre ?

spakkker

CEX sell 20/30gb hdd for a fiver del. 12mth g'tee -40gb are 8 quid. Dban should be fine.

http://uk.webuy.com/product.php?sku=SHDD64D0AA

candtalan

Whatever route you take, you will be surprised by something like Ubuntu (based on Linux). Live CDs will run even without hard drives in place, but the RAM will need to be say, 384 MB at least.

To try it you will need a live CD of Ubuntu or and Xubuntu, or Lubuntu (there is quite an active industry out there!)

If you are up for a try and have difficulty getting a CDs let me know and I will try to get some to you?
candtalan

A.Penny.Saved

I think using Linux would be a smart move as it will significantly reduce support time after it's setup. It will be considerably more secure from all aspects both from Malware on the web or infected software being run on the PC's by the kids. Linux will allow internet browsing fine and there is lots of free software if other things such as word processing are required.

It doesn't get any cheaper either.

CoolHotCold

Do the old systems have XP licenses attached to the casing.
As in if they are branded they should have a COA (for windows license) which will have a product code, and if they are custom built they should still have a COA attached. If thats the case you can use a OEM XP disc and install using the product code attached to the system. Legally I see no issue with that as a OEM COA is a non transferable (transferable in very certain circumstances) license to use Windows XP/Vista/Win7 on the machine the COA is attached to.


Also some companies will physically destroy the hard drives or send away to get erased with a report sent back saying all data was destroyed etc etc so the company has something which protects them legally in the future and if customers enquire about it they can produce the report that it was done to standards.
MSE most loved company PcWorld do offer a Data Erasure using software called Blanco which (along with other standards) wipes data at DoD 5220.22-M by default(Department Of Defence certified, although the USA has now changed so degaussing or physical destruction is only accessible now) and a certificate is printed out by the Blanco software to say the data has been destroyed by x method on x machine with x characteristics)

I believe the charge is £29.99, but depending how many systems are handed over they could get a discount

sharkie

closed wrote: »

You won't be able to get any data back after a dban, another alternative is to use the factory restore partition (assuming these are branded pc's with original OS), and then wipe free space will ccleaner, same result, the data is unrecoverable, and you have an os. The factory reinstall takes 10 minutes, wipe free space a little longer (but you don't have to sit and watch either) - even if they remove the drives, they are going to either have to go through this process, or physically destroy them somehow.

If they still aren't happy, dban (or buy new drives), and use the windows license sticker on the PC's to reinstall windows - you'll need a matching XP disc, which may be the OEM version, or professional

If they want proof nothing is recoverable, install Recuva and do a deep scan

We do the same as the above company. The time, effort and cost involved erasing the data is too much. Every year we scrap 1000's of disks of which the vast majority still work, but they are of small capacity 20-40Gig.

I do not know the current prices, but we pay around £6 to get each disk acid bathed to remove the magnetic coating, then the disk is shredded in a metal mangler.

If inadvertently a disk is left in and any data is suspected to be on the disk and the police get hold of it, then the manager in charge and senior managers spend a good half a day at the police station being interviewed. Fortunately there were no names, addresses or other identifying data on the disk as then they would have been charged.

Just not worth the risk.

I am surprised that they offered them. Apparently there is legislation regarding should anything electrically go wrong with them, the company is liable for the safety checks and the 'fit for purpose' of the electrical equipment and is liable should any one be harmed.

Most dell PCs contain a windows key glued to the pc. your PCs may have the same, or you could use linux.

Browntoa

Puupy Linux runs well on a CD without the need for a hard disk

http://puppylinux.org/main/Overview%20and%20Getting%20Started.htm

Save Money - Even if your PC has no hard disk (ex, broken hard disk), you can still boot Puppy via CD or USB and continue working. Old PCs that no longer work with new systems will still work good-as-new with Puppy.
Do More - Puppy boots in less than a minute, even in old PCs, and it does not require antivirus software. Administering Puppy is quick and minimal. With Puppy, you just have to take care of your data, which you can easily save to USB flash (Then forget about your operating system!). Your data can be read by other computers.

Includes a wide range of applications: wordprocessors, spreadsheets, internet browsers, games, image editors and many utilities.

Save Money - Even if your PC has no hard disk (ex, broken hard disk), you can still boot Puppy via CD or USB and continue working. Old PCs that no longer work with new systems will still work good-as-new with Puppy.

gonzo127

if you are only using the computers for internet access and some basic office programs go with Linux,

just to save hassle with all the license's required, and i am not just on about the operating system license's, but the virus scanners and any other software you want to install on them, all of them will require you pay for the license's since you will not be using for 'personal use', which is generally the only time you can get free software on windows. with Linux you will get the software free, and the only time you need to pay is if you require support, and to be honest most of the time you should be able to sort it out yourself. and this is not even taking into account the fact you dont need anti virus etc

as for the ones to look into as people have said Ubuntu, is a good choice, although can require more resources than some of the other versions, if you require a less resource hungry operating system Xubuntu and Lubuntu are great (i use Lubuntu and a 1.2ghz celeron laptop with just 512mb RAM, and runs really fast, booting in abotu 40 seconds, closing in about 5 seconds), this being said Linux Mint is also a very good choice, or puppy - however puppy is more for booting without hard drives as it is not generally recommended as a fully installed operating system

Browntoa

I picked puppy to avoid the cost of installing hard drives

Owain_Moneysaver

6-year-old PCs might be a bit clunky even running Linux - many kids will want to run Flash web games etc which can be surprisingly taxing.

You will need to network the PCs together to provide them with internet. You will need a firewall/proxy/filtering server eg Dansguardian so you'll need a server anyway.

A bit more technical to set up, but you could use a thin client setup whereby the clients (PCs) don't have hard disks. They boot up over the network and download a cut-down operating system from the server which just handles the keyboard and display on the client. all the processing is done on the server. Here's an example of a 20-seat configuration.

Every time the child logs on they get their own 'desktop', file space etc, or a completely clean 'new' virtual machine, no local hard disks to become corrupted or virus-infected.