Maintenance

Greg will be posting his lengthy details of his efforts to do audio setup with new machines in Lab B. I helped for a while at the beginning.

With Stew, spent a while reading through a package of reviews of language lab systems. In general, we didn't see a single package we'd want to buy; some are astoundingly expensive, and others are severely limited or very crude. We hope that by the time we're actually looking for a replacement for our Sanako system, there are some better options.

I have a machine that makes a siren-like sound after running for a few minutes. Looks like an overheating problem. This may be fixable by reapplying thermal paste and re-seating the heatsink. In the meantime, the machine is not buildable.

UPDATE: Pasting/reseating the heatsink seems to have solved the problem. Added 25 minutes to this entry.

Some visual progress is being made.
I will have, by 4pm today, replaced 10 machines in Lab B with the CASStoffs.
Stations 1,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18 are done.

Got my hands on one of the CASSt-offs from Marc and started putting together the bits I'll need to do a build.
Specs of machines:
CPU: AOpen 2.0GHz Athlon XP+ 2400 socket A (462)
RAM: 1x512 PC2100 (DDR 133)
HDD: Maxtor 6E030L0 30GB
Graphics: NVidia GeForce2 MX400 (64MB)
Audio: onboard Realtek Avance ALC650 AC97 (uses Via South Bridge chipset - KT400 VT8377)
Mobo: AOpen AK77-8XN with a Phoenix BIOS
NIC: onboard Realtek RTL8139 Family PCI Fast Ethernet NIC
OS: Windows XP
CD burner (generic JustLink 52x24x52x)

This makes them better than what we have by quite a bit, but they aren't quite as good as I thought. The biggest benefit is that we now have XP in the labs.

I grabbed a newer set of drivers from the AOpen site as well as an app called SilentTek (also from AOpen) that purports to keep the machine running quiet and cool, but it uses 8MB of memory. Also grabbed the manuals - stored on my machine.

UPDATE: the machines do not have DVD readers in them. To add a DVD drive from existing lab machines will take approximately 30 minutes (5-10 for removing the DVD drive from the current lab machine and 20-25 minutes to install it in the new machine. Problem is that the new machine has a cage that needs to be literally cut apart to insert the extra drive). Option here is to replace the existing CD-RW drive with a DVD read-only drive - is this something we want to entertain?.

Finalized build last night. Ghosted both labs.
Problems:
1) on logout, unprivileged users were told that the "CA ISS Dashboard Tray" wouldn't quit. The warning timed out but didn't cancel the process on it's own. I had to uninstall AV and reinstall it (4 reboots and 25 minutes of complete scanning) as local admin user, then pull the image.
2) Ghost configuration server (on Casper) died three times, necessitating a reboot of Casper.
3) Default configs for machines seem to have been screwed up. Old configs seem to have been imposed on Lab C machines (like a default gateway etc.). I had to manually edit all of Lab C machines.

I've got Lab C SWs on the DHCP as Lab B and media players set up as best I can. To refresh: getting machines on a purely DHCP setup requires that in the IPAdmin/PortAdmin tools I switch each port to vlan 761 and delete the node in IPAdmin manually, then go to each machine and switch it to DHCP manually - can't push that kind of thing out with Ghost because the machines are not "seen" by Ghost until everything is on the same vlan. About 1/3 of the machines refused to pick up a 177 IP address. The resolution was to turn off all of the network protocols and turn them back on (File sharing, TCP/IP etc). This forced the NIC to negotiate an IP with the DHCP server that was on the 177 subnet. ipconfig /release etc. was not effective in this context. So, the process was a bit laborious, but it only needs to be done once.

Also worked through some Sanako problems (hardware on C08 is flaky and made some adjustments to the way cookies are stored etc.) and replaced a monitor on C24.

Still to do:
Static-DHCP on Teacher station in Lab C & config the Crossroads stuff to the static IP assigned by DHCP server.
Pull new image from Lab B01 and push to both labs.
Replace B10 HDD - its another failed Fireball HDD

Revised AP Test Instructions (May 4, 2007)

May 4, 2007 Instructions: (Stewart, Judy) AP TESTING HOW-TO

A: CONNECTION

1) Insert CD
2) Log in, start “Sanako Lab 300”, make sure the source for all 4 groups (A-D) is Cassette.
3) Place only participating machines in a group. If this is not done the machines NOT participating will cause the next step to fail.
4) Choose AP Test under the Testing menu.
5) Under the “Student ID” section of the UI press “Start” to make the system aware of the participating students.
6) Students then enter their AP ID # (8 digits) using the bookmark buttons in the Sanako player.
7) When the students are done click on “Stop” (“Entering student ID Button”) under the “Student ID” section of the UI. Button turns to “Start”.
ID # for each student is then indicated on each student icon at teacher station

B: PLAY/RECORD SAMPLE

1) Teacher audio or track on CD as SOURCE (we used “Teacher”)
2) Press “Sample” under the “Student ID” section of the UI to test playback.
3) If students hear the source press “Stop” before Record then press “Record” and have the students speak a few words to test the recording functionality.
4) Press “Replay” to let students listen to their “dry run”. If they hear their recording press (unclick) “Record” again to stop the dry run.

C: TRIAL RUNS + TEST

CHANGE SOURCE TO “CD AUDIO”:

1) Cue the CD to the desired track (starts playing?) . Press “Start” (under Exam) and the
“Pause Student Recording” so the students can hear the taped instructions and do the TWO practice runs (but not to be recorded), hit “Play” button again to start CD if stopped. The entire Instructions/Practice takes approximately 4.5 minutes. Pause the Master track if necessary so teachers can field questions.

2) Once instructed to “begin recording”, unclick the “Pause Student Recording” button under the Exam section of the UI to begin the test. If master track is not running, click the Play Button (green arrow).

3) Hit “Pause Student Recording” when instructed to “stop recording”. Master track continues to run.

4) When instructed to “begin recording” again, unpause the student recording by clicking on the “Pause Student Record” button. Keep in mind that unpausing the student recording (for some reason) pauses the Master track. If that happens hit “Play” on the master track so students can hear the questions and record themselves.

5) When the test is over press “Stop” then “Collect” and follow the onscreen instructions

6) Collect goes to “Lab B Media”; files are on desktop of teacher station make backup/burn CD before LogOut