iBook vs. School

Hypernate

Hypernate

McGeek
Ergh! My school has the worst computer admins I've ever heard of! I was talking to one a few days ago and it was shocking! I'm thinking of buying an iBook to compliment my iMac, or maybe wait for the (inevitable) iBook G4. But anyway, I want to be able to connect it to my school's network. Our Admins said NO because, "Macs are useless and it's impossible to connect them to our network." What crap! It's a Windows 2000 network running Novell Netware. I know for a fact that OS X WILL connect to the network. Fine, I admit, they may not get on GREAT, but it will work. What I relly want is net access there. That's all. If I can get to my school home directory, great, if not, I still want net access.

How can I show him that the iBook will attach to the network?

Oh, and my school used to actually use macs... but our newest ones are 90mhz ones running OS 8.1. Most are running 7.5.1. Actually, I lie. We have two blueberry iMac DVs. But only for photography and drama.

When our admins joined, they immediately cut the contract with Apple, and opened one with Dell, so we now have to use horribly slow machines.

Sorry, that turned into a rant :p:eek:
 
I hate when that happens. Apple needs to start a major campaign to take back the schools.

I'm not sure what you can do. They're Windozers, so if you try to explain Unix and open source options that'll work to connect your iBook to the network you may hurt them or make them start to cry and then disable your net access completly.

I say get an iBook, find an open ethernet port, plug in, and let DHCP do the rest :cool:
 
oooo man i know what you are saying man... everyday my schools network just plain and simple does not work... we are running celeron 500 mhz with 128 ram.... the computers are fine for word prosesing, but the hole thing has to be worked on every damn day... bahhhhh, i brought in my moms powerbook and pluged in one wire and finished my work 30 minutes faster then everbody else LOL!
 
Originally posted by dricci
I hate when that happens. Apple needs to start a major campaign to take back the schools.

I'm not sure what you can do. They're Windozers, so if you try to explain Unix and open source options that'll work to connect your iBook to the network you may hurt them or make them start to cry and then disable your net access completly.

I say get an iBook, find an open ethernet port, plug in, and let DHCP do the rest :cool:
Click to expand...

Ha. They wouldn't dare take away my access because I made them cry ;) Big fat 'ole man (should be careful, I'm at school now lol) woulnd't dare. We pay au$10000 a year to go here, so they would get a lot of angry letters ;)

Basically, I would act like a spoilt little brat ;)
 
Does your school have wireless?

If so just get an Airport card, set it up and when the admin says it won't work, just say, "You idiot, I'm on right now!":D

Or as dricci says, just find an open ethernet port and plug in. If your school is using DHCP it'll work no problem.
 
I work for my college's sysadmins and PC's are the odd ones out. There is a single NT lab (mostly for ID and engineering/cad) and a few odd PC/Linux machines that the Animation kids use for Maya (since Mac Maya is only Complete and not Unlimited). Being a lackey... I don't need to fudge with too many PC's (makes support very very easy) and it's a nice environment because it's balanced... basically... the administrators don't shrug off PC's... they just keep them in their place.

Then again... this is a school supporting photo, design, fine art, etc.
 
actually the answer to your dilemma is simple ;)
1) Aquire valid IP from school
2) Aquire valid gateway IPs
3) Program them into your mac
4) COnnect ethernet cable
5) Dazzle the idiot sysadmin
6) Make him suffer for his error :p



Admiral
 
for me :D over breaks:D i just take my iMac down and start surfing and downoading. but what sucks is the we have Bess the Bit*h and it won't let us go to any game sites or anything like that (all i realy would want it to filter out is porn and then it would be a good system)

but then again we have all macs so i don't need to take my keyboard or power plug
 
There are many ways to get around proxies such as bess depending on network configuration, etc. I believe it's ran off of a NT system. Not that I'm promoting any network agreement violations, of course :p
 
Well, I'm halfway there ;) I know both our school's IPs. 192.168.96.4 for the Middle school, and 192.168.95.4 for the senior school, where I am. How do I find the gateway IP? And then how do I connect the mac? I'm sure I could work it out, but I'd like to play it safe.
 
To the post that inspired the topic:

I don't know what school you go to, but having such clueless sysadmins kinda speaks volumes about the comp-sci program at the school, doesn't it?

I'll be honest with you, I'm vary wary of schools that let "absurdities" pass by.

Right now, I attend two schools - one is NJIT, and it has an all-pc campus. Don't get me wrong, I actually agree with this policy - if a student doesn't have a PC, they're given one (a slow but workable one) by the school so that they can run the programs provided by the school for technical courses. In about 99% of the majors, specialized computer programs are required.

While VirtualPC would probably work - that's a program that not all mac users have. Yet, if a student wanted to bring in a Mac to type up term papers on, I don't think they'd have a problem with that. - although they'd probably give them a PC when they enrolled anyway.

Rutgers-Newark on the other hand does not give away PCs to every student. They've got a computer lab, however, which has about 120 PCs, 17 blue & white Powermacs, and 3 Solaris stations. Too bad the blue&whites are running OS9.

The point is, even if your school has a good excuse to restrict Macs, like NJIT, they shouldn't be telling you "Macs are useless and it's impossible to connect them to our network." and use that as an excuse not to help you. "We don't support Macs" is fine.

Get the iBook, set it up, if worse comes to worse and the sysadmins actually *actively* block Macs from the network, you can just put together a cheapo Linux pc and route the internet connection through there.

Brian.
 
The only reason is that they hate macs. I'm sure of it, seeing as the ONLY software 99% of us use is Word, Excel, Powerpoint and Internet Explorer.

The other 1% use Visual Basic, or Photoshop.

As far as I know, all of them, except Visual Basic will run on an OS X mac (Once PS 7 is released).

Oh, and they use groupwise for network email, but I can live without that, PLUS my dad uses Groupwise on his TiBook at work so I KNOW it works there. And seeing I'd be providing the software myself, I'm like WHY NOT?!

And even my sister's school, where they all are supposed to use Toshibas, will let you use another brand, (i.e. Dell, Apple) but won't supply software, and won't give support. Fair enough. They will connect you to the network, just not fix your comp, or give software. I agree with that.

But discriminating because my computer is pure white, not black like their Dells? ;)
 
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