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First world IT problems...

wow people need to chill.

I get the OP, it sucks. On the bright side, you still get ethernet, which may be a good thing for an IT guy
 
mikeo007 said:
There's probably nothing you can't do, but many things you do with OSX require a workaround. Again: square peg, round hole.
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I'm just not getting the square peg round hole analogy. Case in point.. Administering AD. Sure, I can't put the tools on a MBP, but in two clicks I can be consoled into a DC or another machine with the Admin tools and have all the tools at my disposal. I'm just not getting the "workaround" you speak of.
 
Oh, and most of the schools I work at are on Domains so occasionally I will connect to it...that is the only thing I could think of.
 
I can relate to tspinning's problem. 4 weeks ago my office computer was up to replacement and, as I had been thinking about jumping to Mac anyway, had a choice of a new Mac Pro or Dell (to replace my Dell). I only had a couple days to decide and decided not to take a chance with the Mac Pro.

Fast forward a couple weeks and I finally decide I need to make the jump to Mac and buy a MacBook Pro with my own funds.

So now I need to wait 2 years (maybe more) before my office PC can be switched to a Mac Pro unless I use my own grant money instead of my employers.

In the big picture, this is not a problem, but I understand the rumination in the OP's post.
 
Ccrew said:
I'm just not getting the square peg round hole analogy. Case in point.. Administering AD. Sure, I can't put the tools on a MBP, but in two clicks I can be consoled into a DC or another machine with the Admin tools and have all the tools at my disposal. I'm just not getting the "workaround" you speak of.
Click to expand...

You're using two computers to do the work that a single box running windows could do. It's a workaround.
 
charlieroberts said:
wow people need to chill.

I get the OP, it sucks. On the bright side, you still get ethernet, which may be a good thing for an IT guy
Click to expand...


I don't think anyone's upset about it. I for one am extremely curious. Call it more a professional curiosity. I'm lead engineer in IT for a large company. I have 250+ Windows servers, about 300 or so Unix/Solaris/CentOS servers, and 3200 Windows desktops and about 500 Mac's. I can't think of anything I can't do from a Mac and I'm wondering what others are seeing that I'm not.

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mikeo007 said:
You're using two computers to do the work that a single box running windows could do. It's a workaround.
Click to expand...

No, because the admin tools on a desktop machine are an attack vector. Still requires two machines, 1 dekstop + 1 server.They also require me to either run as or be an admin on that machine which has it's own issues or is a workaround, especially when I don't even need to be bound to the domain on the Mac.
 
Ccrew said:
I don't think anyone's upset about it. I for one am extremely curious. Call it more a professional curiosity. I'm lead engineer in IT for a large company. I have 250+ Windows servers, about 300 or so Unix/Solaris/CentOS servers, and 3200 Windows desktops and about 500 Mac's. I can't think of anything I can't do from a Mac and I'm wondering what others are seeing that I'm not.
Click to expand...

Yeah, it is actually insightful to see what other IT professionals are using! I know more and more techs in the k12 world are making the switch to Macs but I am just not ready to make that step.
 
pmkoch said:
Oh, and most of the schools I work at are on Domains so occasionally I will connect to it...that is the only thing I could think of.
Click to expand...

You can bind to the domain on a Mac. I'm still not getting these reasons.
 
mikeo007 said:
You're using two computers to do the work that a single box running windows could do. It's a workaround.
Click to expand...

No, I still would be SSHing into the server for PowerShell as some of the scripts require certain server functions to be installed. Sharepoint and Hyper-V to name a couple. So, I'm actually managing everything exactly the same as I would with a Windows laptop - SSH into a server for 90% of the job.
 
mikeo007 said:
You're using two computers to do the work that a single box running windows could do. It's a workaround.
Click to expand...
Not really. When you run your admin tools on a workstation, those tools almost always connect to the server to accomplish the task. Workstation w/ admin tools + server = at least two boxes.
 
pmkoch said:
Yeah, it is actually insightful to see what other IT professionals are using! I know more and more techs in the k12 world are making the switch to Macs but I am just not ready to make that step.
Click to expand...

Agreed, mainly because more and more EDU's are going Apple.
 
Ccrew said:
I don't think anyone's upset about it. I for one am extremely curious. Call it more a professional curiosity. I'm lead engineer in IT for a large company. I have 250+ Windows servers, about 300 or so Unix/Solaris/CentOS servers, and 3200 Windows desktops and about 500 Mac's. I can't think of anything I can't do from a Mac and I'm wondering what others are seeing that I'm not.

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No, because the admin tools on a desktop machine are an attack vector. Still requires two machines, 1 dekstop + 1 server.They also require me to either run as or be an admin on that machine which has it's own issues or is a workaround, especially when I don't even need to be bound to the domain on the Mac.
Click to expand...

You're still using more resources using the Mac. The server and your workstation exist regardless. You're using an extra session to do your work. Your Mac is basically acting like a $2000 thin client.
 
mikeo007 said:
You're still using more resources using the Mac. The server and your workstation exist regardless. You're using an extra session to do your work. Your Mac is basically acting like a $2000 thin client.
Click to expand...

Just a note: we pay $1500-$2000 for a Windows engineering laptop too.
 
mikeo007 said:
You're still using more resources using the Mac. The server and your workstation exist regardless. You're using an extra session to do your work. Your Mac is basically acting like a $2000 thin client.
Click to expand...

The workstation doesn't exist because my Mac IS the workstation.

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mikeo007 said:
Which has tools to directly access AD resources.
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Not on Windows 7 it doesn't by default to administer. Add to Windows 7, or Add to a Mac. Choose your poison.
 
Ccrew said:
Glad you had good luck with them, they proved to be a cheapass nightmare for us.

Went with these instead for the poor Windows users. http://www.shopping.hp.com/en_US/ho...nt_source=1&@Sort.TieredPricing=0&PageSize=15
Click to expand...

Glad to see we aren't the only ones who have had massive latitude failure rate.

We gave up after the 6x10 series (we were a Dell shop since 2003), and went to HP elitebooks (after having numerous meetings with Dell who basically called us liars or that we were doing something wrong - and claimed they have a 1% failure rate). Have gone from roughly 35% failure rate within 18 months to about 1-2% over 18 months.

That's comparing about 250 E series latitudes between 2008-2010 and 220 elitebooks between 2010-current.


Given a choice between Dell Laptops and "other" I would recommend pretty much anything else these days.


Dell servers are still good - their portables, however are junk. Don't let the spec sheet fool you.
 
aristobrat said:
Is the account that you logon to your Windows workstation with an AD admin, or do you right-click/run as each time you launch an AD/admin tool?
Click to expand...

I'm guessing he is an domain admin since he is talking about being directly connected.
 
I guess we must be missing each other's points. The point I'm trying to make is that your using a Mac to admin a windows network. Why? The tools listed aren't 100% compatible and youve still got to remote into a windows box to perform some simple tasks.

Honestly though, I'm glad you've been ale to make it work for you. It will never work for me, and maybe that's why I'm having a hard time imagining it. We've got way too much propritary Windows only software, and I wouldn't be caught dead running it thin.
 
throAU said:
(after having numerous meetings with Dell who basically called us liars or that we were doing something wrong - and claimed they have a 1% failure rate). Have gone from roughly 35% failure rate within 18 months to about 1-2% over 18 months.
Click to expand...

My god that sounds so familiar. Especially the liar part. We're pretty much now the same. Dell on the server side, HP on the laptops, and predominately Dell at the full desktop.

Dell rep tried to get past me and get an audience with the VP over me, and his only response to the Dell rep: "Nice, you make laptops, we'll never buy another one" Needless to say that went over well. I will say however that our older D series Latitudes were tanks, and I still have some in service.

As to the overall conversation here, I don't think anyone's right or wrong, and I'm sure we can all banter back and forth as to what works and what doesn't although I haven't yet heard a *compelling* reason why I have to use a Windows workstation. At the end of the day it's about getting the job done in an expedient fashion and I don't think anyones wrong if that's getting done.
 
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Exactly the same exerience with the D series here as well.

Towards the end of our dealings with the E series, i was actually sending out re-built 2-3 year old D series machines whenever they were going anywhere that was hard to get to (we're an international mining contractor).

Simply because i trusted the old machine to be more reliable than a brand new one.

If that doesn't indicate severe quality control problems with Dell's portable lineup, i'm not sure what does.
 
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mikeo007 said:
Which has tools to directly access AD resources.
Click to expand...
Actually no, it doesn't. As I said before, many software packages require the software to be local to manage with PowerShell. PowerShell is the thing MS is pushing heavy and is what I use for all my management work. All my scripts were written when I had a Windows laptop and all were run using putty on that Windows laptop off of a server with either AD, Exchange, Hyper-V, Sharepoint, etc, etc.

The only difference now is I use the unix SSH app instead of putty.
 
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