'Dumb Terminals' Can Be a Smart Move for Companies

Carl Bialik from WSJ writes "More companies are forgoing desktop and laptop computers for dumb terminals — reversing a trend toward powerful individual machines that has been in motion for two decades, the Wall Street Journal reports. 'Because the terminals have no moving parts such as fans or hard drives that can break, the machines typically require less maintenance and last longer than PCs. Mark Margevicius, an analyst at research firm Gartner Inc., estimates companies can save 10% to 40% in computer-management costs when switching to terminals from desktops. In addition, the basic terminals appear to offer improved security. Because the systems are designed to keep data on a server, sensitive information isn't lost if a terminal gets lost, stolen or damaged. And if security programs or other applications need to be updated, the new software is installed on only the central servers, rather than on all the individual PCs scattered throughout a network.'"

Comments

Missed the point

[plopez]

FTA:
Because the terminals have no moving parts such as fans or hard drives that can break, the machines typically require less maintenance and last longer than PCs. Mark Margevicius, an analyst at research firm Gartner Inc., estimates companies can save 10% to 40% in computer-management costs when switching to terminals from desktops

The TCO is not in hardware, but in software and support. What makes a PC network so horrendously expensive (Gartner estimated 4K to 10K USD per seat per year at one time) is the army of technicians required to keep them running. Dumb boxes allow centralization of support which is much less expensive. So you spend less on hardware and labor, and use some of those savings for a really, highspeed network and a really reliable server cluster.

BTW, now-a-days this is often pronounced 'Citrix' or 'Remote Desktop'. Same basic principle.