IT's Love-Hate Relationship With Laptops

Ian Lamont writes "Are laptops really as great as they're cracked up to be? We love their portability, and we've been charting the steady rise of laptop sales for years. Yet while many of us depend on them for work, our IT departments view them with mixed feelings. IT managers point to wi-fi configuration, complicated authentication procedures, and eight other issues as making their jobs a lot harder. What else is missing from the list of laptop limitations? What would you like to see in the next generation of laptop computers?"

Comments

Laptops

[proudfoot]

Part of the issue is that people demand laptops when they don't need them. They do have the attractiveness of not having cords or other extraneous things that confuse users, but at the same time, being mobile is oftentimes not the best practice. Security is a major issue - can you trust that your data won't be compromised if lost or stolen? Do you have a reasonable backup? (Most people don't) For most employees, a desktop is often enough. And if laptops are handed out, then users need to be very, very careful. (Encrypt data, daily backups...) I'm thinking a better solution would have a laptop that works as a dumb terminal.

Re:Laptops

[thatskinnyguy]

They do have the attractiveness of not having cords or other extraneous things that confuse users ...and 80% of the people who have laptops where I work demand a mouse within the first few days of having the laptop because they refuse to get used to the touchpad.

Re:Laptops

[Stalus]

Your desktop can also be stolen, and the disk can crash. Ignoring those issues just makes you more vulnerable. I remember a class at UT-Austin where the prof went to put up his slides and realized the desktop under the podium was missing. Yes, that's right, someone lifted a desktop machine out of a lecture hall in the middle of the day on a crowded campus. And those things are normally locked down and alarmed. Quite surprising. Also, desktop HD's crash just as much as laptops.

I'd say that your argument enforces that laptops are better for most users because it causes some people to actually think about the relevant security and backup issues.

Re:Laptops

[Ephemeriis]

I'd say that your argument enforces that laptops are better for most users because it causes some people to actually think about the relevant security and backup issues.

It may very well make people consciously think about security and backup issues... But you simply cannot claim that desktops are equally vulnerable to the same kind of issues.

Laptops are small and portable. While it is possible to steal a desktop PC, it is harder. Especially if you've got some kind of security on the premises. Not impossible, but harder. Laptops, on the other hand, are routinely toted from one place to another...they could easily be nabbed out of your car, off your shoulder, off a chair at the library/terminal/cafe. Laptops are genuinely easier to physically steal.

A desktop is easier to consistently back up, since it is generally connected to the network at all times. You can easily use a utility of some sort to pull data off that desktop PC whenever it is necessary. A laptop could very easily be off the network for days at a time. Sure, you can use some kind of VPN or web access to anything important...but what if they have no bandwidth at all? Keeping data safe and backed up is more of an issue with a laptop.

And while we're on the topic of VPNs and bandwidth... Your average desktop doesn't leave the building - it stays on your network with your security/antivirus/whatever in place at all times. Laptops often wind up on somebody else's network. Maybe they're grabbing free bandwidth at a hotspot somewhere...maybe they're using the hotel's bandwidth...maybe they've got a cellular modem... Regardless, they're no longer behind your firewall, and are now at the mercy of whoever set up the network they're using.

You claim that desktop HDDs fail just as often as those in laptops... I'm not going to debate that, I have no data either way... But I doubt if desktops get knocked off tables, dropped, tripped over, or have crap spilled into them nearly as much as laptops do. Again, laptops are portable, people are carrying them around. People drop things, trip, fall down, slip. By contrast, a desktop is generally stuck under/on your desk and doesn't really go anywhere. Sure, you might have damage to a mouse or keyboard from time to time...but those are just peripherals. You aren't terribly likely to do serious damage to your CPU/motherboard/HDD if you spill coffee into your keyboard on a desktop.

The fact that laptops are portable, routinely leave your building, and connect to other networks makes them uniquely troublesome.

Re:Laptops

[jollyreaper]

Part of the issue is that people demand laptops when they don't need them. They do have the attractiveness of not having cords or other extraneous things that confuse users, but at the same time, being mobile is oftentimes not the best practice. Security is a major issue - can you trust that your data won't be compromised if lost or stolen? Do you have a reasonable backup? (Most people don't) For most employees, a desktop is often enough. And if laptops are handed out, then users need to be very, very careful. (Encrypt data, daily backups...) I'm thinking a better solution would have a laptop that works as a dumb terminal. My last job was like that, anyone who needed to work from home got a laptop. Of course, these same simps never bothered to make time to get training on how to work from home with IT. In fact, the rationale for the purchases was never run by us, we were just told to make it so. These people all had desktops at home and fast connections, they could have just used the terminal server to log in instead. They were either working at home or working at work, there was rarely ever a location C involved. Only a few people ever truly required a laptop because they could be any of a dozen places. For the most part, laptops encouraged poor data security practices, not so much fear that they would lose the data to a thief but that they would lose the data with no backups maintained on our servers. No matter how many user-invisible techniques I tried to make this simple, they never seemed to work, always making things more complicated than before. We would send out directives telling people that they should not store things locally but again, nobody ever listened. Every time I went to help someone directly I'd check their my documents and tell them they shouldn't be doing that and they wouldn't listen. I tried remapping my documents to point to the public file store and they'd end up saving things to the desktop instead. We had at least three serious "oh shits!" when hard drives in laptops failed and a lot of important info was lost.

You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink. Likewise, you can lead a man to ponder but you can't make him think. You can also lead a horticulture but you can't make her think.

Re:Laptops

[John Courtland]

You mean the Clit mouse?

Sys Admins complain! News at 11!

[sTalking_Goat]

So what? Network administration has only gotten more complicated since the beginning of the profession. Is this really news?

More upgradeability

[SeaFox]

I know this is going to increase thickness a bit, but having upgradeable graphics cards would be nice. Same with optical drives. I know there's a couple laptops where the graphics are on a daughtercard pretty much, but until it becomes a more commonplace feature with a standard interface, there wont be an industry/market of new cards for laptops like there are for desktops.

Re:More upgradeability

[syncrotic]

You can't just throw a graphics chip into a laptop as an afterthought: the entire machine has to be designed around the thermal profile of both the CPU and the GPU. Given how marginal laptop cooling systems are, an increase of 5W in GPU power output might be enough to overheat the system.

A laptop really isn't designed to be upgradeable - the good ones, especially so. They're integrated systems, carefully engineered for structural strength and heat dissipation. The only laptops that could accomodate a modular graphics interface are the cheap 17" ABS monsters.

Poor IT Manager Then

[explosivejared]

Seriously, IT is tough sometimes get over it. Laptops are good for all the reasons listed above. An IT manager should, as per the technology part of his title make it easier to do work. The position this article takes is akin to "well jet flight is nice and all because of the speed, but all these little constraints and extra controls make it complicated and hard, waahhh!" An IT manager is a facilitator and nothing else. I suppose the author of the article would have it that an IT manager is nothing more than a guy who installs OS's and such. There is a lot more to it. That's just the job.

This is a terrible story!! Period!

Re:Poor IT Manager Then

[The Angry Mick]

Their very jobs were created by users bringing in unauthorized equipment in an attempt to circumvent company and administrator policies on the mainframe that kept them from doing their job easier and better.

Funny. This is exactly what our law department says about their own jobs.

Seriously folks, this "us vs. them" attitude has got to stop. Like it or not, IT is an integrated part of any business. Sure, they can be controlling at times, but no one can deny that some controls are necessary. It's far easier to try to understand what each side is doing than to continually butt heads against each other's attitudes. Hurts less, too.

their list

[mincognito]

1. Battery life still bombs.
2. Laptops get banged up and broken.
3. They're tough to fix, and they die young.
4. They get lost.
5. They're difficult to secure, digitally and physically ...
6. ... and security precautions make users nuts.
7. Wi-Fi is still the Wild, Wild West.
8. Laptops spawn a new breed of uber-entitled user.
9. They're too big or too small.
10. Software performance just ain't the same.

Re:their list

[Solder Fumes]

Choose your rants better. USB-RS232 is the accepted solution in the field, and is not that much of a hardship. With a hardware RS232 port, you still need to carry a serial cable, right? The USB converter cables are no easier to lose or damage than the plain RS232 cables, and aren't any bulkier. The end result with both options is that you carry a 6 foot cable, you plug one end into a device, you plug the other end into the laptop. I've been in the field with hundreds of automation engineers, and not one of them ever had a serious complaint about not having a serial port on their laptop. It's a simple problem with an obvious solution, and everyone but you has dealt with it and moved on.

Re:their list

[Belial6]

"8. Laptops spawn a new breed of uber-entitled user."

This complaint is exactly why the rest of the complaints have to be seriously questioned. By that standard PCs spawn a new breed of uber-entitled user. I mean really, people expect the programs to run NOW? Having their application sit in a queue for a week to get the results just doesn't seem to fly anymore. What kind of uber-entitled user doesn't understand that there requests should sit in a queue until a time slot becomes available on the mainframe? If we allow employees to expect their job to be facilitated, the next thing you know, employees will start expecting telephones at their desks, photocopiers, pens and paper. Heck it might even get so bad that they might start expecting electric lighting or bathrooms!

As an IT Manager, only one signifcant problem...

[Kris_J]

As an IT Manager, there's only one bad thing that's particular to laptops that significant enough to be comment-worthy. They're a vector for virus infection. Everything else an IT department can just get on with, but the high virus risk associated with devices that regularly travel in and out of the firewalled company network merits pointing out.

One day, some place I work, I want to set up a DMZ for laptops.

Re:input device?

[MikeFM]

What's worse is accidental use of the stupid touch pad. You're typing along and zoom your cursor goes flying somewhere crazy and you've just deleted something important or done something equally as horrible. Touch pads are horrible devices.

Shorter Lifespan

[dfm3]

In my brief experience with IT at a small university several years ago, I learned that laptops have a much shorter expected lifespan in the real world compared to desktops- two years versus four or five before they need to be replaced. Even if users treat them like their firstborn, they just aren't designed to last much longer than that. Out of the half dozen or so laptops that we have floating around the office that are over 2 years old, not one of them has a battery that lasts for more than 15 minutes off of AC.

Re:Shorter Lifespan

[another_twilight]

What makes/models?

I have had Thinkpads (mostly T series) last 5+ years, including drops and spills. Part of that is excellent design, part of it is the ease with which every part could be ordered and replaced. I am not so familiar with the post-Lenovo quality 'though.

Some early, high end Dell laptops were still useful at similar timeframes (I am thinkning mostly of the C840), but the later Inspirons, less so.

You will pay for them, but in each generation there are machines that will last 4-5 years of even moderately hard use. Consider the design - avoid 'consumer' grade equpiment that is competing on price, not durability. Look at the warranty and support offered by the company - can you order parts and repair in-house, are there local repair centers or does everything have to go off-shore? Oh, and avoid Acer. Period.

Re:Shorter Lifespan

[timeOday]

Out of the half dozen or so laptops that we have floating around the office that are over 2 years old, not one of them has a battery that lasts for more than 15 minutes off of AC.

Batteries are consumables, and they're not all that expensive to replace. Heaven help you if you toss laptops just because the battery goes flat. On second thought, wanna sell me one of those "worn out" 2 year-old laptops?

Portable desktop

[phorm]

Most people I know (myself included) tend to use laptops as more of a "portable desktop." Perhaps if we dump the batteries we could add more cooling and - in general - get more use out of them for that purpose?

At the same time, I've seen various different models of power bricks, but I much prefer the ones that attach to the laptop snugly rather than the standard rounded barrel-connector. Perhaps something that clicks into place but isn't a pain to remove (because without batteries, it would suck to accidentally knock out that easily-disconnected power jack).

Re:input device?

[yokem_55]

Try running syndaemon on your login. This little program is included with the synaptics X driver and it disables the touch pad while you are typing and reenables it automaticaly after a specified timeout (I have mine set to 2 seconds).

In a well-managed LAN upgrades are easy

[Nefarious Wheel]

If you use roaming profiles correctly you can upgrade an entire bureau just by walking down the aisles and swapping out the laptops. I was told a fairly major SOE upgrade was handled this way recently, in a government agency in Canberra.

Boo Hoo

[cromar]

IT managers point to wi-fi configuration, complicated authentication procedures, and eight other issues as making their jobs a lot harder.

Cry me a river.

Re:input device?

[dafpoo]

That's why they have the little red nub for!

Re:input device?

[epp_b]

You would think that in the years that have gone by, they would have developed something better.

They did. It's called a trackpoint

My problems with laptops

[FranTaylor]

My problems with laptops:

1. They are too fragile.
2. The internal guts are too hard to work with. Anything more than a RAM upgrade is a nightmare of tiny screws and shielding tape.
3. Operating systems are targeted for desktops and servers, they don't make it easy to set up a laptop the way you want, with encrypted partitions, network configuration, etc. Sure these features are there for the tinkering, but I don't want to mess around, I just want to get to work.
4. Laptop hard drives are so slow! You would think there could be a slightly larger drive form factor that would allow for a drive whose speed approaches that of a standard hard drive.
5. The batteries are all different. Hard drives, RAM, etc. are interchangeable to some extent, why not batteries?
6. Those tiny little laptop cooling fans drive me batty. I really hate the high-pitched whine.
7. While I appreciate the small size, I would gladly trade a pound or so and a quarter inch of thickness for less whiney fans and a faster hard drive. If it's too big to fit in my pocket, it should be a real computer.
8. Not much to be done about it, but it's not possible to use one in comfort; the ergonomics inherently suck.

Re:My problems with laptops

[Rakishi]

1. They are too fragile. So are desktops if you tried carrying them around and throwing them about.

2. The internal guts are too hard to work with. Anything more than a RAM upgrade is a nightmare of tiny screws and shielding tape. So? Very, very few people do upgrades on their computers nowadays. They may build them from parts but aside from the hard drive and ram "upgrade" means getting a whole new system (motherboard, cpu, video card, etc.). Technology changes too quickly and parts are not that backwards compatible. For most people messing with the inside of their computer is simply a waste of time, both techies and non-techies.

3. Operating systems are targeted for desktops and servers, they don't make it easy to set up a laptop the way you want, with encrypted partitions, network configuration, etc. Sure these features are there for the tinkering, but I don't want to mess around, I just want to get to work. So you want to mess with the hardware but not the software? Anyway, everything requires tinkering if you want it to do what you want. You're simply used to doing things ones way (and setting them up) on a desktop.

4. Laptop hard drives are so slow! You would think there could be a slightly larger drive form factor that would allow for a drive whose speed approaches that of a standard hard drive. ...when was the last time you even saw a laptop 1995???? Laptop hard drives are 7200, guess what desktop hard drives are? 7200.

5. The batteries are all different. Hard drives, RAM, etc. are interchangeable to some extent, why not batteries? Because manufacturers have nothing to gain from it and battery sizes vary a lot.

6. Those tiny little laptop cooling fans drive me batty. I really hate the high-pitched whine. So get a laptop with a large fan.

7. While I appreciate the small size, I would gladly trade a pound or so and a quarter inch of thickness for less whiney fans and a faster hard drive. If it's too big to fit in my pocket, it should be a real computer. I repeat my previous point "...when was the last time you even saw a laptop 1995????"

8. Not much to be done about it, but it's not possible to use one in comfort; the ergonomics inherently suck. It's called a docking bay with external monitor, keyboard and mouse.

Re:My problems with laptops

[ceoyoyo]

You're just not using it right. The appropriate way to use a laptop is in a hammock, with it on your thigh just above the knee so you're typing with your arms stretched almost straight. If it's hot and you're wearing shorts you'll probably want to put a towel under it for thermal isolation.

NOTHING is more ergonomic than that. Yes, that's how I wrote the first half of my thesis. Unfortunately the couch has to substitute for writing the second part. The ergonomics are essentially the same but the ambience just isn't there.

Re:My problems with laptops

[forgotten_my_nick]

Your post may of been valid say 10 years ago.

1. Most modern laptops are not fragile, unless you mean throwing a the floor or trying to crush it. In which case it is as fragile as most flat screen monitors.

2. Changing ram/hard drives doesn't happen often but again all modern systems are a simple case of remove 1-2 screws then pull out and slot in the new hardware. Long gone are the days where you had to take the laptop to pieces to add something.

3. Bull. Operating Systems work fine on laptops. There is no difference between them and a desktop.

4. Again this depends on the laptop. Some sacrifice speed for heat. Again the newer models have very fast HDD.

5. How many times are you changing batteries? I've had my current laptop two years and I am still using the same battery. The life on it by the way is max 7 hours.

6. Newer laptop models can run quiet.

7. Are you talking about laptops or notebooks? Different things.

8. Again it depends a lot on the laptop. I have two laptops (lenovo + Dell XPS). The Dell is more like a PC keyboard with a XTFT monitor attached. Great for gaming, not noisy. The Lenovo T60 is small, very quiet and very fast. I have have a docking station for the second and a montior and keyboard plugged into that docking station.

For using it on my lap I got a lapdesk which is great for stopping any heat issues and keeps it locked on my lap while still being able to use a normal mouse.

I think any IT Admin who has problems with laptops these days should probably look at a new career.

Best new feature (from IT's POV)

[PPH]

Would be a heavy chain attached to an eye bolt welded to the office floor.

Or, whatever else it takes these things from wandering off the property. They get stolen along with data that shouldn't leave the property in the first place. Or taken home where the kids can goof around on the 'net with them and get them all infected with crap that mom/dad subsequently bring back inside the company firewall.

Re:Clunky but cramped.

[(H)elix1]

Same here. Most current laptops have a VGA or DVI port, which you can run an external monitor on. Dual screens all the way (when you can).

Re:their list and what's missing ...

[zzedd]

... they are an ergonomic disaster-in-waiting. with a screen right next to a keyboard, this arrangement encourages a hunching posture that with long-term use can cause nerve and muscle damage in the upper-arms and neck.

Re:As an IT Manager, only one signifcant problem..

[rnswebx]

This really isn't much of an issue if you don't give your users admin rights. I used to work for a company who's name represents a really long river and we weren't given admin rights on our laptops. (I was a system engineer)

At first, I hated it and even more I just hated the idea of not controlling my own machine. In the end though, it really came down to them providing me everythingI needed. If I wanted something that wasn't already installed and pertinent to me doing my job, it was almost instantly handled and installed over the intranet via what I can only guess were custom tools.

It's give and take with the portability that laptops provide. OK Joe User, you can go do your work from home, but in exchange for that we need to, among other things, take precautions that you won't be bringing in viruses to our network.

The key ingredient to my successful situation in such an environment was the capability of the supporting IT team. Without a very solid support team, I think the users would become frustrated with not being able to either install their own apps, or have the support staff provide a way to get them installed.

Food for thought at the very least.

From the My Computer Is My Monitor Dept.

[Strange Ranger]

> What would you like to see in the next generation of laptop computers?"

One thing I'd love to see is a little modularity and separation between the computer and the screen.
I want a strong hinge that can be disconnected with a simple everyday tool.
And at least within the same manufacturer, make it standard, the only variables being the size and resolution of the screen.
What a great idea to be able to replace only the half of the laptop that is broken or upgrade only the half that needs to be upgraded.
Reduce waste, reduce downtime, save money.

Is there something intrinsically magical about the screen hinge and graphics connection of a laptop that keeps them forever joined lest ye ship them back to the vendor?

Re:From the My Computer Is My Monitor Dept.

[maxume]

Most people would go with a brand that wasn't busy making their laptops more expensive to purchase, ignoring any reduction in cost of ownership.

Re:How 'bout this?

[Nefarious Wheel]

Option for no OS? Good idea. I understand VMWare is going to offer a bootable hypervisor supplied on a thumb drive this month, and also heard that Dell, IBM, and HP (I think) are going to offer a hypervisor in mobo firmware so you can boot up into a virtual environment just like our servers can now. I would really prefer that sort of arrangement to multi boot, so I can keep my debian, ubuntu, xp etc. experiences separate but simultaneously available without the underhead of an OS. Intel and AMD are offering CPUs than vector tier0 instructions off to use the hypervisor without all having to hit the BIOS at once to respond to IO interrupts, too -- this would make a laptop incredibly powerful, fast, simple, and useful.

Where do you want to go today? Gee, I don't know -- let's try this land called Ubuntu, sounds exotic. (Click.) Now that's windowing.

Re:As an IT Manager, only one signifcant problem..

[huckamania]

Because they are salesmen. They go out and hunt rabbits, bears and elephants. They bring in the sales that make the company grow. They need powerpoint and other salesmany cruft to make their sales. IT exists because of them, not the oher way around.

Linux as a complete desktop OS is still relatively new and even now not entirely complete. Advocacy aside, why would anyone willingly choose a solution that means deprivation? Why would anyone suggest it?

I'm not IT, but I have worked on the traveling salesman problem and it's not easy. Cisco, Symantec and Microsoft were all working on solutions at some point. Cisco and Symantec were going with some kind of security authentication server and Microsoft was trying to tie it into DNS. That was about 4 years ago, so they may actually have something usefull by now.

my list

[Burz]

1. Whole-disk encryption still not standard
2. Better efficiency hasn't been used to improve battery life
3. No standard enclosures or motherboard form factors
4. Attract clueless software salesmen, who will demonstrate demanding workstation apps on their 'spiffy little wonder'.
5. Have caught the bigger-is-better disease in the USA... The laptop as an SUV-like status symbol.
6. Most warranties are absurdly short for such a device

Overall though, laptops are the bees knees. Blogging would be an insignificant phenomenon without them, and they have taught the industry a lot about elegance and efficiency.

Re:my list

[WuphonsReach]

Thinkpad X61s - 2GB RAM, Core 2 Duo, 160GB HD along with the extended (9 cell?) battery will get 6-7 hours on a single charge. With only a moderately aggressive power saving scheme. The downside is that it's only a 12" XGA screen. On the flip side, it is very lightweight even with the extended battery.

Things like "turning the monitor (back light) off after 2-3 minutes" or only running the display at half brightness go a long way. The Thinkpads have a function key combo that allows you to adjust display brightness, so I'm always turning the brightness down to get more life.

In comparison, my T61 (3GB RAM, Core 2 Duo, two 160GB HDs) with the standard battery only gets around 2.0-2.5 hours of use. But that has a larger 15.4" 1680x1050 display, the second HD, and the smaller battery pack.

The Macbooks are rumored to have better then average battery life, but I haven't personally used them.

Re:Clunky but cramped.

[jamesh]

At least one manufacturer makes an adapter that will split a (eg) 2048x768 signal into 2 x 1024x768 separate signals to drive two monitors. That's the solution that some of our clients are using to get 3 displays. You need a bit of smarts on the O/S itself to treat the one screen as two, but once you do that it works well.

I agree with you about two screens being a minimum though. The attraction for me isn't so much the screen size, it's having two distinct workspaces. A 30" single screen probably wouldn't be as nice for the stuff I do as two 15" screens is.

Video In

[lymond01]

I'd like to be able to carry my laptop to the server room and hook up a VGA input so I can view what's on the server's screen without either purchasing a KVM or lugging in a full external monitor. Sort of like a temporary slave function (or just a F-key that allows video in...I'm not all that bothered about the keyboard and mouse).

A virtual keypad (like one of those you can lay down in front of you) plugged into your virtual eyewear (that projects the screen onto your eye) would be a nice space-saver too. Everything wireless, computer the size of an iPod in your pocket.

Re:Video In

[BrianGKUAC]

*tries to ssh into machine stuck in kernel panic*

*gets no response*

*goes and finds a monitor to lug into the server room, cursing the whole way*

There's a difference between system administration and needing to see what's on the screen.

Mods on crack again!

[rts008]

Why were you modded offtopic?

From the summary:
"What would you like to see in the next generation of laptop computers?"

Ask and ye shall receive!

Personally, my tastes (and needs for a laptop) are really different from yours, as I still am in love with my Sharp MMC20- think the size of a Playboy magazine, and quite light to boot.

But if I had the budget, Oh Yeah! Gaming laptop here I come!
So I see where you are coming from, and think your post was ONTOPIC, my own needs drive me the opposite direction....but so what?

Your needs/wants in a laptop are are valid as anyone else's, and you answered the submitter's question. WTF?

Moderators take note: At least RTFS or RTFA before blasting out offtopic mods!

Re:Clunky but cramped.

[renegadesx]

Same, I know alot of "non-techies" that love them but I cant stand them, give me my full ATX tower anyday. I know people say "just use a docking station when you're at home" but then you just have a lower powered PC. The keyboard is crampy, I HATE touchpads with a passion, its just not what I'm after. Wireless is not what its all cracked up to be, there a bastard if hardware failes and there more expensive. So yeah, lol, not a fan

Missing the point

[L.Bob.Rife]

IT is part of a business. Making IT's job harder in that business costs money. The article is making the point that there are some pretty serious cons about using laptops, and these need to be considered as part of their cost.

Re:Missing the point

[m0nstr42]

IT is part of a business. Making IT's job harder in that business costs money. The article is making the point that there are some pretty serious cons about using laptops, and these need to be considered as part of their cost.

Having pissed-off employees who feel chained to their workstation (and consequently horribly unmotivated) can also be a pretty big cost.

Re:Missing the point

[Gulthek]

That seems an excessive reaction to a lack of laptops.

Wah no laptop => horribly unmotivated? Something tells me that these "laptop motivated" people aren't worth the money.

Re:Missing the point

[traabil]

IT is part of a business. Making IT's job harder in that business costs money. The article is making the point that there are some pretty serious cons about using laptops, and these need to be considered as part of their cost.

I think you're completely off the mark. Although IT is part of the business, like it or not, it's part of the business the same way the mailman, the guy in the cafeteria and the janitor are a part of the business. At the end of the day they're all cost elements (for most companies, anyway) and their only task is supporting the needs of the part of the business that actually brings in the money. Missing the users' business need for IT support is way more costly than having to take appropriate measures to provide a safe and functional laptop park.

Re:Missing the point

[PMuse]

IT is overhead. IT exists only to support revenue. If a laptop will increase revenue by more than the differential cost between that and a desktop, then deploy the laptop.

Don't expect IT to see any share of that increased revenue. Things don't work that way.

How about actual standards?

[ShadowFalls]

I know it is wishful thinking and all, but how about having laptop designs from all manufacturers follow a certain number of standard design. This case when a motherboard fails it isn't a ridiculously expensive replacement you must get.

Back on topic, not that we were off....

[porpnorber]

The size of a magazine, sixteen hour battery life, five second suspend/resume, and a disconnected-mode DFS that actually works. One with on-disk encryption. The laptop should not want or need an identity distinct from its home network. And, ah, yeah, a hypervisor so that my 'home' and 'work' laptops can be the same physical object without causing any issues of system or data management propriety. That's all I ask.

Re:As an IT Manager, only one signifcant problem..

[pleappleappleap]

If someone has physical control of a machine, there really isn't anything you can do to stop them from doing whatever they want, anyway.

ThinkPad on a ship

[wikinerd]

I actually do a lot of my work on a ship using an HSDPA/3.5G connection and various laptops. One of my laptops is an IBM/Lenovo ThinkPad machine. On one occasion it fell down on the metallic upper deck's floor. A PCMCIA (3G) card on it was completely destroyed, but there was absolutely no damage on the laptop itself. Not even a small scratch. No damage to my 7200RPM HDD (Seagate, custom upgrade by me) at all, which is incredible considering that it was working when it fell down. The durability of my IBM/Lenovo ThinkPad really surprised me. My biggest problem was actually my lost SSH connection (which I revived soon as I luckily had another 3G terminal with me, and from that day I always use the nohup command whenever I am about to execute anything time-consuming on a server).

On another occassion, the same IBM ThinkPad machine was exposed to large amounts of seawater by accident (shit happens). The water actually entered into the laptop through the cooling holes. Again, the laptop had absolutely no problem working.

In general, having used 4 different ThinkPad models over years, I can say that their durability is great. A very old IBM with a 100MHz processor still works as if it were new, and its screen hinges have not shown any signs of aging. An old Dell Latitude I have, however, suffers from a too relaxed screen which dances on every little move (never bothered to fix it as I don't use it much).

It also worths noting that my IBM/Lenovo ThinkPads have never had problems with radio interference, although other laptops I have go crazy (random keystrokes/mouse clicks/speaker noise etc) whenever I place a 3G terminal too close (2-4 cm) on them.

Using the laptop offline

[GeezTheGeeza]

One thing that doesn't seem to be mentioned here is proper use of offline modes, rather than being a hardware thing this is possibly more of an O/S or application thing, but is a crucial area which is often overlooked. If you have a user with Windows who works mostly away, then domain credentials must have an absurdly high cache number or else they will no longer be able to login after working a month offline. Using local user/password instead means they have to keep typing in passwords when they eventually do access the network resources unless set in a batch file. Yes easy to do but not for a lot of differing users/connections/laptops. Roaming profiles equally are great but troublesome - not immediately but think of the user who installs iTunes and then fills their 80gb ipod! Yes there are controls to stop certain folders syncing but there is no granularity. Synchronisation of data files can be done in a variety of ways, but short of using a cumbersome safe that everyone has to check files in and out of, then there is always going to be problems with synchronisation: someone takes a file offline, makes a change then comes back and syncs a week later. The day before they sync someone else modifies the file - who wins? Synchronisation of any database app also has similar problems, whether its keeping a CRM up to date or financial data, strict controls have to be enforced to make sure that when it does sync it syncs properly. The trouble is endusers always will request full access and it just 'to work'. One day the entire world (read: including the green fields, yellow deserts and blue oceans) will be networked, and then we can issue thumbdrives that boot *nix and establish RDP back to the head office...

The inseperable hinge

[The Conductor]

Is there something intrinsically magical about the screen hinge and graphics connection of a laptop that keeps them forever joined

Yes, and it will only get worse in the upcoming years. One of the many constraints in laptop design is routing the cables through the hinge. You have a back light and its control, and all the crazy data & clock lines (not analog video) for the LCD display. Now with WLAN you have co-axial cable, since since real-world experience has shown that locating the antenna up high is worth the cable losses. The trend is to put more stuff up there, like webcams, where the machine can see, and the microphone, further from those fans whose noise everyone is complaining about in posts here. And more antennas, for WWAN, TV, DVB, UWB, blah, blah, blah.

Re:As an IT Manager, only one signifcant problem..

[Thumper_SVX]

Ergo, if you have to manage laptops, do not allow the user to install software and they can't install VMWare.

This isn't rocket science, really. You just have to prioritize what you want to do, and provide the tools your users need without giving them the keys to the kingdom.

I personally do not manage PC's any more... I moved on to the server side of the house but let me relate to you how things work where I work.

I have a laptop, and I use it since I'm on-call one week in 6. I do not have admin rights to my laptop... in fact I'm as locked down a user as everyone else is. However, despite my initial bad feeling about this, I have had few if any problems. Quite simply, our desktop support team uses SMS to distribute updates and software to the end user in a packaged form. That way, we can control who has what software simply because some of them require passwords to install which are requested on an ad-hoc basis. Every piece of software I need to do my job including software like Putty is out there under "Run Advertised Programs". I just click the software I need, click install and within a minute or two my software's installed even if I'm on a VPN.

What about tools like VMWare Server? Well, we have that in RAP as well... but that's strictly limited to people who sign an agreement with the desktop group about responsible behavior, and we don't build arbitrary XP boxes. VM's built on our systems are audited by a script pushed by group policy, so the desktop group can spot an arbitrary XP desktop a mile off. Yes, they have alerts... yes, those logs are put in a database... yes, in the event that I put arbitrary OSs on my system I could be disciplined by HR by the terms of the agreement I signed with my desktop folks.

So what about admin tools I need? OK... ever used Citrix? We have a section of our farm dedicated to our UNIX, SQL and Windows admins that provides all those tools for us to use in an admin job; Windows admin tools and so forth. This also has the advantage that our performance of admin tasks even on a slow VPN can be similar to working at the office.

Sure, I'm not totally locked down... and I have a different account in the Active Directory that I use to authenticate to servers; a so-called Admin account. If I want to connect to a share with admin privileges all I need is a command prompt and a "net use \\server /user:adminaccount" and I can connect to the shares with my admin privileges. My desktop group grants me that because of my job... all it took was for me to sign that "privileged operations" agreement that also allowed me VMware Server on my laptop.

Sound like a bit of a pain, but trust me... I don't want to be troubleshooting desktop problems all the time. I want to focus on my job; keeping the lights on in the datacenter. If my laptop shoots crap, I want to be able to pick up the phone and have someone else responsible for my not being able to do my job... or provide me an alternate way to get my job done. If I had admin rights to my laptop, I'd probably fix it myself... and the one time I've had problems with my laptop I actually had a good idea of the problem. But you know what? Because of that I was able to pick up the phone, call our desktop folks, explain precisely what the problem was and they were able to fix it within minutes because no troubleshooting was required... and they trust me since I'm also a professional Windows guy.

See, in my opinion the people who cry about not having admin rights to their machines are the same people who sit in the basement and refuse to talk to anyone else. Me, I'd rather have my rights taken away to my laptop so I can just focus on MY job... not someone else's. It makes me more productive, and allows me to defer responsibility when stuff goes wrong with my laptop. Hell, even when I ordered upgraded RAM I let the desktop folks do it... I put components in servers every other day, but I figured that I have better things to do with my time than figure out where all the screws are to get to

Re:Clunky but cramped.

[jcnnghm]

I have a 37" display connected to my Macbook pro, and two 20" 4:3 monitors, as well as a 23" 16:9 monitor connected to my windows desktop. As long as Ultramon is installed, the windows machine is much better for development work than the Macbook. Separate workspaces provides more utility than one huge workspace. With the 37" I find I am constantly moving and resizing windows because stuff ends up overlapping and getting in the way. With three monitors, I can have three separate apps maximized to a screen. I usually have the project specs on the left screen, the documentation to the right, and the project itself upfront. Additionally, I have a e-mail to the left and Firefox to the right, and can shuffle maximized apps between screens in two clicks.

Re:Clunky but cramped.

[jcnnghm]

I couldn't agree more. Neither Windows or OS X seem to really handle very large or multiple monitors well. Windows issues can be remedied, for the most part, with Ultramon, but it would seem that this functionality should be built into the OS.

Re:Clunky but cramped.

[arminw]

.......Linux was the first OS I used multiple monitors on and that was about a decade ago.......

Back in 1989, I used an external 19" monitor with my SE30 Mac. It was great for doing drawings with Macdraft and later Claris CAD. The Macbook Pro is a laptop that will support two monitors.

Laptops are for on the go people. Computer costs for professionals are low enough now, so many can own a fully accessorized desktop and also a powerful laptop for travel. Laptops of necessity have to make certain compromises. Synchronization software can keep the user data up to date.