Practicalities of a "Thin Client" on a home network?

Gimpymoo · 10 Oct 2016 at 22:30

What would the cost be of running such a setup in the home?

Server OS cost?
Client cost?

Is there a Linux combo which would accomplish such a task? What would the Microsoft equivalents be?

I need to setup a few "simple" PC's in the home and got thinking of maybe a hobby project

I initially wanted to do it "as cheap" as possible, but I am also thinking it would be nice to do something a little different. Not a "simple PC" but an almost "dumb" terminal.

Thanks.

Minstadave · 10 Oct 2016 at 22:35

Just overly complicated to be worth while to my mind.The cost of tiny, low energy PCs is so cheap that thin clients aren't worthwhile.

As an experiment go for it if you're curious but I can't imagine you couldn't have a normal computer that performs better for less.

D3K · 10 Oct 2016 at 22:39

Sounds feasible if the terminals are cheap throwaway mobiles or tablets. Otherwise, as above

Liquidfox · 11 Oct 2016 at 22:43

RDS CALs are NOT cheap if you're wanting to do it properly.

Gzero · 11 Oct 2016 at 22:48

Buy one of those popular microservers (can't link competitor) and stick an eval Server 2012 R2/2016 licence on it?

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/evaluate-windows-server-2016

Ignore cal's and find out how rubbish the experience can be TODAY!

Stick an RDP client on your smart phone and struggle with basic tasks!

DragonQ · 11 Oct 2016 at 23:27

My experience with thin clients at work is basically they suck for doing anything serious. At home you'd probably want to be able to play audio and video properly and thin clients aren't good at that.

!bluetonic! · 12 Oct 2016 at 13:44

You're not saying what you want to achieve, but start with this Linux project:

http://www.ltsp.org/

I always thought thin clients were the shizzle and with the appropriate monies they are, but (IMO) there's no argument for them at home (One point of failure for multiple thin clients unless you've got redundancy on disks, power, internet etc). For a minimalist, awesome setup, you'd had a flat plate on the wall of each room of the house that had VGA, Sound out and a couple of USB ports for mouse and keyboard.

Also, have a look at UnRaid at https://lime-technology.com/. Or Virtual Box or VMWare.