# Probably way more extreme than you want to do, but -->

Posted by Matt (93SE) on July 07, 2002 at 21:04:52:

In Reply to: OT, but I'd welcome your thoughts... posted by Uncle Pete on July 07, 2002 at 14:57:27:

When I was going to school at Rose-Hulman, the school required laptops for every student. we took them to every class, and all the classrooms had rows of tables with power strips in front of each seat. basically it was a strip of aluminum bar stock with holes drilled into it to pass through a female computer power cord end. Then they just hard-wired the cables underneath the tables.

When the students got to the room, they pulled out their power supplies and the laptop and plugged in.

There were also ethernet connections right there too, so everyone had access to the school network no matter where in the school they were.

the only problem with this was that after about a year and a half, my power supply for the laptop developed a bad connection inside the supply from constantly being plugged and unplugged. it was replaced under warranty, but is a concern in a case like that.

the new laptops they were using when I was there simply used a +12V supply, so they just put a huge 50A supply in the corner of the room and ran power down one side of the wall, then along the same bundle of wire as the 110V and network wiring. then it had the funky connectors that wer purchased from the laptop mfg.. that way, they didn't have to keep messing with the power supply. just pull the laptop out and it plugged directly into the bench. nifty.

: OK, in work I've got a cabinet of 30 laptops that go out to classrooms for kids to use. The machines have batteries that last for about an hour and a half, and take an hour to charge, so there are obviously power issues with back to back lessons.

: I could potentially issue each machine with its power supply, but mosts of the classrooms aren't equipped with 20-30 sockets. What I'm looking for is a sort of 'one box' solution that can be used to power, say, 10 machines.

: Short of finding a bloody big bench power supply and wiring ten sockets to it, have you guys seen anything that might solve this problem?

: Cheers chaps :-)

Replys:

- That's just what I'm thinking of actually! Uncle Pete (89 SE) 01:33:00 7/08/2002 (1)
  - try looking around here--> Matt K (89 SE 5spd) 11:24:07 7/08/2002 (0)

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: When I was going to school at Rose-Hulman, the school required laptops for every student. we took them to every class, and all the classrooms had rows of tables with power strips in front of each seat. basically it was a strip of aluminum bar stock with holes drilled into it to pass through a female computer power cord end. Then they just hard-wired the cables underneath the tables. : When the students got to the room, they pulled out their power supplies and the laptop and plugged in. : There were also ethernet connections right there too, so everyone had access to the school network no matter where in the school they were. : the only problem with this was that after about a year and a half, my power supply for the laptop developed a bad connection inside the supply from constantly being plugged and unplugged. it was replaced under warranty, but is a concern in a case like that. : the new laptops they were using when I was there simply used a +12V supply, so they just put a huge 50A supply in the corner of the room and ran power down one side of the wall, then along the same bundle of wire as the 110V and network wiring. then it had the funky connectors that wer purchased from the laptop mfg.. that way, they didn't have to keep messing with the power supply. just pull the laptop out and it plugged directly into the bench. nifty. : : OK, in work I've got a cabinet of 30 laptops that go out to classrooms for kids to use. The machines have batteries that last for about an hour and a half, and take an hour to charge, so there are obviously power issues with back to back lessons. : : I could potentially issue each machine with its power supply, but mosts of the classrooms aren't equipped with 20-30 sockets. What I'm looking for is a sort of 'one box' solution that can be used to power, say, 10 machines. : : Short of finding a bloody big bench power supply and wiring ten sockets to it, have you guys seen anything that might solve this problem? : : Cheers chaps :-)