Our Dream Computer Laboratory

My co-teacher and I are always working on how to maximize the space of our computer laboratory room, considering the number of students using the room. We plan and hope that it’s not just a dream; that this plan will not be forever just a hope but also be put into reality. At present we are still fortunate because we still have 15 “moody” computer units. “Moody” as it is noted because of the indications that these units are showing signs of malfunctioning like memory failure, death blue screen, hard disk boot failure, CMOS checksum error. So much effort have been made to at least prolong it’s use, these Pentium III with 800mhz of processor, 128 MB of RAM and 20 GB of HDD are still working after ten years.
In our eagerness to make our dream and hope a reality, we would be very glad and will appreciate all comments and recommendations you wish to share with us in this BlogSpot if you think we've forgotten something.
Should you wish not to be identified publicly, you can e-mail us your idea regarding our dream plans for our school computer lab. Here is our dream plan:
Computer laboratory:
We have 60 students per class, so we really would want to have a big computer laboratory room that can accommodate all of them without having troubles with chairs, tables, ventilation, a brand new and quality air-con to replace the old and “moody” air-con, cabinets for our instructional materials and the repair of our classroom windows.
Student Computer Workstations:
We are dreaming of a 1:1 computer unit per student, but because of our classroom size and air-con problem which we wanted to prioritize, we will put aside that ratio in our plan at this time. Here are the computer units’ specifications we are dreaming of for our class per student:
System Unit:
• Motherboard: with complete ports: Video-VGA and DVI/WLAN and LAN/Sound/USB/ etc. and will support core2duo processor
• Processor: Core 2 Duo
• Memory: 3 GB of RAM
• Hard Disk Drive: 1 Terabyte SATA type
• Optical Disk Drive: DVD RW SATA type
• Video Card with VGA, DVI and S Video port. 512 MB 64 bit of specification
• Wireless Network Interface card
Monitor: LCD Monitors 17” With VGA and DVI port
Keyboard: Wireless or USB
Mouse: Wireless or USB
Speakers
Headset
Web Cam
Workstation for teacher:
As of now, we bring our own laptops so we will not use the computer units intended to be used by our students anymore because we only have 15 computer units as I mentioned earlier. But we are still dreaming of a separate computer unit for us with the same specifications above. A laptop would also be a great one because we sometimes need to connect it to a projector for important lessons for a clearer view.

LCD Projector: We also wish that an LCD projector should be mounted on the ceiling permanently which is directly connected to one computer unit to avoid possible problems like broken VGA port. Because the more you move an LCD projector, the more it will be prone to parts malfunctioning.
Quality Laser Printer: We already have printers in our school and fortunately we have no problems with it. But a continuous supply of ink is a better one.
Software
Operating System:
• A windows 7 Ultimate version is much better but we also dream of having separate computer units with other operating systems like BAYANIHAN Linux, UBUNTU Linux and APPLE MAC OSX would be appreciated so our students could also be familiar with other O.S.

Application Software
We teach PC Operation, Computer Hardware and Servicing, HTML and Web Page designing enough to justify that we are in need of the following application/software:

• Microsoft Office 2010:
• MS Office FrontPage
• Adobe Photoshop CS4
• Adobe After effects
• Macromedia Dreamweaver
• Adobe PageMaker

All about CMOS and BIOS

CMOS is short for Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor. CMOS is responsible for storing the date, time, system setup and other small functions. They are used at the start of a boot process in a computer system that is why it requires a small battery on the system board that provides power to the CMOS chip, even while the computer is turned off so it will not loose all data save on it.

The program saved inside the CMOS is called BIOS, short for Basic Input Output System. BIOS is the program capable for storing the date, time, system setup and other small functions. Through the BIOS, user can configure devices at the start of a boot process in a computer system.

The BIOS is useful especially if the user needs to reinstall a new operating system on the computer. User need to access first the BIOS and configure what it is needed to.

BIOS of new motherboard can be access by pressing any of the following keys on your keyboard during the boot up process.

• F1
• F2
• DEL
• ESC
• F10
  

After pressing the correct key, you should be redirected to BIOS settings screen. below are different examples of BIOS settings screen.

In this type of BIOS, the menus are listed. System time and date could be access by selecting the first option and press enter.

After you press enter key, you should be redirected to this screen where you could change the time and date and see system information about your hard disk drive and other devices.

One important option is the boot sequence which could be configure on this screen. change the values by selecting it and pressing enter and use the arrow keys or press + and - sign.

Another type of BIOS is just like this one above. The menus are in tab format and you could select each menu by pressing right and left arrow key.


The boot sequence could be access under BOOT menu. change the values by pressing enter.

Remember: If you are using a bootable disk as your medium, the boot sequence must by like this:

First Boot Device: CD or DVD
Second Boot Device: HDD

And if you are booting on a bootable flash drive, just change the first boot into USB, then after the reinstallation, you should change again the boot order into this sequence:

First Boot Device: HDD
Second Boot Device: CD or DVD

HOW TO RESET BIOS PASSWORD

Sometimes BIOS is inaccessible due to due hardware related issues such as electrical problems or due to inadvertence, such as someone set and then forget the password and the only way is to reverse this. This can be time consuming or frustrating depending upon the motherboard manufacturer and model of the motherboard. So here is my guide if ever this would happen to you. follow my procedure on how to reset or disable the BIOS password.

1. Read about you motherboard manual and Locate, if possible, the instruction booklet for BIOS jumper setting of your motherboard. If you don't have the manual, then use this site - motherboard references
2. Make sure you shut down your computer and unplug the power cable from the outlet.
3. Locate where the BIOS jumpers are located.

4. Take note of the present pin location and the location of the jumper on those pins to determine their default location. Write it down so you will not forget!

5. Move the jumpers from the their default location . From pins #1 and #2 , place the jumper across pins #2 and #3.

6. Leave the jumper in place for 20 to 30 seconds and then return it to its default location

7. Plug the power cord back in and restart the computer.

8. During it's startup (boot) process, press the DEL, F10 or F1 key, (depending on your computer) to get into the Bios/CMOS setup. If you don't know how to access the BIOS, follow this link - Bios Basics

9. The Bios password should be gone!