Solve real business challenges on Google Cloud and run workloads for free. For Slashdot users: Get $300 in free credits to fully explore Google Cloud. Get started for free today.
Posted
by
michael
from the double-your-pleasure dept.
cojsl writes "Anandtech reviews the Jetway Magic Twin small form-factor PC that allows two simultaneous users on one Windows PC. The article mentions a mobo only option too."
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
These are nothing new. The PCBuddy has been around for a number of years. We don't pay much attention to this stuff in the USA because PC's and parts are cheap. These devices are popular in third world countries where resources are streched.
Buddy betwin - Betwin B-680 - Enables 2 Users or more to share 1 PC
Sometimes one computer just isn't enough. With buddy betwin, you don't have to spend thousands of dollars on a second PC. This device lets you connect a second keyboard, mouse and monitor to your existing computer to create a second, fully functional PC. Share drives, printers, scanners, software, and even surf the Internet at the same time using only one modem, one telephone line and one Internet Service Provider account. Start taking full advantage of your computer's power! Every member of your household can be online simultaneously. You can track your investments while your spouse sends e-mail and your high-schooler downloads information for a homework assignment - all at the same time, and using just one Internet connection. It enables up to four additional users to share the computing power and resources of a single computer running Windows 2000 or XP. This is perfect for the home and small office. Simply install it into your computer and connect an additional monitor, keyboard and mouse. Windows ® will recognize all the devices automatically. Now you can do your work while the kids play their games!
by Anonymous Coward writes:
on Friday April 16, 2004 @04:59PM (#8886172)
Considering that Windows allows multpile users, built into the operating system I don't think so. In XP, you can switch from user to user at will, and with Terminal Services, Citrix, Remote Desktop, etc. you can operate the system remotely with other users logged on at the same time. Considering the MS is the one who released Terminal Services, I doubt they would have ground to stand on for charging for two licences.
That problem is easily answered when considering 1 or 2 computers run off one interface (VNC, TS, telnet, ssh). But the problem comes when one wants to manage their whole lab infrastructure or every computer in their home from one interface. Windows 2003 comes with a neat little MMC snapin called "Remote Desktops" that lets you manage all of your TS sessions. The problem with that is that there is one process for each computer, and if you can imagine, 100-1000 mstsc.exe processes can consume quite a bit of memory. As well it doesn't support features that KVM does like being able to broadcast to all of the machines at once.
What would be nice is software that lets you split your computers into groups, allow you to broadcast to those specific groups, etc..
We can only guarantee that the program will properly run on a completely reinstalled Windows XP system, using the latest hardware drivers and system requirements,
without third-party software and hardware.
.. so as long as you don't try to run any applications on it, you'll be fine! The software is fully tied to Windows XP, so no chance of running other operating systems. It looks like there is only one copy of Windows XP running, but then Page 13 has this quote:
Microsoft Windows License Request: After you have read and accept the Microsoft license terms, the MagicTwin software will explicitly ask you, the licensee, whether you have obtained a sufficient number of Windows licenses. If your choice is "NO" then at every restart the software will notify you of this issue.
Page 8 tells you to turn off the system standby in XP's power management. Guess they don't have that working well. But they do warn the second user if the first user decides to shut down the system.
There are already a few misguided posts on the matter so hopefully, I can clear this up for you.
Microsoft and many other software makers already address this licensing issue. On this machine Microsoft requires either two licenses for Windows or one Windows license and a Terminal Server Client Access license. For MS Office a license is required for each per seat instance. SO, two users in Word requires two licenses.
This same licensing system is also required by many/most other commercial vendors. Anyone familiar with Terminal services or Citrix should be familiar with this licensing model. If they aren't Microsoft will enjoy speaking with them.
You're right this isn't unique, in fact they had a mini-computer called the Virtual PC Buddy B-210 [active-hardware.com], but the main difference between the Jetway machine and the PC Buddy, is that the PC Buddy could share it's resources with up to five people, instead of Jetway's two.
Not a whole lot keeps two X servers from running locally. I saw this howto at tldp.org a few months ago, and was very interested. It requires a kernel patch or two, but it seems very nice. http://tldp.org/HOWTO/XFree-Local-multi-user-HOWTO/ [tldp.org]
by Anonymous Coward writes:
on Friday April 16, 2004 @05:36PM (#8886578)
Slashdot called it a "review". Anandtech called it a "first look". Two different beasts.
To me, it is just an informative piece, no reason to put it on slashdot with just this single link. There are other links people have given that are also useful...
Many, many years ago, I came across an article in a Hong Kong magazine regarding a piece of software called "Betwin," which does the same thing. Googling will find you links like: Buddy [getabuddy.com] and Another version called Buddy Betwin [newworldtelnet.com]
Basically the same thing... Nothing new here, move on...
VNC can be configured under Linux to display an existing desktop, not just one of it's own virtual desktops. This is how KDE implements desktop sharing.
bhtooefr is correct. There can be only one person connected whether it be at the console or via RDP. Logging on via RDP disconnects everybody else and connects to an existing desktop if that user has already logged in. Logging on at the console will then disconnect that remote user, and connect to the same session if it is the same username.
I wish there were a way to hack XP's terminal services to allow multiple concurrent logons.
I already did the same thing with plain old X-windows on a linux *LAPTOP*. Windows is so behind the times. (With X, you can define the two outputs of the video card (VGA out and the LCD screen) to be different screens altogether, and define one to use the laptop's keyboard and laptop's touchpad, and the other to use a usb keyboard and mouse, and violla, localhost:1.0 is user 1 on the laptop, and localhost:2.0 is user 2 using the usb keyboard, mouse, and the external VGA monitor.)
The Win32 API has had most of what's required for this since long before Terminal Services. CreateWindowStation() is one of the calls. I don't think it had multiple interactive user support, but it did have multiple desktop support, and a bunch of other things not exposed by the windows GUI.
Stuff I always wanted to implement, but then I just switched to linux.
CreateWindowStation was intoduced in NT 3.51 to support Citrix's WinFrame server, the predessor to MS Terminal Services. Multiple desktops (not sessions) have always existed in NT; when you press ctrl-alt-delete while logged on, it switches to the logon desktop.
About Linux: yeah, there are lot of things in Windows (NT mostly) that Microsoft and everyone else woefully neglects, and that's not usually the case with Free/Open software
Yeah, it was called the Buddy, and the old incarnation sucked. It was a PCI board which was essentially a video card plus a PS/2 keyboard and mouse controller. The video capabilities were terrible (sync rate limited to 60Hz, IIRC), and the second keyboard was prone to random resets and other problems.
The new incarnation of Buddy [ipc.com.sg] seems to address all those problems by using standard hardware. Buddy and BeTwin (they look like the same software) appear to work with any PCI video board that'll coexist with other video hardware, and since they use USB keyboards and mice (and audio, if you want), the proprietary controller problems should be gone too.
The new Buddy doesn't stop at 2 stations, either. It'll happily run up to 5, which might have a chance of using some of the absurd CPU power available in a modern PC. They have a trial version up for download, I might have to check my hardware compatibility and tinker with it later.
Actually, you can still get the BeTwin software (http://www.thinsoftinc.com/products_betwin_info.h tml) and all it requires is a dual-head video card or multiple cards and USB kybd, mouse and optional USB speakers. I installed and ran the demo of the software on my PC back in 2001 and I could run 2 instances of C&C Renegade (FPS) at 800x600 on a dual-head GF2 card. It worked really well for all other applications I tried. You can still download a demo of the software here: http://www.thinsoftinc.com/download_2002.php or buy a copy for ~$100. It worked great for me and I've been contemplating using it to add a terminal on my Windows machine downstairs and in the third floor rec room. My computer sits idle most of the time anyway.
It's a lot harder to get a dual consoled Linux desktop than a dual X-windows Linux Box.
If you want multiple consoles with seperate keyboards/mice, then you are looking for The Linux Console Project [sourceforge.net], I've never played with this
If you just want multiple X-Sessions running with sperate keyboards/mice, then you should just need to seperate all your keyboard, mice, and screens into sperate ServerLayout sections of your XF86Config-4 file. check here for documentation [faqs.org], This isn't actually all that hard.
The HOWTO has a LOT of info that you can ignore, but there are quite a few gotcha's if you aren't aware of them. It is the most complete reference I know of for getting X-windows setup with 2 seperate heads.
I guess I should have said that it is pretty easy, given a few things.
You are running a 2.6 kernel (I am)
You are running Debian (I am), Debian unstable has an Xserver reaady for multiple X-heads, and no special issues [faqs.org]
It was easy for me at least, I didn't patch a thing or install any extra software. It was mainly an issue of getting the input devices all setup correctly.
My setup:
Geforce4MX/USB Keyboard/USB Mouse
Matrox G200-TV/PS2 keyboard/serial Wacom tablet
I don't use it this way anymore, I now have it setup as a regular dual-head box again.
Big Deal (Score:2, Informative)
Re:I want the opposite... (Score:3, Informative)
These have been around for some time (Score:3, Informative)
Anyone remember the BUDDY? (Score:2, Informative)
Buddy betwin - Betwin B-680 - Enables 2 Users or more to share 1 PC
Sometimes one computer just isn't enough. With buddy betwin, you don't have to spend thousands of dollars on a second PC. This device lets you connect a second keyboard, mouse and monitor to your existing computer to create a second, fully functional PC. Share drives, printers, scanners, software, and even surf the Internet at the same time using only one modem, one telephone line and one Internet Service Provider account. Start taking full advantage of your computer's power! Every member of your household can be online simultaneously. You can track your investments while your spouse sends e-mail and your high-schooler downloads information for a homework assignment - all at the same time, and using just one Internet connection. It enables up to four additional users to share the computing power and resources of a single computer running Windows 2000 or XP. This is perfect for the home and small office. Simply install it into your computer and connect an additional monitor, keyboard and mouse. Windows ® will recognize all the devices automatically. Now you can do your work while the kids play their games!
Never got to use one. How did/didn't it work?
Re:Wondering about licensing and grammar (Score:1, Informative)
Re:I want the opposite... (Score:3, Informative)
What would be nice is software that lets you split your computers into groups, allow you to broadcast to those specific groups, etc..
More information plus pricing (Score:5, Informative)
Happy Trails!
Erick
Also via a PCI card (Score:5, Informative)
Install guide has some more details... (Score:4, Informative)
Page 8 tells you to turn off the system standby in XP's power management. Guess they don't have that working well. But they do warn the second user if the first user decides to shut down the system.
Software makers already do. (Score:5, Informative)
Microsoft and many other software makers already address this licensing issue. On this machine Microsoft requires either two licenses for Windows or one Windows license and a Terminal Server Client Access license. For MS Office a license is required for each per seat instance. SO, two users in Word requires two licenses.
This same licensing system is also required by many/most other commercial vendors. Anyone familiar with Terminal services or Citrix should be familiar with this licensing model. If they aren't Microsoft will enjoy speaking with them.
Re:Unique? No... but legal questions? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:linux and windows (Score:2, Informative)
You could use VMWare. But you'd probably be better off running Windows on top of Linux to accomplish this.
Re:should possible on any PC with sufficient hardw (Score:5, Informative)
http://tldp.org/HOWTO/XFree-Local-multi-user-HOWT
Re:this wasn't a review (Score:2, Informative)
To me, it is just an informative piece, no reason to put it on slashdot with just this single link. There are other links people have given that are also useful...
NOT a new concept... (Score:3, Informative)
Buddy [getabuddy.com] and Another version called Buddy Betwin [newworldtelnet.com]
Basically the same thing...
Nothing new here, move on...
Re:Terminal Server (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Terminal Server (Score:5, Informative)
I wish there were a way to hack XP's terminal services to allow multiple concurrent logons.
Yawn (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Terminal Server (Score:2, Informative)
Stuff I always wanted to implement, but then I just switched to linux.
Re:Terminal Server (Score:2, Informative)
About Linux: yeah, there are lot of things in Windows (NT mostly) that Microsoft and everyone else woefully neglects, and that's not usually the case with Free/Open software
Re:Unique? No... but legal questions? (Score:4, Informative)
The new incarnation of Buddy [ipc.com.sg] seems to address all those problems by using standard hardware. Buddy and BeTwin (they look like the same software) appear to work with any PCI video board that'll coexist with other video hardware, and since they use USB keyboards and mice (and audio, if you want), the proprietary controller problems should be gone too.
The new Buddy doesn't stop at 2 stations, either. It'll happily run up to 5, which might have a chance of using some of the absurd CPU power available in a modern PC. They have a trial version up for download, I might have to check my hardware compatibility and tinker with it later.
Re:Anyone remember the BUDDY? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:anybody done dual head linux? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:anybody done dual head linux? (Score:2, Informative)
I guess I should have said that it is pretty easy, given a few things.
My setup: