Thin client computing has been around for many years -predating the PC, if you include standard green-screen terminals. However, the real push with thin client devices was during the late 1990s, when the likes of NCD, Wyse and IGEL pushed their devices as being the antidote to the high price, low stability and variable management costs of the standard PC. The problems with thin client computing result from such devices and approaches being at the mercy of the network. If the network is busy, users are made to wait. In many cases, this has been the downfall of a server-based computing approach-if everything is centralised, then it is all or nothing You could, however, run a hybrid system. Applications that need fast response could be run at the desktop, with other applications being run from the server. This is fine, except that it used to mean that you still needed that expensive/complex/ maintenance and power-hungry PC as the end-user device, and, as such, savings were minimal.
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