5 Administration and image upgrades

This section highlights and discusses the Remote Administration capabilities and firmware upgrade methods applicable to your thin client.

Altiris Deployment Solution software

The Altiris Deployment Solution software is a full-featured remote administration tool set. It accesses the thin client through the Altiris remote Agent and PXE server utilities installed on the thin client. Altiris allows you to perform the thin client administration functions (including firmware upgrades) without requiring an administrator to visit the individual thin client sites.

For more information about Altiris, see http://www.altiris.com.

Add-on upgrades

If you want to install an add-on module, you can use the Altiris Deployment Solution to administer the thin client. Disable/enable the write filter as needed to save the changes.

CAUTION: If the available free space on the flash memory is reduced to less than 3 MB, the thin client becomes unstable.

NOTE: For add-on modules to work and be downloaded, there must be sufficient flash space available. In some cases it may be necessary to remove software components to free up space for add-on modules.

Image upgrades

The Intel Preboot Execution Environment (PXE) is a protocol that defines interaction between TCP/IP, DHCP and TFTP to enable a client to download a preboot environment from a server. PXE allows a client to boot from a server on a network prior to booting the embedded operating system or the operating system from the local flash module. PXE allows a network administrator to remotely wake up a thin client and perform various management tasks, including loading the operating system and other software onto the thin client from a server over the network. The PXE client is installed on the thin client and the PXE server component is part of the Altiris Deployment Solution suite.

NOTE: Citrix ICA auto update does not function for the ICA client installed on the thin client; updates are implemented through the standard firmware upgrade process.

HP ThinState Capture and Deploy

The HP ThinState Capture tool is a very simple wizard based tool that can be used to capture an HP thin client XP Embedded image, which can then be deployed to another HP thin client of identical model and hardware. For more information about the HP ThinState Capture tool, see HP ThinState Capture on page 34.

38 Chapter 5 Administration and image upgrades

ENWW