I am from Southern Africa and am seriously considering establishing an internet cafe. I know that in some parts of the world, internet cafes are no longer a good business venture. However, here in Southern Africa, where few people can afford a PC at home, and many dont have telephone lines at home, an internet cafe is a very good business.

In order to reduce establishment costs, i am considering using thin clients, a server running on Linux, and open source 'office' software for the terminals. The internet cafe will have 15 terminals, and will provide the following services:
-internet browsing
-scanning & printing
-VOIP
-Gaming (an extra 4 terminals)
-the browsing experience must be in a multimedia environment, with reasonable speeds.

My questions are as follows:
1. What specific hardware can i use for this? What are the best brands/makes of thin clients that have multiple USB ports?
2. For the server, what are minimum specifications?
3. Just out of interest, is it possible for the server to run Linux and XP, and enable clients to access whichever OS they want? (I know that buying XP negates the whole point of cutting software costs, but its an interesting issue).
4. For the gaming terminals, what is the best hardware and software?
5. Using wireless networking - is this possible, and what hardware do i need?
6. Which version of Linux should i use?
7. Besides the speed of the internet connection, precisely what 'item' on the server determines browsing speed?

Please remember that the internet cafe will be using a 56k connection. (I am also exploring what speeds and what technology are offered by our mobile phone network).

I have been using the internet for the last 6-7years and am reasonably well informed. However, I have very little technical knowledge.

Your help will be greatly appreciated

Regards
lemmyb

P.S. I have read a number of posts in Linux forums but i have not been able to fully establish the minimum hardware requirements.

I have also heard of the Nivo (ultra-thin client) by Ndiyo.org. Does anyone know if the Nivo is on sale yet?

What is available and cheap where you live?
A modem, a NIC, a 16 port switch, a motherboard with a processor and some RAM and a drive.
As far as I know, you can't use XP like this. XP is a monouser system. If you have 15 clients, you need 15 copies of XP. XP isn't an option IMO.
For gaming, you want a good graphic card, and probably XP (although several good games can run on linux but the best for that is XP). But is really depends on the game. Starcraft doesnt require a good graphic card for instance and neither does it require XP.
It is possible and you need wireless devices. An access point (a wireless switch) and a wireless NIC per client.
depending on your hardware, choose from www.distrowatch.com
at 56k for 15 clients, nothing will slow down the browsing speed beside the internet connection. No element of the network can be slower than that. Even a null-modem serial connection between the server and the clients is fast enough


Have fun.

Thanks Agrouf.

For the source of hardware - We do not have any suppliers of thin client hardware here - i will have to import from wherever i can get - USA, UK, China, etc. Hence i really need to know which brands/types are robust.

Server minimum specs - are you saying that a Pentium 4 server, with 256MB RAM, and a 40gig HDD is sufficient? Can it sustain 15 users for 9 12hours a day?

I'd say get more RAM (probably 512 Mb+) and probably a bigger HDD, though to be honest I don't know much about thin clients (is it the same as a dumb terminal/server setup?)

For
-internet browsing
-scanning & printing
-VOIP

Yes, it is sufficient.
More RAM will make it more confortable but 256Mo is ok with at least DSL and dillo for 15 X11 clients 24/24.

The point of thin clients is that they are cheap. I believe transport will cost more than the clients themselves. Check what is nearest to you.

for gaming you want windows XP. Its the only OS thats any good for gaming.

Thanks guys. Is there any one out there who would like to share their experiences of running an internet cafe using Linux based thin clients?