Recently, the popular press has pointed to increasing evidence of misuse and abuse of emerging technologies in U.S. schools. Some examples include using Web sites to intimidate or threaten students, downloading music illegally from the Internet, plagiarizing information using the Internet, using cellular phones during class time, and playing games…

The "standard" PC desktop is and always has been a moving target. Although the fear of obsolescence has diminished considerably from the early days of personal computing, it is still true that today's state-of-the-art system will eventually be too slow, too underpowered, and probably too archaic to warrant repair, or even use. To extend the life…