The Verizon Wireless call center in Wilmington recently replaced its internal staff’s desktops and as a result, 395 computers were donated to 10 area non-profit organizations, churches and schools.

The computer upgrade is part of a company-wide plan to replace desktop computers with thin clients based around a Citrix system. A thin client is a small device that connects the user to the central computer.

It resembles a small PC, but does not include a hard drive or operating system. With thin clients the computer processing, desktop, and all files are stored on the central computer. 

Verizon “made the decision to move to the Citrix thin client because of the return on the investment,” said Chrissie Kenny, Associate Director of IT End User Support at Verizon. Kenny explained that the thin clients only cost about $225 per unit and have better security and lower power consumption. With around 1,400 desktops in the Wilmington office, “I was budgeting over a million dollars every three years for PCs,” said Kenny.

Each thin client connects to a central server hosted in Verizon’s data center. “We run 50 users per server,” Kenny said.  With 70 percent concurrent usage, the entire setup requires about 20 servers total. “The servers last about 5 years, where desktops were only under warranty for three,” she said. “Now I just patch 22 servers instead of 1,400 machines. We just started the conversion [to thin clients] at the end of last year, where some of the other centers have been running them since 2007.”

After each PC is retired, the hard drive is wiped clean using special software that securely removes the operating system and all data by  writing random data over the hard drive multiple times. Verizon technicians use software from Microsoft but a free, open-source tool called DBAN is available to do the same thing. The computers are donated without operating systems because  of licensing restriction. Kenny said the license for Windows can not be transferred and is reused for the thin client desktops.

Local organizations that received computers included Lake Waccamaw Boys and Girls Home, Good Shepherd House, Chapel of Peace Church, Wilmington Christian Academy, Bradley Creek Elementary School, St. Mary Church and School, Pender County Schools, Boys & Girls Club, Trask Middle School and Wrightsville Beach Baptist Church.

Wilmington Christian school will be receiving 100 computers from the program. According to Barron Nobles, administrator, the school “will be rotating out in-class computers.”  The school is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year and had begun make plans to replace their computers. “We were looking at fund raising and this came up.  It is a great a birthday gift,” said Nobles.

As the desktops continue to be replaced, another 350 computers will be given away later this summer. According to Margee Herring, Verizon spokesperson, organizations should contact the Verizon Wireless if they’re interested in receiving any of these computers.