Campus Computers and Printing

Please see below the guides and frequently asked questions on campus computer rooms and printing facilities

Guides

Computer FAQs

1. What are the computing and printing facilities at LSE?

Please see facilities for students. This lists the public computer rooms and computer classrooms with the facilities that are in each area.

2. Can visitors use PCs on campus?

No. Visitors can only use IT at LSE if they are from an institution participating in JANET Roaming, and have a laptop or other wireless-enabled device.

 

3. What are the opening hours of the School's public rooms and computer classrooms?

4. How do I find out when a computer classroom is going to be free?

The computer classrooms are all located in St Clements building, where IT facilities are available to all students when the room is not booked for teaching. Please see timetables. Please note that this is only available during term time.

5. Can I save files on a public room or classroom PC?

You should not save files directly onto the C: drive or the desktop of a public room or classroom PC. The user profiles get deleted from these PCs regularly throughout the day, so if you saved something to the desktop it will not be there once you have logged off. Please ensure that you save files to your H: space.

 

 6. How do I report a faulty PC or printer?

This depends on where the faulty piece of equipment is.

Staff offices or PhD study rooms and departmental PC rooms

If you find a PC or printer that is faulty in a staff office or a PhD/departmental computer room you can do the following:

  • E-mail the IT Service Desk or call x5000
  • Visit the IT Service Desk (Walk In Centre, Library 1st Floor)

Please tell IT staff the room number, PC or printer number and what the problem is. 

Teaching rooms and lecture theatres

If you find a PC or any AV equipment that is faulty in a teaching room or lecture theatre you can do the following:

Please tell staff the room number, PC or equipment number and what the problem is.

 

Public PC areas and computer classrooms

If you find a PC or printer that is faulty in a public room or computer classroom you can do the following:

  • E-mail the IT Help Desk or call x5000
  • Visit the IT Help Desk (Walk In Centre, Library 1st Floor)

Please tell IT staff the room number, PC or printer number and what the problem is.

 

7. Do the PCs at LSE allow audio?

Yes, the public PCs on campus allow students to listen to lectures but only through headphones. Please plug your headphones into the socket on the front of your PC. Check volume is on.

8. Does DTS rent out laptops to LSE students?

No, DTS does not rent out laptops to students.

However, there are laptops available in the library under the i-roam scheme. See the i-roam webpage for details.

Use of the i-roam service is governed by the Conditions of Use of IT Facilities.

9. How are the LSE computers updated?

DTS rolls out an update to the LSE desktop once a year, during the summer. This provides the opportunity to install new, upgraded and amended software to all teaching rooms and open access student PCs.

Teaching staff will be contacted during Winter term to discuss requirements for the following academic session. The beginning of Spring term is the deadline for academic support staff to finalise the information they need in order to introduce new or significantly upgraded software for the desktop in the following academic year.

It may be possible to implement minor upgrades and alterations during the Winter break. Requests should be discussed with the Service Desk as soon as possible, and any agreement finalised by the beginning of October.

10. How do I log on to a PC to use a data projector?

All PCs are connected to the LSE network. Please use your logon if you are on the LSE domain. Otherwise, you need to know the name of the PC in order to logon with generic details.

The easiest way to find out the name of the PC is at the logon screen click on ‘to logon to a different domain’, this will reveal the PC name and you can log on using the details below: 

Username: *computername*\GUESTLEC

Password: HELLO

Please note: The password is case sensitive, so type it as displayed above, in capitals.

11. What is videoconferencing?

Videoconferencing is a means of video and audio communication to people in different locations across the developed world. This could be a meeting between two locations or between several sites simultaneously. We have held videoconferences between the UK and Western Europe, Australia, New Zealand, America and the Far East.

Our dedicated videoconference suite has the facilities to allow us to connect to remote sites using a dial-up basis via ISDN lines as well as using what is known as Internet Protocol (IP). IP calls travel across the internet rather than via telephone lines.

Both technologies have their positive and negative points, and you would need to decide which is best for you. Depending on the resources available at the other site, or sites, this question could already be answered for you.

At present, IP calls are not available to external clients due to the terms and conditions imposed by our network provider.

 

12. What are the main reasons for using videoconferencing?

Videoconferencing can be used:

  • to hold meetings,
  • to carry out interviews,
  • to give seminars,
  • to teach.

When videoconferencing is used for teaching it is often more effective for small groups of students at each site. Lectures can be delivered from large lecture theatres, although other factors involving lighting and audio affect the call quality.

It is also possible to share computer applications over videoconferencing links to enable participants to view presentations and documents at each site and to make changes as required.

Over the last few years within LSE videoconferencing has been used for:

a) meetings between two or more sites saving time and travel

  • committee meetings
  • working in collaborative groups between two or more universities
  • examiners' meetings
  • interviewing potential candidates from other parts of the world

b) seminars and conferences

  • participation in remote seminars
  • giving papers to remote conferences
  • telemedicine conferences with live links into operating theatres.

c) teaching and learning

  • discussion amongst a distributed group
  • giving or receiving specially-broadcast lectures
  • small group teaching
  • telemedicine training

13. What videoconferencing facilities are available at LSE and do I need special technical knowledge to use them?

There is a state of the art videoconference suite in Tower One, available to all members of staff, students and external clientele.

Charges for hire, staffing, and call costs are available here.

Other departments may have their own facilities - we do not support these, and cannot comment on or provide any assistance with them.

You do not need to have any knowledge if you just wish to make a videoconference call - the AV Unit will provide you with a step by step guide on how to use the equipment, and where we can, will start your call, and be on call for the duration of the event for you.

If you wish to know more, please contact us, and we will try to help.

14. What are the differences between ISDN and IP?

 ISDN: (Integrated Services Digital Network)

ISDN-based videoconferencing provides a guaranteed picture and audio quality at a known price. It is therefore mainly suited for group meetings, long-distance interviewing and similar applications where high-quality audio and reasonable-to-good quality picture is necessary.

ISDN is supported by telecoms service providers throughout the UK, Europe, North America, the Far East and Australia.

The ISDN service is designed to provide reasonably high data transmission rates for digital data and its digital telephone links can be used to support videoconferencing. Each ISDN channel provides 64 kilobits of data per second (kbps). At least two ISDN channels are used for videoconferencing (ISDN-2), hence for links in UK the cost is twice that of a voice telephone call.

ISDN videoconferencing between more than two sites will require the use of a Multipoint Control Unit (MCU). Each site calls the MCU site, and its location will determine the cost of the call. There may also be charges for the use of the MCU depending upon the service provider. The MCU normally operates with voice-activated picture switching while maintaining open audio between all the sites in the videoconference.

Internet Protocol (IP) videoconferencing

IP (Internet Protocol) videoconferencing is more widely used to communicate between individuals where the quality of the picture is not so critical. This technology is currently free to the user since it uses the Internet, but does not provide a guaranteed picture and audio quality as it is dependent on Internet traffic, which varies enormously.

At present, IP calls are not available to external clients due to the terms and conditions imposed by our network provider.

15. Who supports videoconferencing facilities and where can I go for help and advice?

The Audio Visual Unit look after the facilities in our videoconference room. Should you require assistance, please contact us: 020 7107 5400 | dts.av.support@lse.ac.uk

Printing FAQs 

1. What are the printing facilities at LSE?

There are HP LaserJet printers or Canon multi-functional devices (MFDs) in all of the public computer rooms and areas, which can be used for the production of high-quality documents.

Some of the MFDs in the Library offer both black and white (b/w) and colour printing, photocopying and scanning.

For a list of public computer rooms and computer classrooms with the printers and other facilities by area, please see the student computer rooms webpages.

2. How much does printing cost?

LSE charges:

  • A4 | 3.5p per side for b&w and 10p a page for colour printing
  • A3 | 7p  per side b&w and 20p a page for colour

3. Where are the value loaders for printer account top-up?

There are value loaders on the lower ground floor and ground floor in the Library.

All value loaders take notes and £2, £1, 50p, 20p, 10p and 5p coins.

4. How can I print out in colour?

Colour MFDs are available in the Library. Colour printing costs 10p (A4) or 20p (A3) a sheet and you have to connect to a different print queue before sending a job. 

See our guide to colour printing for more information.

5. Can I print to a school printer from my own computer?

You can print from your own computer on campus (including halls of residence), to a public room or classroom printer.

Currently, colour printing can be done on LSE Campus only. See our guide to colour printing for more information.

6. Can I print double-sided (duplex) on campus?

Yes; double-sided printing is set as default on all campus printers. There are only a few printers at halls of residences that don't have duplex units and so can only print single-sided.

7. How do I print out two pages on one side of paper?

This will depend on the program your file is open in. Printer settings can usually be changed by going to File | Print and choosing from the available settings.

 

8. Can I use OHP sheets in the school printers?

Yes but please ensure they are suitable for the model of laser printers we have otherwise they can cause paper jams and other printing problems. The Students’ Union Shop sells laser printer compatible OHPs.

9. I'm having trouble printing PDFs. What can I do?

There are a number of possible causes. In general, try the following options:

  1. If you have been trying to print multiple pages per sheet AND double-sided, try printing with only one of these options
  2. If you are printing a PDF embedded in a browser window (e.g. Internet Explorer), make sure you are printing from the printer icon in the toolbar of the PDF files, NOT from the File | Print menu in the browser
  3. If you are printing a file opened on a web browser, try to save it onto the desktop and print.
  4. Try printing the PDF in economy mode.

If you are still having problems printing, contact the IT Help Desk.

 

10. When I print out a PDF from a web page, the printed pages come out blank. How can I resolve this?

When printing out a PDF from a web browser you need to select the print button which is on the webpage or Adobe toolbar rather than the print option on the browser toolbar. When you click on the print button a pop up window opens, you can set any printing preferences you want and then press print.

The other alternative is to save the PDF file temporarily to your desktop and then print it from the saved version there. This can be done by clicking

File | Save As and selecting the desktop to save the file.

 

How do I print confidential documents on campus?

Once you press print from your PC/laptop it will be added to the print queue, however it won't start printing until you hold your ID card against the card reader on the printer and select the documents to be printed.

This ensures that documents are only printed once the person is standing by the printer, rather than waiting on the printer to be picked up.