responses to query on wireless laptop usage

[Oberg, Steve]

I apologize for the lengthy time it has taken me to get back to the list
as a whole with a summary of responses to my question from a few weeks
ago about wireless laptop usage.  Here is what I've heard thus far.  I
really appreciate these responses.  On the other hand, I would be
surprised if there aren't more libraries out there with some comparative
statistics to report that haven't spoken up yet.  I also heard from
several people who were very interested in information on this topic.
Maybe someone with more time than I have can set up a formal
study/survey on this issue and write it up for publication!

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>From a college library:

"We have 6 laptops with wireless cards. In 105 days (slightly more than
our spring semester, minus closed days), we had 1582 circulations total.
So, around 15 total circulations a day, 2.5 per machine. In your case,
sounds like 170 checkouts per machine / 90 days = ~1.9, so that's in the
same ballpark. We also had some downtime, but we were fully in business
most of the time. (We have a backup machine.) 

They loan for 2 hours at a time. We have a computer classroom and other
public machines. I think our student body is a bit bigger. Term time,
we're typically open 48 hours a week."

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>From a mid-sized university library:

"We've had phenomenal use of our wireless laptops this past semester.
We have a student body of about 8,500 students and have 18 wireless
laptops available for circulation.  We have 58 public PCs for Internet
searching, but do not have MS Office installed on these machines for
typing papers.  The wireless laptops however DO have Office, which may
fuel their hot demand.  We restrict their circulation and use to inside
the building.
 
For Jan 1 - April 30 of this year, we had 1,776 laptop circulations.
There were a few days this semester where literally every one of the 18
laptops was in circulation and we had to take a waiting list for 1 or 2
people."

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>From another mid-sized university library:

"We have about 3000 students and circulate 30 laptops in our library 
(along with 15 opacs, and a small lab of 12 pcs) In the 198 days we 
were open from October 7th, 2003 to April 30th, 2004, the total 
number of charges was 27,798. 

On one insane day (23 March), between 8:30 am and 11:00 pm we 
had 273 charges and we were frequently over 200 charges per day. 

I'm not sure if that is high, low or average myself, but there it is.  I

am currently working on a draft of a survey of students regarding 
laptop use, and that may tell us more.  We are also reviewing the  
staffing implications, especially given the time taken up with 
charging and discharging machines."

-------------------------------------

Steve

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Steve Oberg
Electronic Resources Librarian &
  Assistant Professor
Taylor University
www.taylor.edu