Highly technical disciplines have always required special equipment. Engineering at Iowa State is no different.

In an effort to address the problem, the College of Engineering will be making some changes to its computer facilities this year.

“In Marston, we’ve replaced all the computer labs entirely. We have four teaching labs that each have … 19 computers, and we will have one open lab of 34 computers,” said Chris McCoy, manager of the Office of Engineering Computing Support Services.

“Where we were running 486s, we now have Pentium IIs, which really increase the efficiency and decrease the time that it takes for students to complete projects,” he said.

The new labs in Marston, and elsewhere throughout the college, were funded primarily by a $167-per-semester engineering, computer fee students in the college pay. The student fee helps partially defray the costs of purchasing and maintaining computers in the college.

“It really makes sense to have everybody using the computers pitch in a little to save everybody a lot,” said Nick Serdar, freshman in aerospace engineering. “If we had to buy all the software for our own systems, it would be really expensive, so having new computers dedicated to engineering students really helps.”

Not all students agree, however.

“It really isn’t worth my money,” said Brent Riese, sophomore in electrical engineering. “Many students who have their own computers seldom use the labs but are still assessed the fee based on their major.”

John Burns, junior in electrical engineering, said most of the faster computers are accessible only to students enrolled in particular classes.

Not all of the computers in the college are funded by the engineering computer fee, though.

“We’ve just finished the final allocation of the McCracken gift,” McCoy said.

In 1992, Edward McCracken, chairman and CEO of Silicon Graphics Incorporated and alumnus of ISU, donated $5 million in engineering computers to the university. This year marked the conclusion of the disbursement of that gift.

“For the past six years, that gift has really benefited the students at Iowa State and will continue to do so,” McCoy said.

“Ultimately, computers are really expensive, but they’re still important to education here at Iowa State,” McCoy said. “The College [of Engineering] is dedicated to providing high-quality, powerful computers to all students who need to use them.”