One fifth of school computers 'unusable'

A new survey has reportedly found that one-fifth of the computers in Irish schools are unusable and many more will soon be obsolete.

More than 3,500 schools were surveyed as part of the investigation by the National Council for Technology in Education.

Reports this morning say more than 11,000 of the almost 100,000 computers in these schools were found to be unusable.

Another 11,300 need upgrading or repair before they can be used, while one-quarter of working computers are between found and six years old.

Most of the computers also have old operating systems such as Windows 95, 98 or 2,000, for which Microsoft no longer provides technical support.