I'm curious how the damage breaks down, because it sounds like a lot of that damage might have been him destroying just a motherboard and then the entire computer being written off.

Corporate/university IT shops don't normally do component-level replacement. Both due to time constraints and the nature of their support contacts.

(Assuming the Dell/HP/etc. workstations they bought even take standard size motherboards. I've seen some that don't.)

Our Helpdesk does full on replacement work. I have seen them swap out mobos even CPUs. We are our own service contractor with Dell, HP, and Apple.

Wow. I want to work at that helpdesk. Every helpdesk I've encountered is just an intermediary for outside service.

Well, with the cost of finding a specialist amortized over 59 computers, surely it becomes worth it at that point.

Corporations and big organizations don't think like regular people. Yes you can repair the computers saving money, but now there would be no support from the OEM, and they would have at least two different systems - the repaired ones and the working ones, because I don't think that motherboards for custom office PCs they have (like HP or DELL PCs) are off the shelf. I have an old compaq PC I upcycled as a home server, everything inside is built to fit together and be very reliable, it is nowhere close a typical PC build. The motherboard isn't even square.

Don't OEMs offer paid repairs themselves?

> I hope he gets the full 10 years.

Ten years for vandalism? That's injustice.

You don't even know why he did it. Perhaps he was just an idiot, perhaps he had a legitimate grievance that he didn't know how to "rectify" otherwise.

> Nothing like the US Penitentiary System to teach you a lesson.

Oh really? Then why does the US system have one of the highest rates of recidivism in the world? Why does the US have the highest incarceration rate in the world, perhaps with the exception of North Korea?

> Perhaps he was just an idiot,

Considering he filmed it, this is the most likely explanation anyway; you should ruin someone life over that? Make him pay 200k in fines and that’s it; jail time is insane for this imho.

Problem is, the fine will be paid by his parental units, which doesn't teach him a lesson at all; in fact, it reinforces the lesson that he can do anything he wants, and parents will take care of it.

If he's over 18, his parents wouldn't be liable.

Would you pay a 200k fine for your child?

Exactly. Nobody got hurt, so a fine is enough. To stop him from doing this again, there could be a harsher punishment for repeated offence.

> I'm guessing he's a rich kid from India, with rich parents who are bankrolling his education.

What is this guess based on?

I grew up in India and had friends who were rich and entitled? A guy I knew one day decided to kick in the car doors of a dozen cars because he was pissed (I think because he didn't get to park there...?). Anyways, cops were called, but parents wrote out hefty checks and that was it. I have seen this kind of behavior before.

In my experience, most are relatively rich compared to other people in their country. I am under the impression they have to pay full price (which the schools love) and they pay cash since loans are not available.

It's just a piece of plastic. Very intricate, relatively expensive silly plastic.

You are demanding blood and to trade off a huge chunk of human life for the silly piece of machinery (which he gonna pay fore anyway), are you feeling well, my friend?

The reason I think this is going to result in jail time, is this is not just one or two isolated incidents.

But instead the 59 incidents make this a willful act of vandalism.

It doesn't get more "wilful" than filming yourself doing it, with glee.

The great thing is, he also flushed his future down the drain, at least outside of India (every visa application in the world asks you about past criminal convictions).

Or to use a more apt metaphor, he zapped his future into smoke.