There are several reasons why in general we should be cautious about customizing the House reslab / computer room. One is that we have to be sure "secondary support" (beyond the primary support provided within the House) is feasible and cost-effective - that the people who service the machines can know what's in them and are trained and equipped to support the hardware and software.
But another reason we've heard is that the reslabs are open to the Penn community and that customizing goes against the needs of non-Van Peltians who should expect a uniformity across all the labs, and who would not be served well by a Van Pelt computer room reorganized around House-specific programs and needs.
To examine the above assumption we recorded every use of the computers from January 23 through February 13, 1996. We found that the percentage of users who residents of Van Pelt College House was
during times when our work-study "computer consultants" were on duty. During hours not covered by the computer consultants, 100% of the users are Van Pelt residents (only residents have the key to the door). Of 610 users polled in this period, just 25 were not from Van Pelt. Of the 25 non-Peltian visits, three were made by one former resident who considers himself part of the program here. Four other non-Peltian visits were made by one person. The Van Pelt Reslab is, in effect, used only by those who live in the House.
By the way, the use of Macs and PCs was split about 60-40% (Mac to PC) and it seems that the students use them interchangeably. (One tracks the name of a single student and finds her on a PC one visit and a MAC the next.)