An alternative to using the MCS for the computationally confident is to do the work on your own computer. All the software you need is free. However, if you decide to follow this route please note:

• You are on you own - we cannot provide support for your system. (You can ask me, and I'll answer if it's possible - but no guarantees).
• Your final program files must be submitted to the course pigeonholes and must compile, link and execute on the MCS

You should only need to install

• GCC
• GNUPLOT
• GNU Science Library
• Perhaps FFTW

If you want to do your project in python, I suggest downloading a prepackaged Scientific Python distribution, e.g. anaconda, Enthought or pyzo. Make sure you get the python 3 distribution (python 2 versions of these distributions also exist in some cases, but python 2 is the past, python 3 is the future!).