Looking to change things in our company.
We are probably headed towards SBS 2008 and thus most likely need to get server class hardware.
Our usage:
This is for a small accounting office.
No more than 7 employees at one time.
10-12 computers in the building (including the server).
We do work from home via VPN.
Network is all Cisco POE routers/switches. Main unit is a Cisco UC520.
New server will run SBS 2008 (as long as I can get it installed and configured ... yikes!!)
We currently use our server (it is running Windows XP Pro) to access our data only and there are "database manager" apps that run in the background to give us access to our tax and accounting files. All other programs are physically installed and run on our workstations.
Network is a standard peer to peer in a Workgroup environment. All computers are hard coded to a specific IP address.
We have an outside email service that handles our website and email accounts.
Our move to SBS 2008 with Exchange is prompted by our need/want to go as paperless as possible. To do that our faxes need to be received and stored electronically vs paper. Our UC520 will do this for us but has to do it with Exchange Server.
Based on research and input from others here it looks like for our purposes a move to SBS 2008 would be a good idea but we probably need to beef up our server.
I would like to keep the budget as minimal as possible but realize that I don't want to skimp on essentials.
We would be looking to put this in a normal tower case vs a rack mount so that we can have access to it in our office space vs back in a closet (no room there).
We will also want to move our existing "data" drives over to the new server once it is ready to be deployed (these are currently (2) 1 TB WD Drives running in a mirrored array with a simply promise Raid card)
Looking at something like the 310 is going to be about $1067ish spec'd as follows
Xeon 3430 2.4GHz with 8mb cache with Turbo (no HT though)
8gb of Dual Ranked UDIMM
Perc 6i RAID Card
2 x 250gb SATA HDD -- we will only use one of these for the OS. We will add 2 of our own drives to make a Raid 1 setup
3yr Basic Warranty from Dell
Naturally we will need to get a Dell approved Raid Card (probably has to be a Perc) to set up the Raid Array for the 2 x 1TB drives for our Data.
My concerns are ...
1. Should we go with 2 servers (1 for Data/Programs) and (1 for exchange stuff only) vs a 1 server solution?
2. Does the Poweredge series have USB ports for external drive hook up? We currently back our data up on an external drive and take it with us each night when we leave.
3. I have read that the Poweredge series requires HDD cages to add other drives but they do not come with them if you don't get the drives from Dell (which are STUPID expensive). Anyone knowledgeable on this topic?
Anything else I should look at instead?
Greg
**EDITED to update T310 build
We are probably headed towards SBS 2008 and thus most likely need to get server class hardware.
Our usage:
This is for a small accounting office.
No more than 7 employees at one time.
10-12 computers in the building (including the server).
We do work from home via VPN.
Network is all Cisco POE routers/switches. Main unit is a Cisco UC520.
New server will run SBS 2008 (as long as I can get it installed and configured ... yikes!!)
We currently use our server (it is running Windows XP Pro) to access our data only and there are "database manager" apps that run in the background to give us access to our tax and accounting files. All other programs are physically installed and run on our workstations.
Network is a standard peer to peer in a Workgroup environment. All computers are hard coded to a specific IP address.
We have an outside email service that handles our website and email accounts.
Our move to SBS 2008 with Exchange is prompted by our need/want to go as paperless as possible. To do that our faxes need to be received and stored electronically vs paper. Our UC520 will do this for us but has to do it with Exchange Server.
Based on research and input from others here it looks like for our purposes a move to SBS 2008 would be a good idea but we probably need to beef up our server.
I would like to keep the budget as minimal as possible but realize that I don't want to skimp on essentials.
We would be looking to put this in a normal tower case vs a rack mount so that we can have access to it in our office space vs back in a closet (no room there).
We will also want to move our existing "data" drives over to the new server once it is ready to be deployed (these are currently (2) 1 TB WD Drives running in a mirrored array with a simply promise Raid card)
Looking at something like the 310 is going to be about $1067ish spec'd as follows
Xeon 3430 2.4GHz with 8mb cache with Turbo (no HT though)
8gb of Dual Ranked UDIMM
Perc 6i RAID Card
2 x 250gb SATA HDD -- we will only use one of these for the OS. We will add 2 of our own drives to make a Raid 1 setup
3yr Basic Warranty from Dell
Naturally we will need to get a Dell approved Raid Card (probably has to be a Perc) to set up the Raid Array for the 2 x 1TB drives for our Data.
My concerns are ...
1. Should we go with 2 servers (1 for Data/Programs) and (1 for exchange stuff only) vs a 1 server solution?
2. Does the Poweredge series have USB ports for external drive hook up? We currently back our data up on an external drive and take it with us each night when we leave.
3. I have read that the Poweredge series requires HDD cages to add other drives but they do not come with them if you don't get the drives from Dell (which are STUPID expensive). Anyone knowledgeable on this topic?
Anything else I should look at instead?
Greg
**EDITED to update T310 build
Last edited:
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