OK, so we have about 35 users in our firm. 25 in the main location, 3 in one satellite office and another 7 in a second office.
Currently we are running a Windows 2003 Terminal Server on an HP ML330 g3 with 2x Xeon 2.4ghz, 4gigs ram, approximately 100gigs hard drive on a SCSI Raid 5 array. We have a 2nd computer that runs Exchange server and is our data store. The Exchange computer is also our domain controller.
It's time to upgrade, but sometimes it feels like our IT provider has a bit of a one track mind. They are recommending replacing our terminal server (or Remote Desktop, whatever it's called nowdays) computer with:
2x Xeon 5550's
16gigs ram
Windows 2008 standard (with necessary TS licensing)
SAS array with 6 disks. 2 in RAID 1 for the OS & programs, 4 in RAID6 for data storage
My questions:
1. Is an evolution of our existing way of doing things (terminal server) still the best option for a firm our size? or is there something completely different out there?
2. If we stick with terminal server way of doing things is this computer going to have the oomph we need to tide us over for a few years? Obviously we can upgrade the computer as needed to squeeze some more life out of it.
3. Does it work to 'cluster' terminal servers together? ie - can we simply add a 2nd terminal server computer down the road and have these two computers share the load?
What would you do?
Currently we are running a Windows 2003 Terminal Server on an HP ML330 g3 with 2x Xeon 2.4ghz, 4gigs ram, approximately 100gigs hard drive on a SCSI Raid 5 array. We have a 2nd computer that runs Exchange server and is our data store. The Exchange computer is also our domain controller.
It's time to upgrade, but sometimes it feels like our IT provider has a bit of a one track mind. They are recommending replacing our terminal server (or Remote Desktop, whatever it's called nowdays) computer with:
2x Xeon 5550's
16gigs ram
Windows 2008 standard (with necessary TS licensing)
SAS array with 6 disks. 2 in RAID 1 for the OS & programs, 4 in RAID6 for data storage
My questions:
1. Is an evolution of our existing way of doing things (terminal server) still the best option for a firm our size? or is there something completely different out there?
2. If we stick with terminal server way of doing things is this computer going to have the oomph we need to tide us over for a few years? Obviously we can upgrade the computer as needed to squeeze some more life out of it.
3. Does it work to 'cluster' terminal servers together? ie - can we simply add a 2nd terminal server computer down the road and have these two computers share the load?
What would you do?
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