recommendations for server class hardware

[skisteven1]

Hi all,

I'm sysadmin for a small not-for-profit with about 10 employees +2 sysadmins (we're part time). We will soon have the opportunity to purchase new hardware with a 1-time budget, so I'd like to do things right. Currently all of our services and servers are a hodgepodge and provided by desktop class machines that we've scraped together. I'd like to change that in the future.

I see two possible scenarios (and would like your advice on which is better)

1) 1 linux file server, 1 windows application server (ie. remote desktop) -- also serves as backup space for the file server -- may also run exchange, and a couple of those linux-based Linksys routers running firewall and wireless

2) 2 identical, really beefy servers, each running VMware. Inside of VMware, we'd have an exchange/windows server, a linux server, etc. Virtual machine hard disks would be mirrored on both machines so that if one goes down, we could always bring up all services on the other machine.

What do you think of the different setups? What kind of hardware do you think we'll need? Here's what I was tossing around:

1x dual core proc, ~2Ghz. Opteron or Core2 (without starting a flaming war, any thoughts on which?)

2-4 GB ram (leaning towards 4, especially for the VM scenario)

2x250GB drives, maybe RAID mirroring.

Server class or workstation class machine (dell or HP, probably)

How many NIC's?

....I think that's about it, but I'll keep you posted.


Any advice you can offer would be most appreciated. I've worked in a Datacenter environment before (iLo, blades, etc -- the whole shebang), but never actually had to determine server requirements. I'm not really sure what I'd need to pull this off.

Please let me know what you think.

 

[jpeyton]

Budget?

 

[skisteven1]

Originally posted by: jpeyton
Budget?

As necessary. Cheaper is better, but something that will be good for at least two years. I'm currently looking somewhere between $2-3k/piece

 

[nweaver]

If you truly want "enterprise" stuff, don't build, buy. Dell servers + 3 year warranty is going to be much much better long term, I promise.

For enterprise class stuff, You should look at: Raid (1 is the best bang for buck imho), backup device (tape drive),

You should be able to get a Dell server + SBS server, which gives you Exchange + CALS for a decent deal. That is the best option for what you want. Big question is what utilization are you going to see? If these are low usage machines, either virtualize or consolidate.

 

[JackMDS]

skisteven1, do not take it personally, but the rule is that network people that build their own server for professional work, are good enthusiasts and bad network people.

 

[skisteven1]

Sorry guys, maybe I didn't make this clear. I have no intention of building the servers. ...None.

I'm looking to buy from probably Dell or HP -- I'm just looking for some help in deciding what kind of specs to get for the machines. I will be installing and configuring and doing software, but want the machines to come pre-built. My question is essentially, "how much power do i need?".

Thanks for any advice you can offer.

 

[nweaver]

Define the specific roles and requirements, such as:

File server: Some sort of disk redudency (RAID) and backup, need at least 1 bajilllion pentabytes
Mail server: taking some load off the gmail servers, so I anticipate eleventy hundred emails a minute
Network services: DHCP, DNS, AD. AD will have only 3 members.


etc....

 

[skisteven1]

~10 users.

DNS/DHCP will be run by a seperate router.

file server: I imagine about 500GB in raid 1. Thoughts? (that's plenty of space, i'm asking more about the raid 1)

windows, I have 2 options.

windows option 1) AD w/~10 users. Exchange, OWA, roaming profiles. Up to 3 concurrent sessions via RDP. Users (remote sessions) generally doing things like web, outlook, office, etc. Potential to run SQL server -- 1 database, 2-3 concurrent connections, not very big.

windows option 2) outsource email (err, gmail), NO AD, just 3 remote sessions as described above. Same with SQL.

And of course in the OP, I described the possibility of either having 2 seperate machines with no failover, or else 2 host machines running everything virtualized (by backing up the virtual machines to the opposite host, I could bring them back up pretty quickly).



Thanks for being so patient with me everyone... This is kind of new ground for me.

 

[RebateMonger]

My "normal" recommendation for a ten-person office would be a commercial (Dell or HP) server with SBS 2003 installed. Then I'd have at least three removable SATA hard drives used for rotating backup, keeping at least one drive offsite at all times.

Virtualization is a nice concept, but for what you are looking at, it'd be something I'd reserve for later. Properly maintained and on good hardware, SBS 2003 is REALLY reliable. I mean REALLY, REALLY reliable. Even if you DID have to do a bare-metal restore, you can bring the OS back up in a few hours with the built-in NTBackup.

The recommended setup uses two NICs. The External NIC can be almost anything, since it's typically connecting to a T1 or slower. 2GB of ECC RAM would be adequate. If you want to run Virtual Server inside of SBS, then use 4GB.

I'd NEVER use a separate router for DNS or DHCP. It can be problematic and there's no reason to do it. SBS will take care of DHCP and DNS automatically with zero setup on your part. Server-based DNS and DHCP works REALLY well, is virtually maintenance free, and has tons of added features you won't get from typical small-office routers.

Use a two-disk SATA RAID 1 for simplicity. I'd set up the entire Server as a single partition (C. Get large (500GB) SATA drives for the removable backup drives.

I only use Intel (Core2 or Xeon) processors. It's not that I dislike AMD processors. It's that I dislike the CHIPSETS that they use. C2Duo is dirt cheap nowadays. It's 100% "compatible". I hate fighting stupid non-Intel chipset compability issues. It's not worth it to me. YMMV.

SBS 2003 will give you integrated Exchange, SharePoint (CompanyWeb), Remote Access, Server Monitoring, Automated Backups and backup monitoring, and a zillion other nice featues that come pre-configured out-of-the box.

 

[nweaver]

Originally posted by: RebateMonger


I only use Intel (Core2 or Xeon) processors. It's not that I dislike AMD processors. It's that I dislike the CHIPSETS that they use. C2Duo is dirt cheap nowadays. It's 100% "compatible". I hate fighting stupid non-Intel chipset compability issues. It's not worth it to me. YMMV.
.

this is very true. I'm not an intel fanboy (and actually have 2 amd rigs at home) but for work, it's Intel stuff on Intel chipsets. It saves me so much time, the extra cost is worth it.

 

[nweaver]

RebateMonger is right, SBS sounds right for this.