IT Infrastructure Refresh

lchristmas · 14 Oct 2016 at 16:20

Hi guys,

Looking for some ideas and inspiration here. Here is the current arrangement I am working with;

HQ Office in SE Asia (50 Users):
 40mb Dedicated Internet Connection
 4mb MPLS connection to new office
 All servers are physical (5+ years old)
 20 TB HP EVA SAN (90% capacity, 4 years old)
 Windows Server 2003, Exchange 2003

Secondary Office in UAE (30 Users):
 200mb Internet Connection
 2mb MPLS connection to HQ
 Windows Server 2012 Domain, file and print server
 VMware ESXi 6.0

I'm currently working on a plan to improve things at both offices and whilst some options are simple to decide, I am undecided on the network connection.

The MPLS is too slow, and even a site to site VPN is quicker for simple file access etc. I'm looking to significantly improve matters, but also try and save some money too. I want to also scope for some redundancy too.

The SAN needs replacing (will implement at both ends), and I will invest in a virtual infrastructure consistent at both ends too (VMWare or Hyper V?)

As part of this, I want to improve the exchange environment and also make skype for business available.

Ideally, I don't want to go down the cloud computing route as the business wants to keep things in house.

Oh, and I have a budget of around $500k to refresh all this (including hardware, software, licensing and maintenance.

Would be great to hear peoples thoughts and suggestions from experience.

Cheers

Caged · 14 Oct 2016 at 21:51

Both your two posts so far have been asking for advice for how to do IT for a multinational company. If you have questions about individual products or approaches to solving a problem then start a thread and ask for input, but you're asking people to design you an infrastructure refresh free of charge.

Spend some of your $500k with a VAR on some consultancy, it will be worth it. Especially as nobody on here is going to be able to provide a portfolio of reference sites to prove they know what they are talking about, because of the nature of semi-anonymous internet posting.

What I will say is that you're focusing on the tech - speccing a new virtual environment, deciding you need a new SAN etc. Make a list of requirements at each location, and note any requirements that are common to both. Then start trying to solve issues rather than building up a list of new stuff.

MissChief · 14 Oct 2016 at 22:02

What Caged said. Spend some money and get a proper consultant in. It may seem like a lot of money but it will save you loads in the long run.

lchristmas · 15 Oct 2016 at 11:07

Hi guys,

Thanks for the advise, and i completely appreciate that my 2 posts on here have been about similar things.

I'm not asking for someone to give me all the answers, thats impossible given the information and variables that we all work in.

What I thought I could do was come on here and bounce some ideas around. The above is a request from a friend, and whilst i have implemented similar things in the past i've not had the need to recently, so thought I could post on here posing those types of questions, and seeing what other people are doing for their network connectivity between remote offices and also a bit about their infrastructure.

There is no agenda here its merely asking around to see what others do to get food for thought. I'm sure the friend in question seek consultancy as I did (with my first post on here) but i really see no harm in coming onto a tech forum for some ideas from the real world.

Has anyone connected two offices between the middle east and SE Asia?
If so what route did you go down? MPLS, DMVPN, Cloud etc
What SAN's are people using these days? IBM, EMC, Netapp etc
What virtual infrastructure are people swaying towards?

Regardless of the entire solution, I'm just curious here.

No problems if this isn't the place to come for advice and apologies if thats the case.

lchristmas · 15 Oct 2016 at 11:12

Caged said:
but you're asking people to design you an infrastructure refresh free of charge

Hopefully I cleared this up, but its not the case at all.

In my first post I clearly said "Would be great to hear peoples thoughts and suggestions from experience."

That isn't in any way asking for someone to design an infrastructure refresh for me is it?

I appreciate you have 1000's of posts on here and I have 2, but I still think what i'm asking is fair enough, and i do appreciate your feedback following that.

Caged · 15 Oct 2016 at 13:13

I think you need to break this down further and start up threads for discussion of invidual points. Your need for connectivity between the two sites seems to be the most important, so figure out the requirements for each site (local Internet breakout as well as inter-site), and any countries that you might expand to in the medium-term so you can get a provider that covers them all. You may want to consider ExpressRoute availability for future expansion into Microsoft's cloud services, even if that's just to enable Skype as a hybrid service.

Once you've found some providers then I'm sure people will be more than willing to help you with any questions that need asking or telling you who to avoid.

ov_sjo · 16 Oct 2016 at 09:30

Additional to the comments above, if you/friend wants to do this in a professional way then start by..

+ Creating a problem statement for each of your issues
+ Create a list of wants and needs (categorise them as such)
~ Look at producing a requirements spec

Once you have this you can start to investigate solutions, however it's a really good idea as above to have a consultant/architect involved so they can look at the bigger picture.