Server help - noob advice

[AHarvey]

Hi,

I am just starting out on my MS server journey and studying via the Virtual Academy but I've an issue at work and could do with some advice from those with experience.

The call centre at work uses old laptops, running win 7 upwards, home and pro editions.

They are finally upgrading to desktops, however, the problem we have is that every 3-4 weeks they like to move everyone around. 26 desks for advisors + maybe 4 for management but they don't really move.

I'm aware a that I would have to use Win Server 2012/2016 Standard but the problem is I have no idea what kind of hardware that would need to manage that number of users?

Can anyone give me a system spec + price for what would allow me to create roaming profiles for everyone?

 

[Xez]

Do you have some more background? Is this server going to be purely a file server and be added to an existing network with Active Directory already installed or is an entire new server that is to fulfil several roles as this will ultimately determine as to the system specification.

I'm surprised if they all like to move around that a terminal server with thin clients wasn't considered as this would allow people to move far more easily without the hassle of configuring roaming profiles and the problems that this can cause when not configured correctly.

 

[Vince]

30 users, assuming that you are running AD, DHCP & DNS you could get away with next to nothing tbh. Each DC in our domain of which we have 4 has a spec of 1vCPU, 2GB Memory and a SAN back end. We service 5 or 6 times the number of users you have and it performs a treat. If the server is virtual there is no reason not to start small and scale it up. Clearly if you are looking at an SBS config then this isn't nearly enough resource.

 

[AHarvey]

Call centre people have access to email (thunderbird) via a cpanel system, Chrome for a couple of websites they need, VOIP software for calls and a LibreOffice/adobe reader. That's it.

They have a tiny amount of emails delivered each month and maybe a couple of spreadsheets.

The main areas that would need covering is the ability to have roaming profiles, however, it would be nice to to restrict access to internet and set certain group rules (backgrounds etc).

I had no say in the new PC's, worse, I think they are on lease from PC World Thin clients was my idea as well, I even had it all running over a RasPi at home without any issue. It's all new to me but I have a basic understanding, unfortunately, the man that makes the decisions doesn't.

Getting them to fund a windows server is going to be a struggle as well, which is why I've been looking at a Samba based one to remove the cost of software making it more possible.

 

[Vince]

Sounds a lot like a small business that doesn't have buckets of cash to spend. From what you have said the server really doesn't appear to be doing a lot at all. If it were me I would scrap server standard and buy a base spec server with probably 1 or 2 sockets, 32gb of ram and a decent disk sub system. From there I would seriously consider the benefits of something unified such as small business server. Last year Microsoft released SBS 2016 which would happily serve that business and give it room to grow, you might consider looking at the upgrade path though if this is a business that is likely to grow quickly.

SBS would include some nice to have items like SharePoint Foundation server, Exchange, Enough CORE CAL licenses for growth etc but more importantly you would be able to serve your users with Mandatory Roaming profiles. SBS should offer very nice figures when it comes to the total cost of ownership, this solution has the added benefit of removing the monthly payments that they will be paying for the mailboxes as it sounds like they will be provided by whoever the business are using to serve the domain and are normally charged at between 1 and 5quid a month. With exchange on premises these would no longer be required and offer a small amount of leverage for you as well as far greater functionality for your users.

TBH there are business I have contracted in and worked with before that no matter how much sense you talk simply don't want to spend the cash. If this is the case then leave them be and don't try and force the issue.

 

[nightmare99]

Last year Microsoft released SBS 2016

I think you mean essentials, there hasn't been a proper SBS since 2011.

SBS would include some nice to have items like SharePoint Foundation server, Exchange, Enough CORE CAL licenses for growth etc but more importantly you would be able to serve your users with Mandatory Roaming profiles. SBS should offer very nice figures when it comes to the total cost of ownership, this solution has the added benefit of removing the monthly payments that they will be paying for the mailboxes as it sounds like they will be provided by whoever the business are using to serve the domain and are normally charged at between 1 and 5quid a month. With exchange on premises these would no longer be required and offer a small amount of leverage for you as well as far greater functionality for your users.

Essentials only includes the cals now and a nice dashboard, you no longer get any sort of Exchange or SharePoint. I can't see how on-prem exchange would make any real sense for this size of business, you really should be looking at hosted.

I think it has been mentioned in another thread but it would probably be a good idea to engage a managed service provider who can really spec the right solution. For a business with this many staff I would say its a good idea to get some expert advise rather than fumbling around in the dark. If something goes **** up and important data is lost do you really want it to be on your head?

 

[AHarvey]

Sounds a lot like a small business that doesn't have buckets of cash to spend. From what you have said the server really doesn't appear to be doing a lot at all. If it were me I would scrap server standard and buy a base spec server with probably 1 or 2 sockets, 32gb of ram and a decent disk sub system. From there I would seriously consider the benefits of something unified such as small business server. Last year Microsoft released SBS 2016 which would happily serve that business and give it room to grow, you might consider looking at the upgrade path though if this is a business that is likely to grow quickly.

Sadly, I wish that was the case. 150 employee's over 4 sites, a further 300 remote sales advisors. £10 mil turn over last year. heavily invested in Azure as the Tech Director loves it but that's an investment as it deals with sales directly. If it sells and makes money it's worth it, if it supports the sales or does other work it's of no importance.

Essentials from what I've read is only for up to 25 users, and we're getting 44 desktops which I think is going to cover both call centre locations. I've even considered sticking my head into a Linux Samba server purely because the more money I can save the more chance of getting it. (This is a company that doesn't have proper heating or hot running water in its toilets in the head office)

 

[AHarvey]

I think it has been mentioned in another thread but it would probably be a good idea to engage a managed service provider who can really spec the right solution. For a business with this many staff I would say its a good idea to get some expert advise rather than fumbling around in the dark. If something goes **** up and important data is lost do you really want it to be on your head?

Luckily this won't hold any sensitive or important data, its main purpose is going to be to allow hot desking. Emails etc are all provided elsewhere.

 

[Vince]

Sadly, I wish that was the case. 150 employee's over 4 sites, a further 300 remote sales advisors. £10 mil turn over last year. heavily invested in Azure as the Tech Director loves it but that's an investment as it deals with sales directly. If it sells and makes money it's worth it, if it supports the sales or does other work it's of no importance.

Essentials from what I've read is only for up to 25 users, and we're getting 44 desktops which I think is going to cover both call centre locations. I've even considered sticking my head into a Linux Samba server purely because the more money I can save the more chance of getting it. (This is a company that doesn't have proper heating or hot running water in its toilets in the head office)

Sad times, I just had a look and having had no case to use SBS for some time it appears that people are right and MS have now scrapped it, as you say with the number of users it wouldn't have done the trick anyway. Depending on the type of business, nightmare might be right and offloading as much as you can to hosted services might be the way forward. It depends on how you business likes to spend money (Opex vs Capex) In the line of work and business I work for this is absolutely not an option so we have masses (£2.5mil in last 5 years) of back end infrastructure and a massive VMWare and MS estate across multiple sites. This is for a business that employs about the same number of people as the business you mention with around the same turnover.

I think if it was me I would approach whoever it is who holds the purse strings and get some sort of commitment on a spend, when you know how much cash you might have to spend you can then build your infrastructure around that.

 

[Quartz]

Can anyone give me a system spec + price for what would allow me to create roaming profiles for everyone?

You would be better advised to create mandatory profiles and lock down the PCs so that the desktop experience is the same no matter which PC the call centre staff use. However, once you switch to a server-based solution, you need to think about the wider ramifications - Active Directory, Group policies, business continuity, server side security, backups, virtualisation, noise, etc. You'll need not one but two physical servers (in case one fails), and how far down the rabbit hole you go depends upon your ingenuity, your skill, and your budget. A quick and dirty solution is two small servers each running Server 2016 providing mandatory profiles.

I'd take the opposite approach to @Vince and figure out what I want to do and cost it up, then write up a business proposal for my boss.

 

[Armageus]

If budget is tiny, then don't be afraid to buy refurbed servers rather than buying new - server hardware *rarely* fails (normally hard drives that do). A lot of ex-corporate refurbs are still done on time based refreshes (e.g. over 3 years old gets replaced anyway), so can be easy to pick up decent hardware.

Where I work we are in a similar ballpark staff and turnover wise, when the previous IT Manager left a few years ago, I made the decision to move from what was 3 "small business style" tower servers (that were all bought brand new and had run for 4 years anyway), to a whole rack of refurbed HP DL360's and DL380's - G5s and G6s, which are still going strong, offer plenty of performance, and we can afford to keep numerous spares for them due to how cheap they are. Biggest costs arguably are Server Licensing costs - although luckily our parent company absorbs most of that under their volume license agreement.

Only area I didn't buy refurbed kit for was our database servers, as needed a very specific spec, and wanted as much longevity/reliability from them.

 

[Vince]

I'd take the opposite approach to @Vince and figure out what I want to do and cost it up, then write up a business proposal for my boss.

And this is exactly the right way to do it, however where money is an issue there is no point writing a massive document and spending huge amounts of time on something only to be told straight off the bat that budget will not allow it. Whatever you decide to do Ill be interested to hear how it all goes so please keep us up to date on how you go about this.

 

[Quartz]

And this is exactly the right way to do it, however where money is an issue there is no point writing a massive document and spending huge amounts of time on something only to be told straight off the bat that budget will not allow it.

Indeed, but that shouldn't prevent the OP from spending some time and creating a brief document and plan briefly showing the benefits with cost and time estimates.

 

[Quartz]

If budget is tiny, then don't be afraid to buy refurbed servers rather than buying new - server hardware *rarely* fails (normally hard drives that do). A lot of ex-corporate refurbs are still done on time based refreshes (e.g. over 3 years old gets replaced anyway), so can be easy to pick up decent hardware.

This is a very good point.

 

[Vince]

Indeed, but that shouldn't prevent the OP from spending some time and creating a brief document and plan briefly showing the benefits with cost and time estimates.

Absolutely not, its funny you say this as when I started where I am now running this team, which is some 5 years ago now, I had to write Prince 2 style documents and workflow that could take an absolute age to get even simple stuff done. As time went on the business grew more confident in my teams ability, as that confidence grew so did both the budget which they decided to hand over. Fast forward to 8 months ago when I was working on business continuity plans and decided that what we needed to buy was a 2 metric ton 3 phase 42u HPe UPS along with IP based PDU's and all the trimmings. It was somewhere in the region of 100k to purchase and required 3 phase power to be run into our comms room as well as the entire floor of the comms room to be reinforced and the PID document, well that was an email with a jpeg of cheezburger cat with a caption to go alongside. Lets just say things are much easier these days and we have some amazing infrastructure for the size of firm.