Small Business Solution without the cost...

HaX · 4 Aug 2008 at 22:57

My next door neighbour runs a company which requires the use of five PCs. He has recently expressed the desire to have a server to enable data to be stored and backed up centrally. Currently all data is saved onto local hard disks and the PCs are not running Operating Systems which could be joined to a domain - XP Home and Vista Home.

While building him sparkling new server running Win 2003 or 2008 is desirable, I don't think that the cost of purchasing licenses for the Server OS and then purchasing XP Pro/Vista Business licenses could be warrented for such a small organisation.

I'm thinking along the lines of purchasing a NAS box, or building a small PC and running a NAS OS on it, however would a NAS OS be capable of backing up to external media?

Curiosityx · 4 Aug 2008 at 23:11

If you purchase a reliable Small Business class server such as the HP ML115 or 310 and a copy of Windows 2003 SBS which comes with 5 cals included the cost wont be at all significant.

The major benefit of Windows SBS is that a single cal covers both the operating system, exchange and sql.

I would drop the idea of a workgroup or client os based solution as it will just cause headaches.

Stelly · 5 Aug 2008 at 07:18

Plus with most purchases of SBS server you get 10 CALs if I remember right, so if you dont have 10 members using the server at one time your sorted

Stelly

Phil99 · 5 Aug 2008 at 08:02

Stelly said:
Plus with most purchases of SBS server you get 10 CALs if I remember right, so if you dont have 10 members using the server at one time your sorted

Stelly

As far as I'm aware it's 5 CALs and the client operating system licenses aren't included. This is the case with the SBS 2003 Premium we run at work, it may have changed for 2008.

Stelly · 5 Aug 2008 at 08:16

Phil99 said:
As far as I'm aware it's 5 CALs and the client operating system licenses aren't included. This is the case with the SBS 2003 Premium we run at work, it may have changed for 2008.

sorry yes you are right, and yes I was on abotu CALs and of course the client OS licences are not included

Stelly

mdjmcnally · 5 Aug 2008 at 08:38

Probably going to get shot down in flames here but what about putting Windows Home Server onto a reasonable box.

Can attach 5+ PC's to it, you don't need to join a domain etc.

Put a proper RAID card in and don't use the Drive Extender so even though they have released the fix for the data corruption issue. You don't have to worry about the Data Corruption Issue. I can recommend the 3Ware 9650SE cards available from Overclockers.

Personally looking at what he wants then is an ideal solution as can have shared folders, along with getting the backup of the PC's to the Server as well.

I didn't see a requirement for Exchange and/or SQL so I don't see the lack of these as a loss for this scenario, and OEM is only circa£100 from overclockers,

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showp...t Windows Home Server 32-Bit - OEM (CCQ-00015)

Rough idea for hardware.

A cheap Dual Core2 CPU,
1-2Gb of RAM
Intel G33 based motherboard (has a PCI-E x16 slot) and use onbord graphics.
3Ware 9650SE SATA Raid in PCI-E x16 slot.
Samsung F1 drives in RAID5

Device Drivers are standard Win2K3 drivers so check the addons for a suitable backup solution at the WHS forums, or look at a NAS box as backup.

Just my thoughts.

Stelly · 5 Aug 2008 at 08:45

I have not really used Home Server, but does this provide such things as DHCP,DNS or RAS? The good thing about SBS server is that even though you might not need the functionality its there for future use...

Stelly

VeNT · 5 Aug 2008 at 09:19

nope no DHCP (guess their router would do it) no DNS (is prolly ditto the router) and as for RAS, WHS has somthing LIKE that but it doesn't always work.

mdjmcnally · 5 Aug 2008 at 09:49

Out of the box it expects you to use your Router/Firewall for DNS and DHCP, however there is a DHCP Server addon from the WHS Community if you really can't use the ADSL Router for this. For a small 5 PC company ADSL is what will be there for the Internet. If your ADSL Router is uPnp compatible then WHS will even connect to and configure the ADSL Router for it's requirements.

If they have more then ADSL then the cost of a proper server license and upgrading the clients to XP Pro/Vista Business wouldn't be an issue.

We are talking about 5 PC's accessing the central file server here, there need for DHCP/DNS internally can easily be handled by the ADSL Router. As the WHS gets IP via DHCP as well then the boxes are all registered in the DNS on the ADSL box so not a problem.

RAS is built into the box as standard for File Sharing and Management of the Server. Once on the WHS then you can access the local PC's as well. There is a 2Gb file limit to what can be transferred via RAS.

Perhaps if the original poster can give some details of wether the company is likely to expand, likely to want the additional features of SBS in the near future, say 12 months. Are they really likely to expand so rapidly that actually require the Internal DNS/DHCP. I don't see them all of a sudden bringing in Email Server, Intranet, Database Server etc if they don't even have the Central Storage at the moment.

Whilst I normally wouldn't suggest a product like this for Business Use, from the description given by the original request then really the IT in this company is just like you would find in a home so it makes it suitable for this scenario.