Server Hardware & Software Advice

This section won’t attempt to explain every technology in detail but will try to outline software & parts that are useful in education.

• Software
• Operating System
• NT4 This is an old operating system that has been superseded.
• Windows 2000 Server. This system is capable of managing Win XP computers on a network but has been superseded
• Windows 2003 Server. This is the latest Microsoft server management operating system for servers. It comes in different flavours but all of them are capable of managing networks with XP Pro clients. Avoid purchasing Windows 2003 Small Business Server as this has a client limit of 75 computers and printers. If you exceeded this you would have to have your server upgraded.
• Hardware
• Hard Drives
• Buy scsi hard drives as these are faster and a little more reliable.
• Buy as much storage as you can afford and make sure there is space to install more hard drives if you need them. (After three years I have often found myself needing to install an extra hard drive)
• Speeds of 10,000 or 15,000 rpm are more common in servers (faster the better)
• Mirrored Drives. Your data is mirrored, copied onto two drives These will take up more space as it uses two hard drives but mean that if one drive fails the other will take over with no loss of data or time spent restoring the data via a backup. This is not a replacement for a backup device.
• Hot swappable drives. This allows you to remove a drive very easily to use it elsewhere. I have yet to hear of a school that has needed this technology.
• Processors
• Faster the better.
• Make sure it is an Intel processor (Xeon are the best and are designed for servers use)
• You can purchase servers with more than one processor. These second processors are not backups but designed to share the network processing tasks. In a busy network these can be useful. Windows 2000 & 2003 is designed to work with multiple processors. (More is better but not essential)
• Backup Devices
• Make sure you have a good backup device on your system. Dat72 and Sony AIT are examples of quality backup devices.
• Just as important is the tapes. Replace them yearly and make sure you have cleaning tapes. Don’t skimp on this as it could be the difference between restoring all your data easily in the event of hardware failure and losing all your data. (personally I have experienced both and the stress and anger caused by data loss as well as the loss of confidence in the network can be very damaging)
• Make sure your backup device can restore all the data on your hard drives when they get full.
• Network Card
• This should be a 1000mhz card. There is no point buying a good server and then creating a bottleneck for your data of a slow network card.