Windows Forum

Ask something
Discussion Locked

Upgrading an office to win2k

0 helpful
9 replies

by m.r.chambers

Closed to new repliesThis discussion is closed. It stays readable, but it takes no new replies.

I have an office of 10 workstations running win95, and a server running NetWare 3.12. The server is a P133, 128MB RAM, and 10GB HDD. This is a very old network. I need to upgrade to win2k Pro on 20 workstations (with room for expansion to 30), and win2k Server on the Server.

The official min systems reqs for win2k Server are P133, 2GB free HDD, 256 MB RAM. However, bearing in mind that MS seem to think min reqs meen "Yes, you can run it on this system, but you can't run anything else!", I think I should upgrade the Server as well as the workstations. What I don't know is, what would be a good configuration for the new server?

It will need to serve as: A print server, a DB server (a large DB, accessed frequently), file server, domain controller, and will probably have a large mapping package on it as well, accessed by engineers (this is a civil engineering firm) from time to time.

Also, does anyone have any general suggestions for a good upgrade strategy? For example, prices, liscensing, vendors (preferably in Australia), network specs, etc.

I know this is a bit vague, but I just want some general ideas/guidelines, not specific solutions.

Thanks.

9 replies

by ken howard

First let me note that you should not bring up a Win2k domain without at least 2 domain controllers. The Directory Service (AD) can be unstable in a single DC environment and if it goes down, you are sunk. I would bring up 2 servers put DNS, DHCP, File serve, Print server and the mapping package on the first DC. Put only WINS and the Database on the second. I would spend less on two smaller servers, rather than spending more on a single DC.

The PC's should probably have at least 512 MB of RAM, 1GHz processor and a min of 4-6 GB system partition. Microsoft claims a 2 Gig partition works, but it is not even big enough to install Service Pack 2.

Once you have brought these up, you should monitor the DC's and the network for bottlenecks (although with only 20 clients, that is unlikely).

Best of luck...

by shanghai sam

First off, the workstations: I would do a wipe and load. I am not a fan of the upgrade at all. Copy all of the user settings and documents to the network, fdisk and format, install WIN2000 Pro, bring back down the user settings and documents. Make sure to make the users "Power Users" and not local Administrators. Hardwarewise you will want as much CPU as you can afford ( at least a PII-350 ) and as much RAM as you can afford ( at least 128MB ). Hard Drive should be at least 2GB ( would suggest in the 4GB to 8GB range ).

The Server: If you can swing it, go with two DCs. You can run a WIN2000 Server domain with only one DC but I would not suggest doing that. RAM should be in the 512MB range. CPU should be in the PII-450 to PIII-800 range. HDD space would need to increase. Consider some sort of redundancy. At the very least go for a mirror situation. You can even use ATA-100 HDDs for this. Adaptec, AMI and Promise have ATA-100 Raid adapters. Go for more drive space

Keep the DB and the Mapping Application on different servers. Put DNS on one ( same as the mapping application ) and DHCP on the other ( same as the data base ). WINS may or may not be necessary. If you will have all WIN2000 computers ( server andclient ) it may not be necessary ( depends on some apps that may still need NBT service ). Make either one a print server ( probably the one with the mapping application ).

You do not mention routers/switches at all. I would suggest that you gowith at least 10/100 Switches ( stay away from hubs ).
HTH,

Cary

by jpave

I generally agree with the last 2 answers but in addition to the configuration info. you should add a second hard drive to each of the 2 domain controllers for the system files. You will see the reccomendation at install of win2k server. Also use Advanced server as it has some better stuff you can use when you need it.

by champ

I agree with the first two answers but I do have some other concerns you might want to keep in mind. First only install advanced server if you are going to have a server with more than two CPUs in it. Second, more RAM is better than more processing power on the database server. Third, make sure you bring AT LEAST one Active Directory server up BEFORE bringing up the clients. Thus, you can create your users and shares as well as home directories before clients need to access them. Fourth, if you can afford it use SMS to push software to the clients instead of spending days and days installing software. This will also pay off later (this will also require owning SQL server but may work with other DBMSs, not sure). Lastly, get to know policy editor before upgrading the clients and decide on a good policy and make it work; you could easily spend a day determining and evaluating policies if you already know what basic guidelines should be followed. I'm agreeing that no user needs to have administrator rights, but also not saying that they should have power user status either, make that decision on your own on a user by user situation.
As a graduate student I teach labs that must implement AD and other services, one thing I'venoticed is that the fewer services runing on one computer, the easier it is to make them all work :). As a result three or four 800 MHz w/ 256 MB RAM might work better than two GigaHz or better machines with lots more RAM and disk space.
Well that's about half the things you need to consider but should get u started.

This discussion is closed to new replies.