First Time

As a start, go to Microsoft Site and inquire on their Small Office and Home Office Edition (SOHO) Windows 2000 Server and Professional. I understand SOHO supports up to 50 clients. Web and File Server are embedded in Windows 2000 Server Edition allyou have to do is to configure your Web and File Server on your machine running the Server OS. You can also make use of the same machine as your DHCP (by typing dcpromo on the run command).You have to purchase an Exchange Server Program for your Mail Server. You may have to install this on a dedicated machine to ease the load on your Web, File and DHCP server. I hope this will make your hands full on your project and good luck.

I recommend buying your server hardware from Dell or HP or IBM. They can all give you volume licensing information. The biggest advantage to going with one of the OEMs is support, support, support. They all have excellent support for their server products. If you have a hardware failure, they can have a technician at your site with the replacement part in hand in under four hours after you call. You do pay a little more for this, but the first time you use it, you will see that it is worth the price. I would not want anything else for mission critical servers.

With the proliferation of worms and viruses, I recommend using 3rd part software wherever you can over Microsoft products. IE, instead of Exchange, use Lotus Notes. Again, the OEMs will work with you on finding the right software for your needs.

Best of luck to you.

at this point, you need to be talking to sales folks, not us...
The Small Business Server 2000 solution mentioned above will work but it is limited to 50 users...and you will paint yourself into a corner with it, imho. It looks and smells like nt/2000 but it is not, exactly. it will pretty much work out of the box and get all the jobs done on one server box. cheap and fairly easy to deploy. but you will not learn how to administer a 2000 network with it and when you need to expand it you will have to ask for way more money to convert to 'normal' 2000 network.
develop disaster plans. server failure. internet failure. for server hardware i would go ibm or dell, and do not cheap out. how many web hits expected? who will use the site? How big will the files on the file server get? will any applications be run from the server or all from the clients. exactly how will you backup each server (e.g. IIS-web server, exchange, sql server) how long a window will you have to accomplish the backups? who will need remote access?
i would get into a ms course on designing and implementing 2000 network. develop a spec swarming with numbers. fax it to sales folks (including ms) then research what they tell you. buy clients and servers with not opening the box during their lifetime (3-4 years)in mind. security basics: public servers in dmz's, windows updates automated for clients and servers, especially os, iis, sql. virus definitions automated.
budget for future software upgrades.
what will you do for your additional test network? you'll need one...what spares should you have on hand. how long can xxx be down? (internet, web server, email, file server). get overnight-type maintenance agreements and/or spares for critical equipment

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