My small technology company is relocating. We are completely rebuilding our network and server topology prior to moving to the new location. We have operated a specialized online service since 1983 that controls building automation systems at 140 client locations (large institutional buildings). We have sophisticated internal IT software and hardware engineering resources.
We bought seven SBS books from Amazon looking for an easy primer and guide for our first SBS installation efforts and also for other books to be used as authoritative references for later fine tuning. We have found in the past that a few days spent reading are needed to ensure an effective, low-maintenance installation of important IT infrastructure. (We use no outside services for software development or hardware maintenance and have a 1,000 volume technical library.)
We have selected this book as our SBS primer and first-time installation guide. We also liked the somewhat longer (and more theoretical) “Pro Windows Small Business Server 2003″ but found this book by Jonathan Hassel a better match (a quick and easy read) for the inexperienced software engineer on our staff who will do the grunt work on the installation. “Small Business Server 2003 Unleashed” by Neale at al. is likely to be our reference book, but it seems too difficult for the first SBS course. Two senior staffers will also read our SBS primer, so that we share a basic understanding of SBS capabilities as we plan our configurations.
The book is theoretically not very deep and does not explain well the limitations of SBS. The book is uneven in its coverage. The chapter on Active Directory (the network directory and heart of Windows networks) is poorly written, and the single domain limitation of SBS should have been properly covered here. Coverage of Exchange (part of the Standard Edition) is brief but perhaps adequate since it is well covered in many other books. SQL Server (part of the Premium Edition) receives only brief mention, but this is appropriate since SQL Server is really an application running on top of SBS with little integration with the SBS core.
It is harder to understand the absence of all but a brief mention of ISA (software firewall, part of the Premium Edition). We have found ISA to be an important part of our network topology. Failure to carefully plan the Internet connection and any router and span appliances or software that will run between SBS and the Internet can result in disasters. With SBS usually running as the gateway to the Internet, security and anti-spam problems can easily bring an otherwise faultlessly planned network to a halt. Although our internal network has been virtual unchanged for six years, we find it necessary to frequently upgrade our perimeter devices (router, firewall, Barracuda antispam) because of threats and also because of the increasing need for mobile connectivity.
In any case, this book will get you watching SBS live faster than any other, and you can grow in your knowledge from there.
Here is what we are doing.
We now have twelve servers and twenty-five workstations on a Windows 2000/2003 network with three Active Directory (Window’s network directory) trees (namespaces) in our enterprise forest. Each tree has a single domain. For the last six years we have run ISA, IIS, Exchange, and SQL Server on four separate servers and each has a backup server. We also run two domain controllers on separate servers for each of our three domains. All of the servers are very lightly loaded, and we have a very robust infrastructure to support our 7X24 operations. We run Office on all workstations together with specialized line of business applications. We are heavy Internet consumers, email users, mobile device users, Intranet users, and remote control users (using GoToMyPC).
We found that we can easily reduce our topology to a single .com namespace with a single domain as required by SBS. We intend to install SBS on a new server twice for practice and then a third time for real. Wd we will not connect the old and new internal networks at any time or migrate any of our present Active Directory or Exchange settings to the SBS installation. However, we will be remounting and running our web site and data base applications and our old email stores on SBS. The SBS box initially will be doing the duty of ten of our exiting fourteen servers; four others on abandoned domains will no longer have any function. The box will be a medium-high level Dell with 4GB of memory and raid 1 (two drives, each mirroring the other). Minimum system requirements are far below this. We are looking forward to adding VPN remote networking and RWW (Remote Web Workplace) remote-control for offsite users with the services that are bundled in SBS, rpelacing third-party solutions for this remote connectivity.
Although SBS is restricted to a single domain and 75 users, there is no limit on the number of Windows 2000/2003 servers that can run within the domain; so, as we grow, any of the server products running on SBS can be moved to a separate server after purchase of a standalone copy of the application and the necessary user/device licenses.
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