New everything advice - or possibly keep existing - time for virtual!

[klop]

Hi all, not sure which forum is best for this, but here goes!

 

Anthony from very-pc is kindly looking into some options for us but I'd like to 'hear' your thoughts too.

 

We've a couple of Dell Poweredge 2900 III servers. They're around 8 years old now.

 

We have additional physical servers for printing, sims, FOG, spiceworks and azure (just for office 365 password replication).

 

Our two Dells are getting a little tired and there is the possibility to replace.

 

However, both have plenty of storage and RAM - although one has been crashing due to either a faulty slot or a dodgy stick of RAM. It seems to be behaving itself for the last week or so since I pulled 4 sticks out.

 

Both servers are Dell Poweredge 2900 III models. Server01 has two Xeon E5430 processors, Server02 has two Xeon E5410 processors.

 

RAM (a little bit overkill for what we currently need but we were offered an upgrade so very cheap it had to be done!);

 

Server01 has 30GB RAM – This could possibly be upped to 42GB. I had to pull four 4GB sticks out as we were having problems with this server crashing. Not sure if it was the RAM itself or the MB slots.

Server02 has 40GB RAM

 

Storage;

 

Server01

2 x 136GB SAS drives mirrored for OS

5 x 700GB SAS drives for general use using RAID 5 giving us 2.8TB

 

C: - OS - 38GB free of 136GB - 72% used

D: - File storage (home & areas) – 583GB free of 1.42TB – 59% used

E: - FOG Backups – 107GB free of 292GB – 64% used

1TB unallocated !!!

 

 

Server02

2 x 250GB SATA drives mirrored for OS

4 x 700GB SATA dries for general use using RAID 5 giving us 2.1TB

 

C: - OS – 152GB free of 250GB – 40% used

D: - ‘Shared Resources’ & WSUS – 598GB free of 976GB (WSUS cut back – needs more) – 39% used

E: - Deployment & ‘Laptop Backups’ – 332GB free of 976GB – 66% used

F: - ‘Spare/temp storage’ – 139GB free of 141GB – 2% used

 

 

We are nowhere near capacity – storage is not an issue presently although being a SEN school we do have a lot of visual evidence for pupil progress which will only grow with the possible growth in iPad use for staff.

 

Users;

Approx 250

We have 157 pupils on role aged from 5 to 16yrs. Each pupil is due to have their own login (currently our smaller Primary classes login as the class).

We have around 90 members of staff including regular supply teachers.

 

Roles etc;

Nothing fancy! Spread across the pair is the basics – AD, WSUS, etc

Laptops are ‘backed-up’ using a script at login to Server02.

Currently we use FOG for deployment but I would like to move to something newer.

Currently we use TrueCrypt for laptop encryption – again I would like to move to something like BitLocker, but our laptops are Win 7 Pro.

 

Clients;

We have approx. 120 desktops PCs, 50ish staff laptops, 30 (rarely used) netbooks and around 12 pupil laptops.

A massive 4 iPads as present but I think that number increase soon - there is a desire for all teaching staff to have one.

 

Ok, so I'd really like to move things forward and virtualise.

We are currently running Server 2008 on both servers.

 

There is the possibility of a budget available for replacement servers. However I'm a little undecided. Our pupils desktops are very old, if I replace the servers then there will almost definately be no money available to replace our classroom kit. We have seven year old projectors and Hitachi IWBs that need replacing too.

Staff laptops are getting to around 5 years old too - again they could do with replacing.

Switches and wifi aren't too bad - we're a small school and all switches are gigabit. Wireless is Ruckus and works well.

 

So, what would be your thoughts?

I'd like reliability, redundancy and recovery - oh and I've no idea about virtualisation as yet other than VMServer free that we used to create one server copy and a little I've played about with at home.

I'd like to move to Server 2012 and use Hyper V I guess?

 

Where do you house your file storage, do you create a VM with storage within? Or should we use our existing servers and buy a SAN or similar for file storage?

 

I've read a little about replication - does this work best - are we too small to need to worry about such things?

 

We're a single building so cannot house anything for a true on premises backup so we currently use RBUSS for cloud backups. I've a couple 1TB NAS boxes kicking about - could I use Veeam to backup the VMs we'd create for additional protection. But, these would then be onsite, as far away from the server cabinet as possible but obviously at risk should something happen to the whole school.

I understand MS are offering hosting for VMs, and there is the option to create VMs only paid for if used? Our budget is tiny though!

 

If I'm honest I'm not sure where to start!!

 

Thanks for reading.

[robyholmes]

My first suggestion would be to plan your upgrades from the top down. You servers should be at the top, everything comes back to them (Or at least it should) so they should be the first thing to be upgraded. Then look at network connectivity before finally moving on to workstations and end users.

 

It’s all well and good having brand new IWB's and desktops but if your servers down they’re useless.

 

As for what you buy, I would be looking at some form of shared storage and multiple host servers. You can always keep one of your youngest servers currently as a physical DC.

I’ve heard people talk about all in one systems were the host server has shared access to storage all in one chassis. No experience myself. We have two main host servers but no shared storage. It means we can’t do live transfers but I wasn’t able to start from scratch so this solution fit.

[klop]

Thanks robyholmes,

 

I think the problem is the budget probably will not stretch to two servers and shared storage - i'd be very suprised anyway.

Whereas I could buy shared storage (if that turns out to be the right option for us) and then a few bits for the class rooms, with some cash earmarked for new servers in the not too distant.

 

I know where you're coming from re servers first... just seems these two we have might just do the job for another year or so?

 

If you have two main host servers are they replicated, or are they two servers running totally different VMs? Where do you store your files?

[robyholmes]

Thanks robyholmes,

 

I think the problem is the budget probably will not stretch to two servers and shared storage - i'd be very suprised anyway.

Whereas I could buy shared storage (if that turns out to be the right option for us) and then a few bits for the class rooms, with some cash earmarked for new servers in the not too distant.

 

I know where you're coming from re servers first... just seems these two we have might just do the job for another year or so?

 

If you have two main host servers are they replicated, or are they two servers running totally different VMs? Where do you store your files?

 

I would check you can get parts for your servers. That’s the key thing if you plan on keeping them. The PSU's seem to be the first things you struggle to get and they often fail first (Hence all the stock has gone).

 

As for my hosts. I use Hyper-V with local storage, using the 'Shared nothing' replication method. As long as the servers are similar in CPU features you can setup replication on a per VM basis between the hosts. You don't get live failover, but if a host goes down you can power up the VM on the second host.

 

Backup of the VMs is done using Windows Server Backup on each host. We have a NAS (RAID5 3x 4TB) which has 2x 3TB ISCSI disks on it. Windows Server back points to this. However we don't use this for data (Which is stored on one physical and one VM). Data backup is done by Azure Backup which runs from another VM. 30 days of back to a NAS then online backup for up to 6 years.

 

PS: Also check is Server 2012 R2 is supported on your hardware, its likely not which could force you hand.