maximum number of users and computers.. server 2003

[PEO]

Just been thinking. whats the maximum number of users and computers can 1 domain controller handle?

 

just a thought

[steveg]

Depends on what else its doing really, and what yours users do. Looks like a good spec server can support about 10,000 though.

 

Microsoft Corporation

 

Steve

[srochford]

That really is a "how long is a piece of string" type question :-)

 

the article the other steve has linked to is good for basic numbers but you have to ask what else might be done by the DC. For example, will you have machine startup scripts? user logon scripts? What will the scripts do? We copy files from the netlogon share (amongst other places!) and this adds load to the DCs.

 

In reality, almost any machine you can buy today will be more than good enough - config B on that web page would be something like a 4 year old server and yet will still handle 2000 users.

 

If you have a server now and you're wondering if it's causing problems then use perfmon to get some data. Look for things like CPU usage (almost certainly low!) and disk queues (should be very low; if it's not then it suggests the disk(s) are struggling). Memory usage may be high - that's not necessarily a problem - Windows just uses RAM to cache things and does it efficiently.

[Michael]

As already mentioned there isn't really a limit and if you had thousands of users, you would have multiple domain controllers for redundancy and load balancing anyway.

 

I think it's more relevant what else the servers would be hosting - file server, print server, databases, IIS but then again none of these services require to run on a DC.

[zag]

Yep a DC takes very little resources in reality, its the fileserver you would want to worry about with that many users.

[Geoff]

Here are AD's 'hard' limits, if anyone is interested.

 

- maximum number of GPOs that can apply to a user/computer: 999

- maximum number of DNS servers in an AD-integrated zone (without manually adding the details): 850 (Windows 2000), 1300 (Windows 2003)

- maximum number of supported DCs in a given domain: 1200

- maximum number of members of a group: 5000 (Windows 2000), unlimited in Windows 2003

- maximum number of DHCP servers in a forest: 850 (Windows 2000 SP1 or RTM), unlimited (Windows 2000 SP2 or later and Windows 2003)

- maximum number of UPN suffixes that can be set through the UI: 850 (you can set more if you need to via ADSI scripts)

- maximum number of objects that can be created over the lifetime of a given DIT (i.e. the AD database on a given DC): 2 billion

 

Doubt you'll hit any of them in the average school environment/network of course.

[PEO]

cheers for that.The reason I asked is I've never seen any info in the MS books.

 

My next question

 

at the moment we have 2 dc

 

server 1 is both dc and file server

server 2 is both dc and print server

 

both the staff and student work is on server 1.

 

from my point of view if server 1 died, server 2 would let people log on but would not be able to access there work.

 

The school will be doubling in size 2010, I im thinking about keeping both DC's but having a file server for staff and one for students.

 

any comments?

[Geoff]

Yes, that's what we have here (sort of), I have:

 

2x DCs in geographically separate parts of the school (one in the IT block, one in the main school).

3x File Servers (in the main school).

1x Print Server (It's running Linux/Cups/Pykota so it'd be separate regardless of whatever else is going on) .

[PEO]

Yes, that's what we have here (sort of), I have:

 

2x DCs in geographically separate parts of the school (one in the IT block, one in the main school).

3x File Servers (in the main school).

1x Print Server (It's running Linux/Cups/Pykota so it'd be separate regardless of whatever else is going on) .

 

 

whats the 3 file servers for Geoff? 1 for staff, 1 for students, and 1 for resources?

[zag]

server 1 is both dc and file server

server 2 is both dc and print server

 

Very bad idea to have the DC and file server using the same hardware, if it failed that would be a nightmare to fix.

 

Much better to have a fast simple DC and a beefy raid'ed file server that are separate.

[Geoff]

1x Staff, 1x Pupils, 1x Applications

[ricki]

HI

 

Its not a good idea having a print server on a dc. Poor drivers will crash and cause all sorts of problems. I would suggest putting pring server on an old box and invest in another server licience.

 

Richard

[PEO]

Very bad idea to have the DC and file server using the same hardware, if it failed that would be a nightmare to fix.

 

Much better to have a fast simple DC and a beefy raid'ed file server that are separate.

 

totally agreed... Its a viglen setup, Its bee bugging me for some time. Will be suggesting to the IT coordinator that we sort it out before potential disaster

[Dos_Box]

HI

 

Its not a good idea having a print server on a dc. Poor drivers will crash and cause all sorts of problems. I would suggest putting pring server on an old box and invest in another server licience.

 

Richard

 

Hmmm. Another good job for a virtual server to do

My print server is on a DC (legacy thing) but seeing as we don't have many users here it's not really an issue. Nice project though.