Tricky_Dicky Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 Hi all, I've only just started as ICT Technician in a large primary and I'm trying to figure out the best way of improving the system. So basically I'm asking for any opinions in regards to what hardware/software you use and how to set it up all(in a broad overview kind of way) Currently have: 1*Curriculum server - running server 2003, AD, file/print the lot basically. 3 years old and has no space left All of the switches are Cisco installed by Link2ICT(or at least through them), not happy with the config as it won't let me Ghost anything without grinding to a halt. Emails are pop3 hosted by Link2ICT I think the following would be best: New AD server File/Print server Exchange server Possibly virtual desktops What do you think? Would you do the same/different? Regards to budget, I don't really know what I have available. Hardly anything has been spent in several years and so if I go forward with it chances are I'll get it within reason. Rich
clarky2k3 Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 Could just get one 'beefy' server and run xenserver or vmware esxi or proxmox and install several virtual servers?
Tricky_Dicky Posted June 9, 2009 Author Posted June 9, 2009 Could do, but is that not a bit risky running everything on one physical machine?
TNE Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 Hi Rich welcome to the forum. Hopefully you dont mind me replying just to say that if when you have your shopping list completed you require a new Cabinet please bear us in mind. We are currently looking to put an offer together for members (possibly local to start with) where the racks will be delivered and assembled in the required position for no additional cost.
Little-Miss Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 Welcome to my world! Been in my primary school for 10 months now and im still trying to improve it. I dont think you're going to get that all at once as well as possibly paying for consumables and the day to day items. I'd start with a new AD/domain. Possibly use old server for something else?
witch Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 And mine! It doesn't matter how much has been spent in the past - most of it you can't keep so they may well not have it now. I don't think you will get funding for three servers, and in a smallish school I don't think you'll need them. I would go for as big and beefy and future-proofed as you can manage, and maybe use the old one as an exchange server? Re the switches: I'm sure you know what you need but we got confirmation of what was needed by involving the NM of the high school at the top of the pyramid - there is supposed to be an agreement whereby the larger schools help the smaller ones - I meant to say this to you, Little-Miss, as well to help bolster your argument for a new server when an external 'expert' agrees with your diagnosis of the network's problems. 1
Little-Miss Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 That's an idea Witch. I've got a guy from link2ict coming out to have a look around this afternoon. I think he's visited our school a few times over the years so is coming in to have a nose and to see what he thinks.
JOrdan01070 Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 Where in brum are you as you could pop over and see my set up if you want. 1
Duke Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 Could do, but is that not a bit risky running everything on one physical machine? Buy two and get a cheap SAN solution, then you have failover for all your servers which would give you theoretically greater reliability than just buying a four-or-so physical servers. You'd also probably get better utilisation of your hardware and easier expansion if it was planned right. However, virtualisation really isn't the answer to all problems and I'd be cautious of recommending what is essentially still an enterprise-level technology on a small network. Have you sat down and planned your storage requirements, both now and in the next 3-years (or longer if you don't get a regular budget for big upgrades)? It's definitely worth doing properly so that you don't waste money or under-spec your storage. Any idea very roughly how much budget we're talking? You might be able to get a really good deal from Sun on a matching grant for servers and discount on a cheaper SAN. How many client PCs do you have? If it's quite a lot then you might want to look at two DC/DNS servers to balance the load a bit and provide you with a little redundancy. How are you finding the Cisco switches themselves, particularly with regards to cost? Cisco are definitely one of the best switch manufacturers out there but they're also one of the most expensive. You might be able to save a lot (and spend it on servers!) by using a different provider in the future. We use primarily Allied Telesyn (fairly big site here, 70+ switches) and the last time I looked at moving to Cisco their closest switch to what we use was over 3 times more expensive! Cheers, Chris
Guest coquet636 Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 Could do, but is that not a bit risky running everything on one physical machine? True, but if you had another server maybe not so beefy and store backup images of the virtual machines you would have a contingency ready to rock and roll.
Tricky_Dicky Posted June 9, 2009 Author Posted June 9, 2009 Where in brum are you as you could pop over and see my set up if you want. I'm in Alum rock, that would be awesome if I could. Where are you? I've been speaking to Sun over the last few days about their 7000 series in regards to virtualisation and it looks pretty good, however I'm very keen to actually go and have a look at some in a working environment to see if it is suitable. Current load is: 1 IT suite of 30, 3 trolleys of 30 laptops(don't work,but that's another thread), about 30 classroom machines, 50 ish staff laptops and 7 shiny new mac books. We have about 700 children as it's a 3 form entry. How does that compare to other people? I didn't buy the Cisco switches so can't comment on that, they were in already and I think they will be fine once they are configured properly.
Duke Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 The S7000 is great kit and the 7110 should be able to handle that load absolutely fine. If you're looking at potentially 200-250 machine simultaneously on the network then it's worth investing in decent hardware to support the backend. We're an IT Specialist Secondary School so our setup is considerably different, but the principals are all the same I guess. If the Cisco stuff ends up working fine then no worries, but if any additional switches are coming out of your budget then be sure to compare the alternatives before buying!
dhicks Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 What do you think? Buy two cheap servers (HP and Dell do ones for around £200 each), 4 extra harddrives (750GB ones? £50 each?) and extra RAM (£200 for 8 2GB sticks, so each server can have 8GB of RAM), 2 extra LAN cards (£30 each?). So call it around £1,000 for hardware. Place the two servers in separate locations, run a standard CAT5 cable betweeen linking the extra, dedicated network cards. Install CentOS on the original harddrive of each machine, making sure to select the "virtualisation" option. Install two extra harddrives (and RAM) in each machine, set up as a RAID-1 mirrored array. Create virtual machines for your DC, print server, etc (could use Zimbra instead of Exchange if you don't feel like paying money for an email server), mirror them to the second physical machine via DRBD. You'll probably need to buy two copies of Windows Server 2008 Enterprise Edition, which will allow you to run four virtual machines per license - that's around £300 at education prices. So that's somewhere under £2,000 (don't forget CALs for Windows client machines). -- David Hicks
TechSupp Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 Love to see the justification to spending on that little lot (I know it would make sense to spend it before you ask) I too work in a couple of primaries and money is scarce at the moment for anything but essential ICT.
JOrdan01070 Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 im in bordesley village directly behind the blues ground we are only a 2 from entry school but we have a childrens centre and a day nursery.
apoth0r Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 As you are reasonably new to the school I would suggest noting down what is actually used within the school and base your purchases around that, with slightly more extreme scenarios. Find out what the ICT action plan is for your school, what has been purchased before, what they wanted to purchase before you arrived and negotiate accordingly. It's far too easy to go into a school with your own agenda, but it really is about compromising with the head (and the budget) to come up with a solution that benefits everyone, especially the children. I don't believe in buying expensive SAN solutions for a primary school, even if it is fairly large, a standard backup would be fine to tape and would save money for exciting technology implemented elsewhere in the school. You have to remember primaries aren't like secondary's and cannot justify buying rackmounts and amazing 'behind the scenes technology'. The teachers and kids want something in front of them, to see the real benefits of using the technology rather than being an end user. (as do the parents from past experience) Perhaps go through the Becta self evaluation stuff before buying anything, come up with an agreed 2/3 year action plan and go from there. Just don't dive in! 1
Tricky_Dicky Posted June 9, 2009 Author Posted June 9, 2009 apoth0r, You have raised some excellent and very valid points. It wasn't a SAN in particular I was looking for, it was just one of the options I came across. The main things are large volume storage as more and more of our children are creating photos, videos and music. I have a teacher who is very keen on setting up podcasting and the school as a whole is being led by a head teacher who is very forward looking. The last thing I want to do is spend X amount now and find out in 12 months time that I've got to spend X again. I would rather spend X+X.5 now and have the system to support the school for the next 3 years. Please keep the ideas coming, especially personnel examples as they are really helping. Rich
ChrisWdnuk Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 Hi TD, I suppose you need a clear idea of your requirements and an even better handle on your budget. Then approach a few companies and discuss whether they can provide what you need, for what you can spend. I'm guessing you won't have the recurring budget for VMware so perhaps would be best looking at open-source virtualization (sic) solutions. It is possible to make a large difference to your systems capability without spending a massive amount. If you can live without flashy front end software to handle most things (and believe me, you can ), you can find a lot of your IT budget dripping back to you, as you won't need to pay the flashy yearly license fees either. Same goes for SANs. Sure, they can be expensive but a workable SAN solution needn't cost an unfeasible amount of money - even for a small primary school. Talk a lot with people who know, maybe discuss with those who build (and not simply resell) the types of systems you require. The main thing though is to be very clear on what you need right now and for your forseeable future requirements. Get a clear idea of what is on offer against those requirements and budget and then sit down and make an informed choice. Best regards, Chris
dhicks Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 It wasn't a SAN in particular I was looking for I'd agree with apoth0r in that a SAN would probably be overkill in your situation. The main things are large volume storage You can get single disks up to around 2TB now, although those cost a bit of a premium. Also, I know the cheap Dell servers (T105) will take four harddrives if you can do without a CD drive. You could fit four disks per server - one for the OS and three in a RADI-5 array. You could also add some more harddisks and re-use your old server as a plain file/backup server. For backup I'd get a self-contained eSATA-connected hardware RAID-1 enclosure (I have one at home, around £100 each with no disks in) to connect to your backup server, that way to backup you simply take one harddrive out and swap a new one in. -- David Hicks
Mandy Posted June 9, 2009 Posted June 9, 2009 As an official Sponsor of Edugeek I would be more than happy for you to give me a call/email to discuss your requirements. We are partnered with all major manufacturers and have specialist in every area - networking, servers, AV, BECTA installtions, IWB etc... Give me a call or email if you would like me to compile a quote and/or technical information/alternatives!
Tricky_Dicky Posted June 12, 2009 Author Posted June 12, 2009 I'd agree with apoth0r in that a SAN would probably be overkill in your situation. You can get single disks up to around 2TB now, although those cost a bit of a premium. Also, I know the cheap Dell servers (T105) will take four harddrives if you can do without a CD drive. You could fit four disks per server - one for the OS and three in a RADI-5 array. You could also add some more harddisks and re-use your old server as a plain file/backup server. For backup I'd get a self-contained eSATA-connected hardware RAID-1 enclosure (I have one at home, around £100 each with no disks in) to connect to your backup server, that way to backup you simply take one harddrive out and swap a new one in. -- David Hicks Having spent the last week looking long and hard at just what we have and what we need I'm getting more inclined to follow your advice David. The quote for the SAN came in and I'm sure if you fully utilize the speed and capabilities then it's an amazing piece of kit but after spending some time with the teachers and kids and seeing what is actually used I just don't think it is necessary. I think spending a few pounds on a decent large simple file storage server, a new AD and then Exchange is going to be the way to go. Quick one on hard drives: Everyone seems to go for crazy fast and relatively small SAS drives now, for what I need should I just buy normal large SATA drives on a RAID6 configuration? Cheers for all your input guys, nice to know there is support before I start crying. Rich 1
dhicks Posted June 12, 2009 Posted June 12, 2009 I think spending a few pounds on a decent large simple file storage server, a new AD and then Exchange is going to be the way to go. Why bother paying for an email server? I've never seen what people see in Exchange. What does it do? Everyone seems to go for crazy fast and relatively small SAS drives now, for what I need should I just buy normal large SATA drives on a RAID6 configuration? You could use Western Digital VelociRaptors - SATA interface but 10,000RPM (normal SATA drives generally run at 7,200RPM, SAS drives generally run at 15,000RPM) and larger capacity for less money than your average SAS drive. -- David Hicks
Tricky_Dicky Posted June 12, 2009 Author Posted June 12, 2009 Why bother paying for an email server? I've never seen what people see in Exchange. What does it do? David Hicks Have you used Exchange before? The main reason for going for it is the use of shared calenders and resources. It also allows excellent mailing lists and controls. There are loads more reasons, but I'm just not that happy with the current POP email setup, it doesn't provide any functionality. I'll have a look at the Raptors, would you recommend anywhere in particular for them? Rich
apoth0r Posted June 12, 2009 Posted June 12, 2009 Have you thought about using the LEA email based system considering you have already paid for it in your broadband fee's? Might be worth looking into, saving even more money? Not sure on what Birmingham uses as a provider but EMBC certainly do provide that service.
Tricky_Dicky Posted June 12, 2009 Author Posted June 12, 2009 We already use the BGFL service. Would it be possible that there are different levels of service available do you think instead of just basic POP?
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now