Advice on Exchange Server Hardware

[johnv]

Hi, I have been asked by my Head to switch our staff email (approx. 100 users) to Exchange Server. I have no experience of Exchange and was hoping someone could advise me on the following:

 

what spec server I would need?

How much RAM?

How much Hard disk space?

What software do I need?

What is required for the staff to access from any internet connection?

 

Basically as much info on exchange as possible!!!

 

Thanks

[jamesreedersmith]

Search the threads - this has been discussed many many times.

[glennda]

what spec server I would need?

we use hp dl380 g5 dual quad core x64

 

How much RAM?

ours has 8gb but exchange will use as much as you give it

How much Hard disk space?

we have about 1tb in ours

What software do I need?

Exchange (o7/10 requires x64)

os

outlook or something like that for opening etc

What is required for the staff to access from any internet connection?

decent internet connection, come with owa (outlook web access) just need to set up a website using iis ours is behind our isa server.

 

we have two of the above serving around 1500 users but would def recommend atleast quad core and as much ram as you can afford

[pete]

I'd use the sizing guides for 2007 as a starting point. You Had Me At EHLO... : Exchange 2007 Mailbox Server Role Storage Requirements Calculator

 

For 100 users, any entry-level server (64bit cpu, dual psus, decent disks/raid controller and warranty) with sufficient ram (4GB min, 8gb is cheap), a pair of spindles for OS + logs and another pair for the database would do you fine.

 

Is the requirement likely to expand beyond 100 users in the medium term? i.e will the head ever turn around and say "let's give the kids access too?".

 

Here we run ~1,000 users on a PE2950 with 12GB of ram and 15K SAS disks split into a pair of spindles for OS, another pair for logs and a third pair for data, but that's way overkill for your current needs.

[KK20]

our exchange server (2003) is a dual 2.8 xeon with 2g ram on x86. Hardware raid card with 8 72g 15k drives. This setup is ancient by modern terms but runs perfectly fine for 500 users. It is also our print server running print manager plus (SQL on a different server) and our general shared resource drive too. Sure the cpu usage is 70% most of the time but everything works just fine (solarwinds is permanently in the yellow on CPU utilisation but it rarely hits red). 2g of RAM would make this a fine backup server (which is what it will become)

 

I plan on upgrading to an 8g ram, quad core over the summer and putting x64/2008 and exchange 2007 on it. I'll see what "europc" have in stock rather than hunt for a certain spec.