jinx4275

Great, thanks, this gives me a direction to go in. Funny enough I've just started looking into spiceworks. Previously no running backup at all, I've already taken 'adhoc' steps to sort this out at the moment, working on setting up a permanent strategy.

OK, thanks, I definitely intend to have the server running only its server roles. I have the same issue with all sorts of software unlicensed but I am sorting through this at the moment. They have OEM client software in terms of XP Pro, but however do have volume licensing for MS Office 2003 . These are the fundamentals at the moment. Unfortunately they want to maintain a separate network for office admin here and have a special arrangement with the County with 2 broadband connections so at present my work is primarily on the curriculum side of things. This was all done before my time so I'm letting sleeping dogs lie so to speak. When I manage a complete audit, I'll lay it out plainly I reckon, although as diplomatically as possible, lol. They will definitely need to replace pc and other hardware at some point, the backbone here is still 10/100 throughout the school. At least 'll be busy for a long time yet to come. Thanks for the advice folks, much appreciated.

We will continue using XP pro for clients and Server 2003 SP2 for the server. Not ideal I know but this is all I have. This server was used in the admin network (thank goodness separate from the curriculum network) and is being replaced by an upgraded server running MS Server 2008 (pre-budgeted before my humble beginnings here). I am being given the old server with licensed server 2003 SP2 and will be obtaining valid CALS for the client machines at this stage since we can get them well priced from our local County Council. The only reason the server is being replaced is because they are upgrading ahead of time in order to maintain compatibility with SIMS software and chose to replace the whole machine (i'm happy since I gain something for the curriculum) so the 'old' server is quite well spec'd.

Hi, I'm new to the forum so hello everyone. I've recently started at a primary school as an IT tech with a relatively small network of 60 to 70 workstations running XP Pro and a single linux server serving the curriculum and acting as a DC, DHCP and file server. The machines are 7 years old now and not been cared for at all in over a year so apart from a multitude of problems I am trying to deal with in trying to 'keep them going' until a budgetary review (a longish way off) I want to redesign the network. I am (in the very near future) being giving an perfectly acceptable Dell PowerEdge machine with Server 2003 SP2 and my plan is to have this to host the network. I prefer MS Server 2003 because I want to implement Group policy, set up basic file shares (teacher / student), remotely deploy software , image pc's across the network, manage users and groups, etc all from a common interface. The current linux setup is dubious. Quite honestly each time I add a user account all the computers 'fall' off the domain and I have to manually rejoin them so I have a constant headache, haha. At present all computers technically need a reformat which I have to do 1 by 1 and obviously takes forever and a proverbial day. Any suggestions of a basic design in terms of layout? Is 1 server sufficient to do the above? Do I need a second machine set up for redundancy? I'll consider the structure of the AD at a later stage, at the moment I am just wanting to get an idea of a basic topology in terms of client /server numbers. Sorry if this is confusing folks. Will gladly clarify any missing details. Take care