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June 28th, 2010 admin No comments

Choose One

How to choose server and transfer from old server to the new one?

We have some severs on Windows NT including domain servers (for about 20 machines), web server, email server, ftp server and the firewall. We wanted to buy a new server to combine all these existing servers into one machine. What kind of machine we need to choose (we will choose among Dell servers). What kind of operating system we need to choose (Microsoft Small Business Server) ? How to make the transition from the existing servers to the new server as smooth as possible? Thank you for your reply!

I can't give a server recommendation as it depends on too many variables (web, email, ftp traffic; file serving capacity and use; etc) which are specific to your organization.
There's always the MS guide:

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb124226.aspx

Though a Dell rep should be able to help with hardware requirements.

Unless there is some odd software you need to run on the server that is absolutely MS specific and has no suitable open source or other replacement, I would recommend Linux as an OS. Most server apps also have a Linux version or an equivalent replacement. The vast majority of distributions are freely available. It's stability, security and TCO beats MS in all but rare cases. One issue would involve support staff knowledge. The cost of a Linux tech can be higher than an MS tech, but generally there is much less for them to do in the long run as far as keeping the system maintained. The change of OS can be relatively transparent to users. Additionally, Linux is typically much easier on hardware than MS is.
Part of the reason that different NT servers were setup for specific functions was because they started becoming unreliable and required more maintenance when providing a bunch of different services on one machine. This is basically a non-issue for Linux as it (like UNIX) was designed as a multi-user multi-tasking OS from the start unlike MS OSes (although with Win2k they started getting a little better).
Windows domain and file/print sharing (samba) resources can still be used with Linux.
The Apache web server, an ftp server, a mail server, and firewall are all included in most Linux distributions. Though if you use Exchange server, you may want to consider the Zimbra mail system which can replace Exchange and work with existing Outlook clients.

The Xandros distribution of Linux (which does have added features for which they charge) includes migration utilities.

http://www.linux-watch.com/news/NS3274783026.html

Though I'm sure that there are other tools available to aid in migration.

Ideally there should probably be three servers in the environment you describe. One as a firewall / proxy server with three network cards. One for external services (web, ftp, mail) isolated to a DMZ. And one for the internal file sharing, authentication (domain) etc. Although it's quite possible to put all services on one machine. The main problem is that security needs to be tight and maintained, because a compromise of that machine comprimises the entire network.
I would suggest at least using one of your old servers (or even an old PC) as a dedicated firewall machine with a firewall distribution of Linux (eg. IPCop) running on it to isolate the internal network and only allow specific outside traffic to access the server. A firewall can run on the single server. However, a dedicated firewall provides a little more security that can make a significant difference.

More info can (TCO studies, recommended software, Linux distro's and links, etc.) be found at the following pages on my site:

http://www.t3technet.com/alternates.html

http://www.t3technet.com/linux.html