Can you recommend a good file / email server setup for my company?

I am looking for a file and email server to initially support 3 people (all of whom will already have their own laptop with windows xp or vista installed). The server will be used as central file storage for sensitive client documents. It will also be used for backing up staff pcs. I would also like to use it for handling all emails, accessed on client staff pcs through outlook. I would like staff to be able to access the file server from home, so that they can access the main company database application. I am also looking for a secondary removable backup mechanism that I will use to back up the file server every week to take home with me at the end of the day. So I imagine the server needs to be robust piece of equipment with a big hard drive! Please can you suggest a solution, and illustrate costs relating to hardware, software, deployment/installation, and support.





FYI the office will have an internet connection with a 1:1 contention ratio (up to 500 kbps) on uploads.

Can you recommend a good file / email server setup for my company?
Yahoo Answers is probably not the best place for such a detailed posting. There are far more technical forums which could give you help.





There are multiple ways of doing this.





1) For email.. you are looking at Exchange 2003/2007 -- this is a major expense and undertaking to implement for just 3 people.


PERSONALLY, I'd recommend contacting your hosting company and see if they can create an email alias/MX record for your company which will allow you to receive email via Outlook thru THEIR email servers. This will be much cheaper and less maintenance then buying Outlook and an Enterprise Anti-virus program.


You can have Outlook periodically check for email, and download it to a PST file stored on the file server which is backed up nightly.





2) Buy a BEEFY primary server running Windows 2003/2008 and then "virtualize" the other servers.


This is better then having 1 server do everything.. by virtualizing you can isolate problems to 1 server, reboot that server and only 1 or 2 services will be affected..vs. having ALL the services on 1 server and having to take EVERYTHING down at once to fix 1 issue.


Ideally the Physical computer (called the Virtual Host) will do NOTHING -- so the chances of it getting messed up are minimal.


You can use MS Virtual Server (2003) MS HyperV (2008) VMWare Server, Virtual Box, or Zen all for free to manage the virtual servers (called virtual hosts)


I'm gonna GUESS that you should be able to get away with 8GBs of RAM on the Virtual Host.


Get atleast 3 500Gb hard drives and put them in a RAID 5 which will give you 950GBs of space


Get dual quad core processors


Get 2 NICs


Each virtual client should be configured with 30Gb C:\ for the OS and 120 - 200GBs on D:\ for data (or less if its DHCP or DNS, etc.)


VMWare Server lets you set the max size of the virtual partition BUT.. allocates space as it ineeds.. so the actual size of the virtual file is initially small..but the Virtual computer THINKS it has a total of 200Gbs - VMWare slowly increases the size of the file as-needed. So you could fool the virtual servers into thinking they all have 900GBs of space..but the actual file size may only be 10-30gbs


Backups should be done on D:\ only with a separate scheduled task to copy the virtual hard drives to a separate location in case the virtual clients get messed up.





3) As for the file server.. I'd recommend the following folders


\User


\Common or Public


\Projects or ClientData


\IT-only


\Apps or Software





the folde names are kinda self explanatory.


Users -- each person has access to only their own folder


\Common - everyone has access


\Project - each department / group has access to just their area.. subfolders would be \Accounting, \HR, etc. and then 1 folder for each client or project you manage


\Software - common programs like Adobe should be open to everyone.. software which has licensing should be restricted to IT





4) Purchase Symantec Backup Exec to perform the backups. Symantec also has client software you can install on the Laptops to back them up as well.


Avoid Symantec's "Continous Protection" product.. I've seen a lot to Postings from people with problems


Purchase Norton Ghost Server for imaging Laptops and MS Sysprep to make a universal image.





5) You could experiment with some online storage via the web and see how much cost is. 500Kbps upload is kinda slow..so maybe experiment with only uploading critical files





Expect to pay around $4,000 for the Virtual Server Host.





As for a remote connection to the Server.. You can configure Microsoft's VPN which requires 2 fixed IPs OR You could configure Remote Desktop Connection and install the optional web interface and set up port forwarding on port 3389 on your Router/Firewall


Employees could then hit a website or subdomain, let's say remote.yourdomain.com and have those requests forwarded to the Remote Desktop Terminal Server and let people remote control the applications on that server.


If not, then VPN will allow them to get a secure connection and internal IP to access files remotely as if they were in the office.


Either method would work for a small office.





HEY.. if you happen to be in the Sacramento CA area - I'm available for consultanting
Reply:If it's that small, I suggest looking outside. Even a web hosting plan (most already come with e-mail) would suffice. Moreover, it will be accessible anywhere.
Reply:in terms of hardware.


i'd suggest getting quotes from every major company out there, dell, hp, ibm. They will all offer you different tiers of equipment and different pricing. You can use their quotes agaisnt each other for better pricing somewhat. The first thing you need to know is what kind of software you are going to run, before you buy the hardware. That way you tailor the hardware to the specific software you have choosen





in terms of software. your looking for a complete solution. email, file server, backup, etc. I'm assuming you are the only technician, so you will be responsable for maintaining it. I would not suggest going with a microsoft/ibm, etc solution. Because they require alot of training to run properly.





I'd suggest going with something open source. There are lots of different applications, that mix and match well. Also there's a huge community around these products. That's helpful, because there is alot of experts who can help you if you are having trouble.





I'd look into a company called clarkconnect. They are an open source linux server. They offer a very highly scalable, robust solution. you can mix and match different elements they offer. Also you can buy support at a reasonable low cost. They have great community support. They also sell turn key systems.





I use the home version, and i am very impressed with the features and abilities this software packages includes.