Shall I buy a basic server for the 270?

[beaumontdvd]

Hi everyone, Im studying the 270 and dont have to much excperience on servers so I was thinking should I buy a cheap one? If so does anyone have any good ideas of price ect..
Can I still setup permissions ect for other pcs using the server if it runs server 2003?

Thanks advance,

Dave

[Boycie]

hi,

I would suggest a good spec machine and run the server software as a virtual machine. You can apply for an actionpack (or whatever they are called these days!) and use virtual pc.

servers need to be kept cool, use lots of electricity and generally noisy.

let us know how you get on!

[JonnyMX]

Originally Posted by Boycie

servers need to be kept cool, use lots of electricity and generally noisy.

Congratulations on your MCSA mate!


JK!

[Shinigami]

Yup, you don't need dedicated server hardware to run a copy of Windows 200x Server Edition for testing purposes when studying for MCP's.

The 270 especially will only skim the surface when it comes to servers, so it's not like you need to shell out tons of cash at this point.

These days almost any of the cheapest machines you can find on the market will install a copy of 2000/2003 just fine, but you may be left with driver issues. So like Boycie mentioned, make a virtual machine instead using Virtual PC and you'll be doing just fine.

A semi-decent machine with enough RAM to run 2-3 virtualized machines is all you really need. If you really wanted to go nuts, you could get hold of 2-3 netbooks worth a hundred quid (give or take... even less if you hunt ebay), and make a set of dedicated machines on a private lan (and hopefully manage to "push" the XP drivers to the 2003 installation), but you don't need anything elaborate in the beginning

Maybe your current machine is enough to run a virtualized guest? What's the specs and what's the current ram usage?

[beaumontdvd]

Originally Posted by Shinigami

Yup, you don't need dedicated server hardware to run a copy of Windows 200x Server Edition for testing purposes when studying for MCP's.

The 270 especially will only skim the surface when it comes to servers, so it's not like you need to shell out tons of cash at this point.

These days almost any of the cheapest machines you can find on the market will install a copy of 2000/2003 just fine, but you may be left with driver issues. So like Boycie mentioned, make a virtual machine instead using Virtual PC and you'll be doing just fine.

A semi-decent machine with enough RAM to run 2-3 virtualized machines is all you really need. If you really wanted to go nuts, you could get hold of 2-3 netbooks worth a hundred quid (give or take... even less if you hunt ebay), and make a set of dedicated machines on a private lan (and hopefully manage to "push" the XP drivers to the 2003 installation), but you don't need anything elaborate in the beginning

Maybe your current machine is enough to run a virtualized guest? What's the specs and what's the current ram usage?

Ok mate will do. The pc I will use is 3.4ghz dual core 2gb ram is that enough? Also I have a 1.8ghz desktop and 1.8ghz laptop maybe I could network them together? Thanks for everyones help.

Repped

Dave

[Bongo_Fury]

Maybe increase the ram to 4Gb? Windows 2003 server likes about 1Gb - on VM Ware anyway

[Shinigami]

Sounds like you got plenty of machines... If you have half a gig of free ram you'll run a 2003 machine just fine.

[beaumontdvd]

Originally Posted by Shinigami

Sounds like you got plenty of machines... If you have half a gig of free ram you'll run a 2003 machine just fine.

Yeah ok is it better to run the client pcs on the same O/S?

[beaumontdvd]

Originally Posted by Boycie

hi,

I would suggest a good spec machine and run the server software as a virtual machine. You can apply for an actionpack (or whatever they are called these days!) and use virtual pc.

servers need to be kept cool, use lots of electricity and generally noisy.

let us know how you get on!

Ok, thanks I have server 03 running virtually upstairs when I was playing about So I will reset and use that. I will let you know how it goes, Thanks again mate,

Repped
Dave

[Boycie]

no prob's, have fun!

[derkit]

Beau - for info, I have a 2.1Ghz laptop with 4Gb of RAM sat in it - I'm currently running 2x 2003 servers and 2x XP Pro clients - as well as a pdf open, Mind Manager and this window! All this is running on a XP Pro base - plenty of RAM left to throw around.

I had the opportunity to grab a load of old laptops from work to do this purpose - after not having all the drivers for 2003 on them (obviously as who would install a server OS on a laptop?!) I ditched this idea and just beefed up my own laptop.

I use VMWare workstation and the "Tools" ie drivers support anything that I've thrown at it so far.

[beaumontdvd]

Thanks for the info mate, I am currently running server 03 and two xp pro workstations virtually, Just playing about with the disk quotas for users and warning msgs as I have never done this on a server before. Seems to be going alright though. Thanks for the advice.

Regards,

Dave

[supernova]

Originally Posted by Boycie

hi,

You can apply for an actionpack (or whatever they are called these days!)

Technet would be the appropriate subscription