Advice on Setup (Domains,Vpn,SBS2003)

[zyn]

Hi, i would appreciate your thoughts on how i would go about setting up the following user network/s.


Details:

Equipement:
Microsoft SBS 2003 (have 2 copies)
2 Hp Proliant Servers
2 Different Sites ie (1 office in town, 1 office 5klms away)head office and branch basically
2 VPN pass-thru routers
2 adsl 512k connections (static ips)
neither site has external identity (as in internet domain, and don't want to)

Office Requirements:

Head office has email on site (this is for both sites)smtp
Users share documents between sites
Employees rotate between stores from time to time
A fair chunk of the computers in one office have indentical names in the other office (which i can't really change)mainly for help desk support reasons...etc (long story)


My Design

My thoughts, set up each office separately like this:

sbs 2003 running internal domain ie (smallbusiness.local)
vpn link between stores for shared documents...etc
maybe tell one store to use outlook web access for there email, considering that their email will be on the server at the head office. (hope this makes sense)

or (i'm thinking i've only got 2 choices, one large network, or 2 separate small networks)


combine everything into one larger network, i would rather do this if it's feasible, but dont' quite know how to go about it. What would happen to the branch office if the server went down for a while in the head office, could people still log on to the domain, would i need 1 dc and one member server....etc these are the things i'm not sure about and would apreciate some advice.

ps. the traffice between the to office's would be fairly low

Thanks in advance for any help/advice offered

zyn

 

[GlenJohnson]

A fair chunk of the computers in one office have indentical names in the other office (which i can't really change)mainly for help desk support reasons...etc (long story)

If you can't change this, I don't see how you can have one large domain. This is going to give you major headaches. If you could change this, you could use roming profiles, so no matter where a user logged on, there profile would load at that machine.

Glen A. Johnson
If you're from Northern Illinois/Southern Wisconsin feel free to join the Tek-Tips in Chicago, Illinois Forum.

TTinChicago
Johnson Computers

 

[dearingkr]

You're going to have alot of issues due to the restrictions of SBS.

It will not allow another domain controller.
It will not allow trusts to another domain.

You're going to have to rethink your design.

MCSE CCNA CCDA

 

[zyn]

Update to earlier post. (still need help)

I have installed SBS in both stores, kinda had to since the software was already installed and for other reasons, so i'm stuck with it. Each site is up and running fine indepdently at least. I have got a vpn running from one SBS server to the other, had a little trouble getting it to authenticate, but now seems stable (or staying up longer than 3 mins), my question now is what ip address setup to use (have configured it already, but not sure of it's the right logic), i'll explain what i've setup so far:

(ServerA)
SBS 2003
2 nics
internal: 192.168.1.1
external: 192.168.1.2
Router: 192.168.1.200

(ServerB)
SBS 2003
2 nics
internal: 10.0.0.1
external: 10.0.0.2
Router: 10.0.0.200

(all subnet mask is set to 255.255.255.0) for both sites

VPN between ServerA and ServerB up and running

Static route on each server just set so each server can ping each other at the moment, aiming to allow one networks clients to see some of the computers on the other network, and vice-versa.


I have both servers configured for the following:

LAN IP routing (originally had NAT aswell, but seemed to play up when-ever the link between the servers was up) so now using router for NAT, and just routing traffic from one nic to the other for the clients internet access and so on.

Could someone atleast look over my ip address, subnet mask settins and tell me if this looks ok, or if it's way off. Haven't done alot of testing over the link, but suspect it's causing problems when-ever data is sent accross it...

A good diagram, or url/link to a site/diagram on connecting 2 private networks would be great...cheers

thks in advance for any/and all help
zyn