I am NEW - Server 2003 setup opinions needes 2

[DELLirious]

I have been studying and preping to take over a network that has about 50 users. Here is the deal. The server that I am configuring will be the only server. Here are the specs

2 RAID 0 drives for applications (10,000K) ~ 36 GB
3 RAID 5 drives for Exchange and Server 2003 application data

A seperate file server will be attached.

Question is What partition sizes would you use on each of these two RAIDs. Is there are standard.

Exchange is the standard version, so data is limited to 16 GB anyway.

Thanks for all your suggestions and patience.

 

[jfk8680]

You are kind of contradicting yourself: first you say it is the only server on your network and later you tell us there will be a seperate file server on the LAN????

Anyway, here are some best practices according to MS:
- Place Windows Server 2003 on a RAID1 Mirror
- Place the Active Directory Database and logfiles on seperate drives
- Place Exchange transaction logs on a RAID1 mirror, place the Exchange database on a RAID5. (this goes for any database)

Considering these options I would create a 4 Gb partition on the RAID1 mirror on which I would install Server 2003. I would create three additional partitions on this mirror on which I would place the NTDS log files, the Exchange transaction log files and the applications. I would create three partitions on the RAID5 volume: one for the Active Directory database, one for the Exchange database and one for the application data.

I would like to bring to your attention that Exchange is VERY resource hungry. If I understand you correctly this machine is going to be a Domain Controller, Exchange server and application server. This is going to be one busy machine! I would really consider investing in a dedicated Exchange server...

Jeffrey Kusters

MCSA, MCSE, CCNA

 

[DELLirious]

Thanks for the tips.

The file server, I suppose is a separate server, but is just a RAID 5 array with no OS.

THANKS for the numbers. I understand the Exchange resource situation. We have no more than 35 concurrent users, but we are prepared to make purchases/changes if our tests do not go well.

Any tips on the sizes for the sizes for the 3 divisions on the RAID 5 that is in the main server?

 

[jfk8680]

Without knowing your network and your user's behaviour it's hard to give you a good advice. There are some tools which you can use to estimate server requirments however:

Microsoft's Active Directory Sizer tool:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/techinfo/planning/activedirectory/adsizer.asp

Microsoft's Exchange Capacity Planning and Topology Calculator:

http://www.microsoft.com/exchange/techinfo/planning/2000/ExchangeCalculator.asp

The latter is pretty detailed and complicated. To give you some comparison. I have got a little over a hundred mailboxes and the database uses about 4 Gb. The transaction logs use about 200 Mb. The transaction logs get backed up and flushed every night! The Active Directory database and logs probably will be quite small. I think your best bet is to define the application data partition (you probably know how much space this is going to consume), then define a small partition for the Active Directory database and use the rest for Exchange.

Good luck!

Jeffrey Kusters

MCSA, MCSE, CCNA

 

[DELLirious]

WOW! Thanks for the information. That is VERY helpful.