Newbie - Server requirements???

[JMCColorado]

Hi,

I am a Windows 2000 System admin and I am working for a company that will be installing Citrix to serve an aplication that we are currently developing. I will be taking Citrix certification training soon, but I need to order the servers now. I am completely unfamiliar with Citrix at this point. The specs are that we need the server to be up at all times. So I am thinking about a cluster. Is this the best option? Also, there will be a max of 40 people on at once - What kind of server hardware will I need? I really appreciate any help I can get!

 

[johnv20]

Hi,
I am not familiar with cirix at all but here are some general guidelines choosing a server solution -

with only 40 people on at a time the main question would be what sort of workload is the application putting on the server. Generally speaking try and get as high a spec system as you can afford. If you can afford it try anything from the Dell 4600 or 6600 range.

You will definatley need to have raid on the system but depending on how critical the application is you may get away with running a raid 10 or 50 on 1 box rather than installing a cluster. On the other hand if the application is really critical try looking at some of the products from the Neverfail group or Legato.

 

[DanZeMan]

Citrix documentation will serve as a good guide for things like memory (read: lots!!!) and disk space.
IE: we just put in a Metaframe1.8 server to server 1200 users (about 20-30 concurrent), and it has 4 CPUs, 4GB RAM, and lots of disk. It's a Dell 6xxx
I'd consider Raid1 for the OS, and Raid5 for everything else. Separate the controllers is performance is key...

 

[pgoss]

I would go with something along the lines of 2-4 dual processor 2650's with 2 - 4GB of memory.

For the Disk drives, space usually isn't an issue when you are serving out a single application and not the whole desktop. Get what you need for your application.

Raid’s don’t really help in a farm/cluster environment because the whole point of having them set up that way is if one goes down the other handles the load. It doesn’t take long to reload a system and get it added back in. Personally I think it is a waste to buy a RAID card but that’s my $.02.


We use Citrix in 2 different configuration where i work, on one we farm out the whole desktop and memory is a huge deal on the other we farm out just an application and neither memory or processor are that bad. We usually have anywhere from 40 - 60 concurrent connections on both farms.

hth
pat