Busy man!!! 
Good stuff.
You're right on about your concerns about growth and up-scaling . I really like what Scale has to offer.
As yes, I would be limited to Synology Rackstation NAS... As RAID-10 array i CANNOT add more disks for additional storage. So that means I cannot grow the volumes any larger than the current 'shelf'
I know I push OWA here as much as possible. Users are not the brightest and often complain 'we dont like the webmail'
Already paying Office365 hosted Exchange.
@scottalanmiller said:
@ntoxicator said:
Just comes down to issue of migrating a user to a new desktop computer. Management does not understand the issues. Tell me 'Just make it work, fast, and a gun to my head'. So alot of times employee's or an entire group of employee's will be shifted from one part of the office to another.
Then you tell them "if you want it to work you use OWA". Don't let them make technical decisions without accepting the responsibility. If they want Outlook at any cost, fine, but make it clear you had nothing to do with the decision or consequences. If they want something that works, present an option and let them decide not to do it.
You're 100% right. This has been an issue for me. As I try and make a plan and lay things out and always get shot down. So the current setup is due to earlier budget constraints, not planning for future growth and other variables. As our CEO has prior IT knowledge and IT background prior to this company. So essentially, likes to make end-game decisions. Which cripples everything.
I've been looking for other IT Job Opportunities
Otherwise.. Have to install Dropbox locally on the Mac Mini server, let it save to the DAS volume.
As they want to 'start fresh' and only bring over files & data they need from the current Dropbox business account.
All sites are connected with IPSEC VPN. So the new users I would have login to the netowork using new OpenDirectory credentials and they automatically have network drives mapped to them and have access to needed company files.... no more dropbox!
Like mac OSX server app to keep everything simple. As with the built in OpenDirectory and such.
Server quotes came back
LENOVO Server X are decently priced per 1U
ThinKServers are cheapest
Still waiting on pricing from CISCO
Oracle dropped price down... nearly 8k for an 1U server. But they have only minimal 600GB SAS drives?? wtf
Like to have NEW server prices and present them to CEO/Finance and then also look at used servers. I really like what xBYTE has for inventory
I could easily build our own again using Supermicro hardware. its trusty. only downside is warranty and such
But I suppose, if running in HA 2-3 servers within XenServer.. would be a non issue if one had a hardware issue.
I'll see if i can join. have another meeting at 2PM EST. if I'm available i'll hop on
thank you. Wonderful explanation.
You the man. Amazing information here. Goes a long ways.
You think there would be an issue upgrading the current xenserver node to 6.5? Presently 6.0
I have 6.1 ISO sitting here right now that some other nodes were running - but I migrated them to Proxmox for testing/development.
Aways worried something will 'break'
So what you're saying is.... I should definately upgrade a node to 6.5!? lol.
next weekend I'm just going to schedule downtime and upgrade this one node to XenServer 6.1 (From 6.0)
Just read more information on site and realized that the LACP bond is not 100% true and working as was not fully supported until 6.1
I had previous nodes running 6.1 and those appeared to have less 'issues' and also seemed faster.
I'll be cautious route and upgrade to 6.1 first. and All is well, I'll proceed to 6.2. Essentially incremental updates
I'm anticipating 50k budget. Considering the millions of dollars we're grossing. They made comment of wanting something that will hold out until 2018 or so. To support ~300-400 employee's
I'll upgrade to 6.1 after holiday when i return from small vacation im taking away from office. Once on 6.1, I'll incremental upgrade to 6.2. from there.. 6.5
hopeful it will go smooth. see what happens
Hey there
Anyone use or check out https://xen-orchestra.com/#!/ before? I just stumbled across this. Looking for any insight or usage case.
I was OS junkie for Linux distro's at one point in time. But I can say they've all matured over the past few years; become little more 'mainstream' and user friendly
Most debian OS's are pretty much all the same.
I'm a big fan of OpenSUSE and PointLinux
Was using SolydX for awhile - but after recent updates and changes.. not anymore.
Madrivia back in the day use to be the tits.
probably going with Drobo unit with 5 drives + mSata SSD drive for SSD Caching. As would be just straight TB connection and drive volume(s) be attached.
Waiting to finalize their network setup and their new office build-out prior to moving forward.
@Dashrender said:
Employee's will 100% bitch that they're missing their sticky notes, or the time it takes for their Exchange email to download to local Outlook.... Employee's refuse to use and complain about the office365 webGUI.
Looks like you've provided an option that would solve the problem - if management allows, uninstall Outlook from the PCs. Another option would be to go to RDS or VDI
The issue is that some employee's have access to different inboxes. We have a corp inbox that some employee's have access to. And then some have access to each others as check and balance. Been issue of employee turnover for some larger roles, so new person needs access to active inbox to see old emails and such. I've suggested 'generalized' inbox(s) for specific items, that way all info is global in one single source rather than dealing with old employee inboxes.
Main site where Primary Domain controller (PDC) has connection of:
Coax: 250meg/25
MikroTIK Router on both sides. RB1100Ahx2.
I have traffic shaping and queue Tree QoS setup. Mangling (tagging) packets based on TCP/UDP port numbers to do such. Ranging from VOIP ports, NFS ports, iSCSI ports, HTTP, HTTPS, DNS, etc..
Main office has many VLANS.
Satellite office is on a single VLAN. No need for me to segment data & voip due to size.
@Dashrender said:
What about just redirecting their Documents and Desktop instead of full blown roaming profiles
You mean redirecting their data to say \sharefilename\User map network drive? I already have folder redirection taking place, all their data is saved on the PDC to a shared network file UNC path.
@Dashrender said:
Eggs in one basket? Unless you have high end needs, not sure what the problem is? I am moving to a single server XenServer box. All VMs on one host. The cost to go to something with shared storage and HA, just not required for me. But that's really a business question, not an IT one - and for another thread.
To move to a single node Xen Server (We already have this). We would need over 64GB of RAM to handle our VM instances and needs and also storage space. We have Synology 1U NAS units using iSCSI to Xen Server host. Because CEO wouldnt spend money prior for upgrades. I had to move COMPANY resources / Virtual machines to my PERSONAL 1U SunFire servers to share the load cost. I have 3 - 1U SunServer's in our company rack using proxmox KVM's (was using as testing...)
I've been with company for 8 years and been here with all the growth. Been trying to find other opportunities in the area that will pay a livable wage. Its difficult and not had much luck. I have my personal technology that I do on the side and have done since I've worked here. although its not sustainable income.
So I'm seeing as quick and dirty solution.... Would be to get CEO/CFO to spend some money on a capable server to have at the satellite office. I'll use as a slave AD server that way users can authenticate locally to that onsite box. Only issue would then be the roaming profiles -- although they load fairly quickly over there (sign-on).
Can create local network share for the files they need and they would be set... then fire up offsite backup.
at same time I can press issue back full circle about the company's current hardware needs.
NOTE: This would only be a 1 year solution.... as supposibly we had approval from the county for us to take-over and build out a larger facility that we will move into late 2017....
he has yet to realize the cost of getting infrastructure installed there.. bahaha...
Exactly.. I know its risky and I've hammered management about this and hence migrate to a new setup. To be more resilient towards any point of failure. As now its a waiting game.
Ok, I'll keep using SAN. As I know before NAS and SAN use to be very different in terms. However, in my usage case due to block level storage, its indeed a SAN.
Well, all things to be answered have been taken care of here. As it originally started off as DFS questions.