This simple guide will help you determine the technology requirements for your new server.
Performing strategic planning to meet your server technology needs is an assessment activity that requires detailed investigation on your part. You must review your business IT services and how to meet them. This might result in the need for a general computer server, dedicated web server, Microsoft Exchange Server hosting for email communications or any number of iterations. Ultimately, you are trying to answer a number of "how much" and "what kind" questions:
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How many employees do you have?
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What problem are you trying to solve?
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What kind of software do you need for the number of people you have?
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How fast does the server need to process data (i.e., processor speed)?
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How many processors do you need? Many solutions require two or more.
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How much memory (RAM) do you need?
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How much hard disk space does data require, now and in the future?
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What kind of hard disk controller (SATA, SCSI, or SAS) do you need?
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Do you want a rack mount server or a tower?
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How many network interface cards do you need?
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Do you plan to attach additional backup and storage drives (tape or optical, for example) to your system?
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What level of redundant array of inexpensive disks (RAID) do you want to support?
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What kind of server management tools do you need?
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Do you want help getting your server set up?
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What level of maintenance and support do you need?
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What are your options when it comes to financing new servers? Would you prefer to lease, finance or purchase outright? HP Finance has several programs available to help you make the best choice for your business.
Knowing the details of the kind of solution you're planning to create makes it easier to select the right hardware. For example, if you are building a file and print server you might ask:
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How many employees are in your company?
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How many and what kind of printers do you need to support?
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How much data do you have now?
If you are setting up an Exchange server or other email system, you might ask:
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Which services do you need to support: email, instant messaging or contact management?
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Do you plan to support mobile access to your email?
In addition to defining how your solution will behave when it first goes into action, you need to consider any additions or changes you plan to make in the next few months or even a year. When you decide to buy a server for your initial implementation that will support future expansion, you save both time and money.
Selecting your solution
Once you've assessed your needs and understand your requirements, you need to select a solution based on several factors, namely: software, data and performance.
The software
Most software solutions have specific hardware and bandwidth requirements for optimal reliability and response time to end users. This includes the best processor speed as well as a minimum amount of memory and hard disk space.
Although the documentation for each software package includes these basic requirements, ask the software manufacturer or reseller for their advice on what kind of system to buy. It's in their best interest for your solution to succeed, and they have a lot of experience putting their software to work on different servers. Typically, this help is free, so take advantage of it.
The data
How much data you have now and how much you'll generate over the life of the server will directly dictate how much storage space your server should offer. For example, if you plan to build a file server to hold documents currently scattered among many different desktop systems, add up the amount of space they take up and divide that by how long it took you to create them (in months, preferably). You'll have a good idea of how much storage space you need immediately, and you can calculate the average amount of data you create per month.
As a guideline, multiply that average by 24 or 36 months, and you'll have a good idea of how much storage space you'll need on your server in two or three years.
If you are creating a more complicated solution like a database-driven website, rely on your programming staff or consultants to help you define how much data the system will generate. Also, don't forget that your actual data isn't the only information your server will store. Any software you install will take up disk space, as will the server's operating system, so you have to take all of that into account when you consider drive space.
Users and performance
You need to have a good idea of how many people will be working with your solution and how well it needs to operate for them. Both of these factors affect the horsepower (both processor speed and memory) your server needs. If your file and print servers will only have eight or 10 users, you won't need as much power. However, if it will have to support 50 to 100 users your power needs will be more significant.
If you are building an intranet or a website, you need to have a rough estimate of how many people will visit the site per day. In addition, if you are building a database solution, how many people will be accessing the database at once?
Also, don't just think about how many users your system needs to support when you launch it. As with data, consider how many users you expect to support in six months, a year, or two years. You want to be sure that your server is ready to support an increasing number of users.
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