Small Office Computer Set-up

[koji]

Hi, we're planning to set-up our own small office consisting of 15-20 computers. They'll be powered by Pentium G4560.

 

Now I checking our options of how we should set it up. I believe that most company do their networks in a diskless system where there is no hard drive in the computers and they all get their data from the server. I have implemented this on my iCafe consisting of 10 computers using a 3rd party software.

 

Also I am thinking to use PFSense for firewall. We're hoping to set it up with the minimum cost with enough network security. We wont be hosting our website or whatever inside the office, we just need internet with backup and maintain it to be virus free.

 

I hope someone could guide me on the route we could take. 

[grimreeper132]

I would personnaly have a C drive which is just a 64-256GB SSD (depending) for boot and basic programmes and then a central NAS for everyone to actually save things onto. Other option is having everything to network boot but the problem with that is that if you do that if there is ever a network issue everyone can't get onto their computers and all work stops. As for firewall yea a PFsense router and a managed switch would probably be enough for you at that scale. 

 

 

(This is how I would do it, might not be the mest option for you but that's how I would do it)

[koji]

2 minutes ago, grimreeper132 said:

I would personnaly have a C drive which is just a 64-256GB SSD (depending) for boot and basic programmes and then a central NAS for everyone to actually save things onto. Other option is having everything to network boot but the problem with that is that if you do that if there is ever a network issue everyone can't get onto their computers and all work stops. As for firewall yea a PFsense router and a managed switch would probably be enough for you at that scale. 

 

 

(This is how I would do it, might not be the mest option for you but that's how I would do it)

Thank you so much for giving me your insight. I am really interested with network boot. I've read about PXE but I'm not so sure if that exactly is what I need. 

[grimreeper132]

1 minute ago, koji said:

Thank you so much for giving me your insight. I am really interested with network boot. I've read about PXE but I'm not so sure if that exactly is what I need. 

yea that might be an option. If you are doing that I would also suggest that you have both a domain server, as that lets everyone travel between computers easier I believe and also use WOL (wake on LAN) as that is really useful by being able to wake computers up etc. when you as the IT guy needs to manage PCs etc. And yea network booting is a choice..

 

 

I would suggest having a C drive though as it will mean faster boot times and also protections from network outages

[Fullmental]

I'll second the C drive. It adds an extra $30-$40 per PC for a 128GB SATA SSD, but you'll see drastically better boot times and application load times that way. If there's anything worth investing in, it's improving office productivity by not forcing your employees to wait on slow network storage all the time. That $800 investment will pretty much pay for itself in a single network outage if it allows your company's employees to keep working, even at a reduced capacity. Assuming it is set up that way, of course.

[chiller15]

Are you going to be running Windows? If so, are you going to be using Active Directory?

 

Client hardware

Basic SSD (120GB minimum) to hold the OS and locally installed software.

 

Server hardware

Server(s)/NAS to store shared files, such as home folders, shared folders, etc. Ideally having at least RAID10 for redundancy, using SSDs or SAS disks and a 10GbE connection or multiple LAN ports that can be trunked.

Separate backup server (RAID is not a backup solution) - Also with RAID10 for redundancy

Offsite/Cloud backup server/repository (or store physical backups like disks, tapes in a different physical building).

 

Networking

At least one good managed switch, with 1Gb LAN ports for clients. Ideally you'd want the switch to be VLAN aware, so you can then implement VLANs and for it to have a 10GbE connection.

1Gb networking drops to all client workstations

 

The reason I've suggested 10GbE to connect the file server/NAS is so that there's no bandwidth bottleneck when muliple users are accessing the file server at the same time. If you can't afford 10GbE, consider trunking say 4 ports together, creating a 4Gb link between the NAS and switch.

 

I cannot empasise backups enough.

[grimreeper132]

18 minutes ago, Fullmental said:

I'll second the C drive. It adds an extra $30-$40 per PC for a 128GB SATA SSD, but you'll see drastically better boot times and application load times that way. If there's anything worth investing in, it's improving office productivity by not forcing your employees to wait on slow network storage all the time. That $800 investment will pretty much pay for itself in a single network outage if it allows your company's employees to keep working, even at a reduced capacity. Assuming it is set up that way, of course.

That and also it will reduce network traffic as they don't need to constantly fetch data for purposes, which can use alot of network bandwidth slowing other things down as well, meaning that it won't just be boot times that you will be increasing but also time for fetching files etc. 

[koji]

3 hours ago, Fullmental said:

I'll second the C drive. It adds an extra $30-$40 per PC for a 128GB SATA SSD, but you'll see drastically better boot times and application load times that way. If there's anything worth investing in, it's improving office productivity by not forcing your employees to wait on slow network storage all the time. That $800 investment will pretty much pay for itself in a single network outage if it allows your company's employees to keep working, even at a reduced capacity. Assuming it is set up that way, of course.

Thank you. I'll have that in mind.

3 hours ago, chiller15 said:

Are you going to be running Windows? If so, are you going to be using Active Directory?

 

Client hardware

Basic SSD (120GB minimum) to hold the OS and locally installed software.

 

Server hardware

Server(s)/NAS to store shared files, such as home folders, shared folders, etc. Ideally having at least RAID10 for redundancy, using SSDs or SAS disks and a 10GbE connection or multiple LAN ports that can be trunked.

Separate backup server (RAID is not a backup solution) - Also with RAID10 for redundancy

Offsite/Cloud backup server/repository (or store physical backups like disks, tapes in a different physical building).

 

Networking

At least one good managed switch, with 1Gb LAN ports for clients. Ideally you'd want the switch to be VLAN aware, so you can then implement VLANs and for it to have a 10GbE connection.

1Gb networking drops to all client workstations

 

The reason I've suggested 10GbE to connect the file server/NAS is so that there's no bandwidth bottleneck when muliple users are accessing the file server at the same time. If you can't afford 10GbE, consider trunking say 4 ports together, creating a 4Gb link between the NAS and switch.

 

I cannot empasise backups enough.

Hi, thank you so much for taking your time. You're right 10GbE might be too much for us.

 

Also I'd like to point out that there isnt really that much high bandwidth of exchanging files that will happen since most of what we'll do is online but if you really suggest for me to trunk 4 ports, please enlighten me of our advantage.

 

As for the active directory I'm not really sure yet. I'm quite new with this and currently what we need is an easy set-up with computers that has access to the internet while preventing users to install apps without admin permission. I hope you could guide me. Can I send you a message?

[chiller15]

9 hours ago, koji said:

Thank you. I'll have that in mind.

Hi, thank you so much for taking your time. You're right 10GbE might be too much for us.

 

Also I'd like to point out that there isnt really that much high bandwidth of exchanging files that will happen since most of what we'll do is online but if you really suggest for me to trunk 4 ports, please enlighten me of our advantage.

 

As for the active directory I'm not really sure yet. I'm quite new with this and currently what we need is an easy set-up with computers that has access to the internet while preventing users to install apps without admin permission. I hope you could guide me. Can I send you a message?

Sure, I'll help as much as I can.

[Electronics Wizardy]

17 hours ago, koji said:

As for the active directory I'm not really sure yet. I'm quite new with this and currently what we need is an easy set-up with computers that has access to the internet while preventing users to install apps without admin permission.

You really want active directory here. Its makes it much easier to manage and work with. Normally just install windows server and its all in there.

 

Id get some guy that knows domains and acitve directory to help you. Your bound to run into a problem if you do it your self.

[nivierheim]

i have been in this diskless network setup, as you mention there only 1 server handling 10 - 50pc client which is no hard drive, all os and data come stream from the server itself and yes i've been in this field.. please do pm me your details sir

 

for a second the server spec which need minimum core i3 4th gen or later , 8gb ddr3/ddr4 , 1 ssd for server os , 1 ssd for client os image file , 1 ssd for client cache , 1 ssd or hdd for client data and single mobo from 1150 till 1151 with 1gbps integrated nic 1000mbps still can support up to 20 client pc.

 

Server spec :

Core i3 4th Gen or later

8GB ddr3/ddr4

1150/1151 Mobo depend on processor (recommend 4 slot of ram and 6 slot of sata and integrated 1000mbps nic)

1 pcie network card 1000mbps (for balancing)

3 SSD's and 1HDD (1TB or 2TB which i've explain above)

 

this server can hold up to 20 client pc in one time.

[KrYpToCiD]

I'm currently using PXE at work but is only for OS deployment on new machines. But we run another server that hosts all the users data and it takes like 30 seconds to get all the user data from server and the whole set-up is over 1GbE so it is pretty nice. Beside that, everything is swarmed with UPSes, and the building has his own power generator and stuff, but for now I didn't catch any network failure. It might be luck or maybe science, idk, but I can tell that I don't know the exact configuration, just the fact that we are around 100 ppl on that network everyone with his own user and own data on server.

[nivierheim]

the server need a software that can handle booting up client thru PXE