SBS 2003 Migration to new hardware

Has anyone here had any experience of this?

I have a client requiring a migration to new hardware and want this to be as painless as possible for all concerned.  The client has several remote users on the road accessing their email and a Terminal Server using laptops or PDAs and I don't want to have to call all of these in as part of the migration...

I was thinking of purchasing the Swing Migration Kit if it will save me time and my clients a headache.

Any feedback would be gratefully recieved.

Rich.

Rich,

I can't give you any useful information yet, but I have a customer with the same requirement.

I have just bought a couple of servers for testing and I will be trying out various strategies in the next week or so to try and figure out the most painless method.

I might even write something up based on my results.

Paulie

The swing migration toolkit can help here, but Jeff Middleton is the best person to ask.

Something you might want to consider is that I believe that Jeff will be present at the Amsterdam SMB Nation event, so you can discuss it with him personally.  More details of the event can be found at:

http://www.smbnation.com/Default.aspx?TabId=110

ttfn

David

David,

I am in heavy dialogue with my wife regarding Amsterdam...

Hopefully I'll be there.

Excellent, Paulie.

I have the purchase order now, and am waiting for the customers deposit.

Oh the joys of cashflow as a relatively new small business, I can't afford to stump up £5k for hardware and licenses and the customer is reluctant to stump this up in advance too.  What on earth do other small outfits do to manage this problem?

We haven't been trading long enough to get terms with Dell or whoever, this is such a frustration and with another client could have cost us the business...

I couldn't afford to stump up 5k for hardware either!

I bought  dual core 3.0ghz servers with 2x160gb and 1.5gb of ram from Dell, £500 each.  I didn't get any operating systems or licences as I will use my action pack.  The servers will be on thier own lan seperate from any other environment.

Perfect environment for testing as I need to brush up on a few things.

Hi guys, for starters I practise using virtual PC or Virtual server.  Even if I have to buy the product, given the current price for Virtual Server, it is very much worth it. ($99 for 4-cpu version)

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem/virtualserver/howtobuy/default.mspx

Just my $0.02 worth

ttfn

David

And of course if you're not sure there's the usual 180 day eval on the download.

It's really a no brianer!

Have you considered using Microsoft Finance? There is a 3 month payment holiday available until the end of March.

My interest has been piqued, hwo many of you use Virtual Server, and what do you use it for?  I know we have mentioned the use as a support and migration tool, but is that it?

Please reply with details as to how you use it.  If we have some great examples I would love to get them written up.

thanks

David

Virtual Server looks real cool.  I did some initial reading on it a few weeks back and I was mightily impressed by what it could do.

It is worth looking through the various webcasts on the features, as it certainly showcases the way MS are moving in the virtualisation direction.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem/virtualserver/techinfo/events/default.mspx

 

It is on my todo list for the next month or so.

I have a few questions, but most of these were addressed on the FAQ :-

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem/virtualserver/evaluation/virtualizationfaq.mspx

My 2 main qustions, are:-

[1]  can a VS client have full visibility to the WWW, ie If I have Server 2003 running Exchange, will it collect/send email?

[2]can  a VS running client machine be accessed via RDP - I know that the host OS could, but I am not sure if the client can be directly accessed?

Regards

 

Andrew

Andrew,

 

the answer to both questions is yes.  I often demo Virtual machines by accessing them by RDP and one of the main features of the networking is to have full access as if a machine on the network.

It is even possible to have 1 server, with 1 NIC card and several virtual machines, each with a different address, all on the one NIC, with the virtual machines getting the traffic routed to their IP address and there being NO NAT involved - i.e. they sit directly on the network.  You can also have the connection NAT'd via the host too.

I hope this answers your questions - yes, VPC & VS are very versitle indeed.

thanks

David

Great, thanks David,

I thought it could do all that wonderful stuff, but I was reluctant to invest tons of time to find out just in case it didn't!  (at least now, if it does not work, then the problem is with me!)

Looks like I need to escalate the installation of VS nearer to the top of my current project list, since I can see a huge potential for this product :-)

Regards


Andrew

Ricard00

I overcome this by not selling hardware (or software).  I specify it, source it and then get the customer to pay for it direct (usually to dell with whom I can usually negotiate a good deal).  I then charge the customer my time for doing that, plus, of course the time to setup and administer their network.

I find that this gives me as much profit as the (tiny) margins on hardware would provide, and it is always 'someone elses box' so if things are wrong with the hardware you don't get quite so tarnished.

It's an approach which has worked for me for the last five years, and I have never had a customer question it.  It is also a nice feeling that all the money that drops through your letter box belongs to you (and the taxman) and not a load of creditors.

I often make good margins on hardware and depening on how you approach it you should be able to as well.

For example I recently purchased 35 Dell PCs, a server with SBS preloaded and some other network hardware.  I made £50 each on the PCs and about £200 on the server.  The customer paid me upfront and in return got them cheaper than the listed prices on the website.

Everyone is a winner?

Some hardware I make much bigger margins on.  I bought a P series IBM 6F1 running AIX recently for 8k and sold it for 12k.

Typically margins on hardware are not high, but you should be able to use it as a small addition to your services revenue if you are careful.  In my opinion at least!