[CallyWood]

Hi guys,

AT the centre I work at, we are using a server to store files and have roaming desktops. The server is 5 gigs. 5!!!

I don't know the specs of the server, but in general, would it be possible to add another hard drive to the server?

My knowledge is limited when it comes to servers, but I'm the only one in this office who won't be jerked around due to lack of knowledge.

anything else I should know?

[Iron Monkey]

To get the whole detail, post the manufacturer and serial number of the server, and we can get the specs. It might be possible, but such an ancient drive...I'd bet it'd cost more to buy another drive then a new server. Decent, basic servers with ridicluous storage can be had for less than $1,500. Did you checkout TechSoup? Servers are available now from them on the cheap.

[CallyWood]

I don't know where the server is. I tried to get the information from the IT people here, but the guy that I spoke to was completely unhelpful. He wouldn't give me a straight answer and kept trying to pawn me off on someone else.

[WIDOWMAKER99]

well maybe they only allow you to see 5 gigs ...

also you can get a cheap used server machine all over the place nowadays .. try gearxs.com and also surplus computers.com

i have even seen rack mounts on sale cheap ..like $99 with dual Xeons

you can put 12 gig of ram it that also upgrade the hard disks and possibly the cpu 's

they even have an opteron server there for sale ..under 200 bucks

[CallyWood]

I checked techsoup and I didn't see any servers there at all. Thanks wid, the only other problem is there is no dedicated IT guy there, and if we bought our own server, we would be taken off of the network we're on now and left on our own. I'm being let go in a month due to my term being finished, and without me there, it's like sailors trying to fly a plane. They're great at the senior stuff but know very little when it comes to computers.

You did spark some interest in me, what hard-drive that wasn't made 10 years ago is only 5 gigs? They must have partitioned it or something to only allow us that much space. I'm going to have to do some digging.

[WIDOWMAKER99]

my guess is yes they have a hardisk partition for your company at another server farm

since you cannot find the server ...

and that also may be due to a contract your company agreed upon so they don't need an IT guy
and that guy said "yea give em 5 gig of that drive"
to bump that up your company may need to pay more ..hence your still @ 5 gig ..also you dunno the retention level of the backups the server farm may be performing and on what basis ..5 gig a day is alot of space!

also remember i'm not allowed near any of the computers where i work

i know too much .. we had an issiue with a video card in our R&D dept one day .. here there was no vid card driver installed ! ..the R&D system still had win 98 SE on it !

i had to SHOW our supposed IT guy /engineer how to pull an agp card , use the numbers off the card and find a suitable driver for the card ..on GOOGLE.....he spent a week trying to resolve the issue ..then my plant manager asked me to look @ it .. since he heard i worked on a few employees systems on the side

well needless to say it was up ...fixed and running in under 10 min !

and still is

i mean c'mon how hard it it to find out what vid card ya have in a system ?

[CallyWood]

Now after the research I've done, I've come to realize that the server may require user licenses to access it. Is this the case for all servers, or only those using windows server 2008?

I found this guy here and I would like to know your thoughts.

we've been quoted 5000 for a new server for our centre, and I just can't figure out why it's so expensive

Also, the server is ours. it's kept in another building connected to ours to make it easier to connect to the groupwise stuff. They were saying the server is quite old, and it's dieing. The tech support people don't recommend adding a hard drive to it because it's an old dieing machine.

My immediate reaction is that I have a 12 year old computer at home that I use for file storage and it works quite well. I don't know why the age is a problem. If it did die, we could just take the harddrives out and plant them in a new server, right?

[Iron Monkey]

SCSI drives have an interminable lifespan, but even they can suffer from time and dust (depending on where they're stored.

GroupWise, huh? Aren't you just lucky. I'm a CNE 5/6, and live/breathe/die Netware/GroupWise on a daily basis.

I agree with your people...if it's 12-years-old, it's a blessing it's still running (probably a Compaq ProLiant 2500...those things are like the Rock of Gibraltar), and no, investing anything in such an old server would be wasteful.

Can you post the quote to us? I'd really like to see it.

[CallyWood]

I'd like to but they won't speak to me, I'm getting the info from our exec director whom they will actually talk to.

any ideas why the price is so high though?

[Iron Monkey]

It really depends....tell you what, since Wid & I are working on this, answer these questions and I'll spec out a Dell server, just as if you were a client:

1. Number of users

2. Role of server? File storage? Applications (like GroupWise, etc) on the server?

3. Growth (increase in users) any time in the foreseeable future?