No more hiding in the server room

Small scale Network...BOTTLED CHAOS

I currently have a network that runs on duct tape, WD-40, and prayer.

It consists of 3 locations, 3 separate sub-nets, 2 site to site VPN connections handled by our Sonicwall Gateway routers, around 15 PCs, 15 network Cameras, a VOIP server, 15 VOIP phones, and a handful of printers and servers.

When I arrived, there was no naming convention, no IP schema, no fixed IPs, everything was dynamic and horrid.

Now all devices are fixed IP, with a new naming convention that describes business, site/location, equipment type, and a serial, all in 8 beautiful digits. This is also their hostname.

Now I want to centralize file storage, with something like a NAS, however, I need there to be some kind of security between users, as each users files are private to them. Any suggestions? It has to be small scale, with the total amount of users supported on this network, AD and domain controllers is overkill, for now.

I would also like to have central user control and roaming profiles...doubt I will get it though.

Oh, and to the nubby IT guy, you are a lifesaver, I have read all of your "10 things" posts and have every item on the list, except for the label maker, at least until it gets delivered some time next week...

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Permalink Reply by Danny Nolan on May 6, 2011 at 9:50pm

I have one other question, how old would you let a workstation get before you tell the man with the bank account its time to man up and order new systems?

The Executive Assistant sitting in the next office over has a Dell workstation from before Bill Clinton was impeached.

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Permalink Reply by Jeff Hengesbach on May 10, 2011 at 9:24pm

Danny,

Do you currently have any form of central authentication? You also mention a handful of existing servers. Is your environment Windows, Linux or otherwise centric? If you are windows centric going with AD will provide you some very nice benefits - and the benefit of a small AD environment is that in the event it goes belly up for some unforeseen reason - rebuilding it is not a significant effort. If AD is out of your budget range, Samba can accomplish nearly the same functionality for centralized user management and roaming profiles in MS Windows settings.

As far a centralized file storage, you have to understand a few things. The size of your data(in total and average file sizes), the size of your WAN links, and how users access the data. You may not find it acceptable to move all data to a main location and then expect users to open multi-megabyte files over long distance or high latency links. With that in mind you could use tools like rsync or MS Windows DFS to do some synchronization between sites to a central location for backup purposes.

You need a documented business guideline on how old PC's should get before replacement. Consider things like productivity time lost due to slow or failed equipment, licensing, etc.

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Permalink Reply by Danny Nolan on May 10, 2011 at 9:42pm

We have Windows workstations and linux servers. The servers are for VOIP, an old samba setup that is no longer used (since before I joined their staff), and a network video recorder.

For the central file stuff, it would likely need a file server at each location, the barn connects through a crappy 2mbps ADSL line. Its all that is available at that location currently. There is no way I can justify a T1-T3 or dedicated fiber line at that location.

The other two locations have dedicated 20mbps fiber connects, not bad for our size. The bulk of our files are standard office documents, small in size. Only myself and the accountant deal with anything bigger. He uses quick books financial and PoS, I do a lot of their marketing materials and work with very high rez images (as large as 600MB a file). My data would not need to be central, as I do backup daily to 3 separate locations, but everyone else....

Having never played with Samba, does it support roaming desktops and central file storage out of the box?

For the replacement guide, does anyone have any studies for that? My boss is big into research and figures and showing him evidence usually makes him move a little more quickly.