menreeq
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Maximum users per Windows 2008 Terminal Server
I have about 225 users that will have to be migrated to Windows 2008 Terminal Server. I will be using multiple terminal servers w/ load balancing. The question I have is how many Terminal Servers will I need? The hardware will be brand new w/ SAS drives (raid 10), Quad Core processors 8GB of Ram each and Windows 2008 Enterprise version. Ideal answer would tell me how many users I can expect to serve per server. Thanks!
Brian Pierce
This is a question with no straight answer I'm affrad. It all depends on what the users as doing and how many will be connected concurrently, there is a rough guide at http://www.windowsnetworking.com/kbase/WindowsTips/Windows2003/AdminTips/Network/WindowsServer2003TerminalServerCapacityandScaling.html for 2003 - I can't see 2008 being a lot different in this respect.
This is a very hard question to answer without scalability testing and the level of redundancy you want.
Some more details might help us to provide general #'s.
1. Hardware:
-> Brand/Model?
-> Quad Core: Single, Dual, Quad Processor?
-> SAS: RAID 10: BBWC (Battery Backup Write Cache)?
2. Applications:
-> Published Applications, Published Desktop, or both?
-> What applications?
--> Small, Medium, Large Memory Footprint (10MB, 50MB, 100MB+)?
3. Users:
-> Concurrent connections? WIll all 225 be logged in all the time?
-> Will users have the ability to launch more then one application? ex. Outlook, Word, Excel, IE, Adobe, etc.
4. Redundancy:
-> What if you lost a server? Do you need the ability to run @ full capacity with one or multiple servers out? ex. You have two Terminal Servers, but if you lost one the other Terminal Server couldn't handle the capacity.
Any other details you can provide?
Some more details might help us to provide general #'s.
1. Hardware:
-> Brand/Model?
-> Quad Core: Single, Dual, Quad Processor?
-> SAS: RAID 10: BBWC (Battery Backup Write Cache)?
2. Applications:
-> Published Applications, Published Desktop, or both?
-> What applications?
--> Small, Medium, Large Memory Footprint (10MB, 50MB, 100MB+)?
3. Users:
-> Concurrent connections? WIll all 225 be logged in all the time?
-> Will users have the ability to launch more then one application? ex. Outlook, Word, Excel, IE, Adobe, etc.
4. Redundancy:
-> What if you lost a server? Do you need the ability to run @ full capacity with one or multiple servers out? ex. You have two Terminal Servers, but if you lost one the other Terminal Server couldn't handle the capacity.
Any other details you can provide?
ASKER
KrAzY,
1. Hardware
-Dell 2950
-2 Quad 2.5 GHZ
-SAS: Raid 10 w/BBWC
2.Applications
-Office
-Internet Explorer
-Medium
3. Users
- Possibly 225 at all times but let's say 150 concurrent users
- Yes, they can launch more then one app
4. Redundancy
-Yes, if we lost one it would be nice to be able to function at some level with the remaining server.
I hope this helps, thanks for your feedback!
1. Hardware
-Dell 2950
-2 Quad 2.5 GHZ
-SAS: Raid 10 w/BBWC
2.Applications
-Office
-Internet Explorer
-Medium
3. Users
- Possibly 225 at all times but let's say 150 concurrent users
- Yes, they can launch more then one app
4. Redundancy
-Yes, if we lost one it would be nice to be able to function at some level with the remaining server.
I hope this helps, thanks for your feedback!
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ASKER
tigermatt,
you make a great point on the memory, I will go ahead and get the servers with more then 8GB. But what do you guys think about I/O usage. Am i going to be ok with 15k local SAS drives or do i need to look at a SAN or NAS?
you make a great point on the memory, I will go ahead and get the servers with more then 8GB. But what do you guys think about I/O usage. Am i going to be ok with 15k local SAS drives or do i need to look at a SAN or NAS?
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tsmvp has a good point which is why it is important to perform load testing, but there are scenarios where more RAM is justified and beneficial. There are varying opinions on this topic and every scenario is different, but typically on a 2 Socket Quad Core system and only 4GB -> 8 GB, you'll run out of Memory way before you run out of processor. We've done analysis of kernel memory (Page Pool, Non-Page Pool, PTE's) via Win Debugger Tools and found that 16GB of RAM with 2 Socket Quad Cores was the sweet stop. The Application is a memory "hog" and we can push around 90 users. Although we are pushing it and typically you shouldn't go over 12GB of RAM and 16GB of RAM is pushing it in a 32bit OS.
A good article about Kernel memory is located here:
http://blogs.technet.com/clint_huffman/archive/2007/10/01/indentify-32-bit-kernel-memory-issues.aspx
There are also ways to "influence" the algorithm used by Windows to balance Paged Pool and Non-Paged Pool. Some would argue if your at this point where this could be a concern then you need to change your hardware configuration or move to 64bit. Some would also argue that with how cheap system processors are (Quad Cores), that you "waste" the processor unless you up the user and RAM.
A good article about Kernel memory is located here:
http://blogs.technet.com/clint_huffman/archive/2007/10/01/indentify-32-bit-kernel-memory-issues.aspx
There are also ways to "influence" the algorithm used by Windows to balance Paged Pool and Non-Paged Pool. Some would argue if your at this point where this could be a concern then you need to change your hardware configuration or move to 64bit. Some would also argue that with how cheap system processors are (Quad Cores), that you "waste" the processor unless you up the user and RAM.
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So what I think we are missing is the fact that windows 2008 Enterprise with terminal server can support more connections that the 2003 verision. Has anybody tried to max out a per/user count on a windows 2008 server. I have a customer that wants to buy a monster box (dual Quad Core's) with 32GB of Ram to get 100 concurrent connections on one box. Do you think this is doable guys. Also, I was thinking that I could partioin the database server off the regular server and create two Hyper V servers to host the Terminal server session. I know this is thinking outside the box, but doesn't MS say that this is the way of the future, where we can get many server instances on one physical box. What do you guys think?
Bottom Line is that I have a VERY SMALL Hardware budget since the software budget is MUCH more than expected. Purchasing Enterprise server / 100 Server CAL's and another 100 TermServ CALs is Creazy, it's almore double the amount of the box ;) I just don't want to get this rolling, and find out that I have to go back to that empty purse to get more money for hardware and software. Any help would be great.. thx guys..