Advice on RDS server
Hi Experts, we are looking to introduce a remote desktop server , RDS 2016 , this will provide ACT and Office ,
their setup is as follows 1 x server 2008 (will upgrade eventually) ,20 users in house and 5-10 users remoteing in.
Their main applications are ACT on premise and office. They currently have hosted exchange but we will move them to office 365 eventually. Some of the users access from Africa and even a hotspot in Africa.
Just wondering what type of HP rack server I should be looking at, ideal Raid configuration, memory ?
thanks in advance.
their setup is as follows 1 x server 2008 (will upgrade eventually) ,20 users in house and 5-10 users remoteing in.
Their main applications are ACT on premise and office. They currently have hosted exchange but we will move them to office 365 eventually. Some of the users access from Africa and even a hotspot in Africa.
Just wondering what type of HP rack server I should be looking at, ideal Raid configuration, memory ?
thanks in advance.
ASKER
Thankyou Lee, really comprehensive answer.
With this user remoting in and using O365 pro in remote desktop, does this solution grant the users a full desktop , or am I getting confused. The client remotely and onsite will want to use their office apps including hosted exchange, access Act (which is on premise) , Sage and access a local NAS drive.
Based on this requirement do we need to look at desktop virtualization?
With this user remoting in and using O365 pro in remote desktop, does this solution grant the users a full desktop , or am I getting confused. The client remotely and onsite will want to use their office apps including hosted exchange, access Act (which is on premise) , Sage and access a local NAS drive.
Based on this requirement do we need to look at desktop virtualization?
ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
membership
This solution is only available to members.
To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.
SOLUTION
membership
This solution is only available to members.
To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.
ASKER
Thanks Lee.
I looked at a few solutions, off the shelf VM desktop (very slick but restrictive,
Had an azure RDS template built works well.
We are going to build a light RDS desktop with ssd , so a few users can try it. But some great ideas in here thanks.
I looked at a few solutions, off the shelf VM desktop (very slick but restrictive,
Had an azure RDS template built works well.
We are going to build a light RDS desktop with ssd , so a few users can try it. But some great ideas in here thanks.
Second, keep in mind licensing of ACT and office. Office REQUIRES a Volume License, Office 365 ProPlus, OR Office 365 E3 or better subscription.
Hardware wise, I'd get something with 8 cores (16 threads) but no more than 16 cores (for a licensing consideration, given that a full 2016 license is licensed by 2-core packs with a minimum of 16 cores (not threads, but I'd question the need for more than 8 cores if it's only running one VM)
You want fast disk. RAID 10 of 15K SAS or RAID 10 of SSD (or possibly RAID 1 of NVMe, it depends on how much you want to spend, but disk is the slowest major component and the faster you can get, the better. I would not get less than 32 GB of RAM. I'd probably try to get 48-64 for your usage. (I'm vaguely familiar with ACT as I have one client using it but I don't generally manage it).
I also cover basic server specs and configuration in my article referenced above.
Finally, keep in mind you now have a single point of failure for 20 users. IN GENERAL, it would be a good idea to get two servers, each capable of supporting the full load and divide that load by the two of them. If one server fails, users can log in to the other server. I have one client now with 32 users, 25-30 of which will require RDS access and we're going to be utilizing 3 servers for RDS so that if any one goes down, the users can be split among the other two with a lesser impact on resources and without disabling the entire company while it's down. At a minimum, setup Replica between two systems, even if the second system is a cheap desktop with a couple of SSDs and 32 GB of RAM so you can bring up the VM on the other server.
BTW, I don't recall if I cover it in my article, but the 2016 license you get MUST be volume license NOT OEM. Otherwise you potentially have licensing issues in a failure situation. (You could have them anyway, but they are more difficult to deal with with OEM).