Re: Which Version of Windows 2003?

Steve,

The performance difference between standard and enterprise is really a
non-issue. I have worked with both and the only real difference between
enterprise and standard is the fact that you can load balance on the fly with
enterprise. Knowing this, you could purchase additional servers with this
version of windows and load balance all of your clients. But you are not
looking for the "buy more stuff" answer.

I actually run the same server you do, altohugh with less people. What I
have changed however, is I have gone to the 64-bit version of Windows Server
2003. This allows you to address up to 32GB of RAM (not sure there are even
enough slots to be able to do this).

You probably already know this, but I will include this for those that are
coming behind and reading this info. 32-bit versions can only address upto
4GB of RAM and because of this limitation (and other reasons that need not be
mentioned here) the idea came of using 64 bit OS's. This allows Windows, or
any other OS, to address more than that 4 GB area. 64 bit actually allows to
address more than 32GB, but the standard edtion stops at this limit. I doubt
severly however, that you need more than 32GB.

So what are the problems that you could have. Well 32-bit applications can
be incompatiable with 64-bit OS's, lucky for you Windows was smart enought to
see this coming and included a tool that fixes this problem on the fly. The
name evades me but I know the process is splwow64.exe. What it does is
convert 32bit applications to use a 64 bit Operation System. The one bad
thing about the conversion is it burns up a lot of RAM. Microsoft recommends
doubling your current RAM, although in practice I have not see that this is
the case, but I will verify it requires more resoures.

Personally, and if money permits, I would take your server to 8GB of RAM on
the 64-bit archetectuire and I think you will be fine. Specifically, check
with Dell support about your server however, as I know that some of those RAM
bays are disabled by default and may require a support call to open them up.
I have never used it before, I just remeber reading it somewhere in the
support manual. Let me know if you need anything else.

Matt

"steve@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" wrote:

Dennes,
Have you had a chance to read the terninal server capacity and scaling
document?
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=A2AE95DA-BE56-4495-9FB5-E4B7170B33D9&displaylang=en

It talks about supporting 200+users on a single server but, the servers were
loaded with enterprise and 4GB of RAM.

Do you think enterprise can handle more users even if you dont have more the
4GB??

"Dennes" wrote:

Hi Steve,
More than 4GB RAM in a Terminal Server won't do much (if any) good, so
upgrading to Enterprise will most likely not give you the performance
increase to justify the cost.
I think you've just about hit the ceiling with this server, so to
increase performance, especially if you're going to add extra
users,you'll want to add another server to the whole and start load
balancing the stuff.
General rule of thumb (mileage may vary!) is about 50 users per
Terminal Server max, before you start adding other servers (either
virtual or physical).

Dennes



On 21 mrt, 16:18, s...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
<stevemcmillaninc...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
We have two Dell PE2800's with dual CPU's and 4GB of Ram.

Both are running Windows 2003 standard.
One is running as a Active Directory File-server with Exchange
The other is running as a terminal server. We have about 60 users using
Office 2003, Peach Tree, Vantage 8.03 ERP client.

From time to time things seem to run slow.

My question is should we upgrade to Windows 2003 Enterprise and increase RAM?

Ive tried to read through the terminal server sizing guide but, Im not sure
if it answered my questions.

When should you move from standard to Enterprise? Any guidelines?

Thanks in advance
Steve



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