One year with SBS 2008
SBS 2008 is out for roughly a year. In this time, i did four deployments of SBS 2008, each with 15-30 users.
During this time, i’ve gained valuable experience, which i’ll try to share here so that others can profit from it. Take all this with a grain of salt, as some observations may simply be my fault. Also, as times changes these things might change too.
Software
- Make sure to install Windows Server 2008 SP2 after installing SBS 2008. Some media may come with SP2 already preloaded. You can use the normal SP2 package that’s also used for Vista and the normal Server 2008
- Do not install SBS rollup updates before completing the configuration wizard. This is extremely counter-intuitive, but is described on the Official SBS blog
- Installing Exchange 2007 SP2 requires you to follow special considerations Here
- Installing WSUS 3.0 SP2, which is needed to support Windows 7, is currently not recommended. I was able to do this without issues on my lab machines, but others have reported issues doing this on machines that were in production. If you’re deploying a new SBS server, this should probably be safe to go. But make sure to test functionality afterward.
- Always use the answer file to deploy SBS 2008. This will make it possible to choose a custom domain name. Read my post about choosing your AD DNS namespace
- Do whatever tasks you can do using the SBS console. Resist of using the normal administration tools as much as possible, as you can break SBS with them easily.
- Ensure that the AV software you install is compatible with WS08 x64. Symantec Endpoint Protection Manager works well – Forefront Client Security on the other hand requires a seperate server running 32bit Windows for management. You may consider deploying FCS unmanaged in smaller environments, and configure FCS using the FCS ADM File
Hardware
- Use servers with the new Xeon 5500 CPUs. Read my x3650 M2 tips to find more about them. Consider using an E5530 or faster CPU. Using two CPUs (for a total of 16 virtual and 8 physical cores) makes little sense.
- Buy enough memory. Lots of it. Really. I mean it. You’ll need lots and lots of memory. I would consider 12GB to bare minimum. In a 3x4GB configuration which makes the most sense for the Xeon 5500 setups, this is quite cheap. Consider more memory if you intend to run SQL Server as, consider bumping the memory to 24GB. Remember that you can only use the first 8 slots in a single socket machine.
- Buy enough disks. A good starting layout is 8x147GB 2.5″ disks. Use a RAID 1 for the OS, another RAID1 for Exchange and Sharepoint, and a RAID10 for Data and WSUS. This is all up for debate of course, and it might make sense to consider other disk layouts.
If you have any additions, think i’m wrong somewhere just send in a comment.
Glenn Matthys:
“Installing Exchange 2007 SP2 requires you to follow special considerations”
What are those special considerations?
22. October, 2009, 13:13Dani:
Just an obvious typo: You probably meant 3.5″ disks, not 2.5″.
23. October, 2009, 16:08Lukas Beeler:
Glenn: Sorry, looks like i messed up the HTML for the link. I’ve fixed it now.
Dani: Nope, it isn’t. IBM defaulted to 2.5″ disks for rack servers a long time ago, and using 3.5″ disks is now mostly a special case where you’re limited to fewer models. The 2.5″ disks are faster, you have more slots for more disk arms, they use less energy. So there’s no reason not to use them.
23. October, 2009, 16:17Justin:
I’ve deployed a few SBS 2008 servers to customers and everything you state rings true.
Your hardware requirements are also on par with my own and I fully agree with using the SBS Control Panel for changes. I’ve seen several severs have issues when someone wants to just add a mailbox or only a login, without using the Control Panel.
Good stuff.
24. October, 2009, 22:16Justin:
Forgot to ask what type of hardware you like to use? Looks like IBM, but what type of machine? Just curious.
24. October, 2009, 22:25Lukas Beeler:
Hi Justin,
Currently, x3650 M2 and x3400 M2. They’re basically the same machine, just in differen form factors.
I think it’s important to take decent hardware for an SBS server – since it’s usually very important for businesses. Ensuring that the hardware can’t fail easily is thus important. Unfortunately, IBM has removed the redundant power supply option from the x3400 M2 (it was there in the x3400).
What do you use, and why?
24. October, 2009, 22:30Justin:
Nearly all my clients are Dell shops so I’ve used Dell 2600′s for clients that wanted to expand, but am now looking at the T-Series stuff. I’ve also been eying IBM’s offerings, which was why I was interested in your hardware.
Used the 2600′s since it was what I was familiar with when I started my own business and I’ve never had a single problem with them.
24. October, 2009, 23:28Dynamic Quest:
Just wanted to comment on your blog, you’ve got a great site here. Also we have also had success with the new 2008 SBS. Everything you have here goes along with what we found to be true too. Good work.
Miguel
5. November, 2009, 17:39Philip Elder:
In my experience over the years, one lesson that I have learned is to keep the disk subsystem as simple in its layout as possible. This improves overall system performance and makes things easier in the event of array member failure or an all out disaster.
There is a need to balance the number of members in an array and the number of arrays relative to the performance of the RAID controller driving things. Software Host Based RAID Controllers (on board or even some tier 1 RAID controllers) will not be able to efficiently drive more than a couple RAID 1 arrays without a performance hit.
SBS 2008 is very disk I/O heavy.
So, in your above example for hardware, we would look at the size and type of client and trade off the extra cost for a 5500 series setup and run with a 3400 series but install a PCI-E 8x add-in RAID controller to improve I/O performance. We would utilize SSD RAID 1 for OS and 15K SAS RAID 10 for the rest. Hot swap and a hot spare(s) would round things out.
BTW, for tier 1 dual processor boxes, adding that second CPU during the intial configuration will be at least 50% less in cost than needing to purchase and add it at a later date. There are also inherent risks to opening up a two year old box and disturbing things to add that second proc.
Since you are running 2.5″ drives in your setup, check into SSD as an option for the OS RAID 1 as that will virtually eliminate the I/O bottleneck. We have had _a lot_ of success with the Intel X25-M second generation drives.
Our default SBS server configuration is a RAID 10 setup with 4x 15K SAS + hot spare driven by a PCI-E 8x RAID add-in (Intel usually).
We maintain an SBS 2008 setup guide on our blog here:
http://blog.mpecsinc.ca/2009/05/sbs-2008-setup-checklist-v111.html
The above guide is the result of many installs as well as SBS 2003 to SBS 2008 migrations that tie into this guide (a link for a migration guide can be found on the blog too).
Philip Elder
14. November, 2009, 18:22MPECS Inc.
Darryl:
I just inherited an SBS2008 installation set up by someone who claimed SBS competence. Client called me in because the internal website (not “CompanyWeb”) was not working right and they were not seeing any progress. The client didn’t even know they had a Sharepoint site available….
First thing that caught my attention: SBS Console Users…blank…only one user “itsupport” all other uses and groups added thru ADUC, Exchange Management console, etc. I learned in Harry Brelsford’s SBS 2000 book when I set up my first SBS system to do things the SBS way.
Imported users into the SBS Console and suddenly all kinds of things started working. Of course there are other issues cropping up…so I’ll stay busy. :) Here’s hoping I don’t have to back up and reinstall, though.
As it is written: do everything through the SBS Management Consoles.
14. November, 2009, 22:04Lukas Beeler:
Philip,
I like your checklist. I have something similar internally, but not quite as polished. I’ve made good experiences with SSD as well, but the ones available from IBM are far too expensive to be worth it.
About the second CPU: From my experience, SBS servers are never CPU bound – and with 8 threads available on an E5530, i don’t see them needing a second CPU in their expected life span of three years.
Darryl,
In my opinion SBS servers are more complex than a several standalone machines, because there are much more interdependencies. But the issue as you described it happens very often, unfortunately.
15. November, 2009, 02:32Interessante Links zum Thema SBS 2008 | phenx.de:
[...] Allgemeine Installationshinweise zum SBS 2008 [...]
17. November, 2009, 18:56underlig:
How do you handle the original “network administrator”-account that is created during the install? I’ve always activated the real “administrator”-user and disabled the one that is created during installation.
There’s a lot in your recommendation and philips checklist that i haven’t done, i really wish i had some more knowledge before rolling out my poorly configured servers.
14. December, 2009, 09:43Lukas Beeler:
Hi underlig,
I usually named the newly created account something like a-Admin, and used that for all administrative tasks, and let the internal admin account be disabled.
14. December, 2009, 09:51