Overclock.net › Forums › Specialty Builds › Servers › New small business mail server, opinions?
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:

New small business mail server, opinions?

post #1 of 16
5/21/12 at 10:16am
Thread Starter 
Hey guys,

We are getting a new server built here for MS outlook. Unfortunately i don't know jack about servers and was hoping that you could tell me if this sounds ok. It needs to run email for about 20-25 people. If you see any issues, please point them out, i appreciate it. Thank you!

Here is the hardware in their quote:
-INTEL P4208XXMHGC S2600CP2 DUAL XEON E5-2620 SERVER
-INTEL BOXED S2600CP2 DUAL XEON SERVER MAIN BOARD
-AIR DUCT FCPUPMAD
-2 X INTEL HEXA-CORE XEON PROCESSOR E-2620 W/HEAT SINK HEXA CORE, 2.0GHZ, 15MB CACHE, 7.20GT/S INTEL QPI
-8 X 4GB 1600MHZ DDR3 PC3-12800 ECC RDIMM (32GB TOTAL)
-22X DVD+/- RW
-8 DRIVE HOT SWAP DRIVE CAGE
-8 X INTEL 520 SERIES 240GB SOLID STATE HARD DRIVE 6GB/S 1.15TB VOLUME, RAID 6
-INTEL RS25DB080 8 PORT 6GB/S RAID CONTROLLER W/1GB RAM
-CABLE KIT FOR RAID CONTROLLER - AXXCBL740MS7P
-INTEL P4208XXMHGC SERVER CHASSIS W/2 X 750W POWER SUPPLY
Wiz-Bang
(26 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsGraphics
Intel Core i7 2700K Maximus IV Extreme-Z NVIDIA GeForce GTX 590 NVIDIA GeForce GTX 590 
GraphicsRAMRAMHard Drive
Intel HD Graphics 3000 (GT2+) Corsair Dominator GT 1866 4GB Corsair Dominator GT 1866 4GB Corsair Force GT SSD 240GB Sata III 
Hard DriveOptical DriveCoolingCooling
SAMSUNG Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM  LG WH10LS30 10X Blu-ray Burner Corsair H100 Extreme Liquid Cooler 1x Rosewill Thor Series 230mm Red LED 
CoolingCoolingCoolingOS
2x Xigmatek Crystal Series 140mm Red LED 4x Xigmatek Crystal Series 120mm Red LED 4x Silenx 120mm Red Led Windows 7 Ultimate 
MonitorMonitorKeyboardPower
ASUS VE247H 23.6" LED Vizio 42" LCD Seitek Cyborg V5 COOLER MASTER Silent Pro Gold 1200W 
CaseMouseMouse PadAudio
Rosewill THOR Gigabyte GM-M6900 X Trac Ripper Logitech Z313 25 w 2.1 Speaker System 
OtherOther
Lamptron FC-6 LED Fan Controller Rosewill 40-in-1 Card Reader w/USB 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
Wiz-Bang
(26 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsGraphics
Intel Core i7 2700K Maximus IV Extreme-Z NVIDIA GeForce GTX 590 NVIDIA GeForce GTX 590 
GraphicsRAMRAMHard Drive
Intel HD Graphics 3000 (GT2+) Corsair Dominator GT 1866 4GB Corsair Dominator GT 1866 4GB Corsair Force GT SSD 240GB Sata III 
Hard DriveOptical DriveCoolingCooling
SAMSUNG Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM  LG WH10LS30 10X Blu-ray Burner Corsair H100 Extreme Liquid Cooler 1x Rosewill Thor Series 230mm Red LED 
CoolingCoolingCoolingOS
2x Xigmatek Crystal Series 140mm Red LED 4x Xigmatek Crystal Series 120mm Red LED 4x Silenx 120mm Red Led Windows 7 Ultimate 
MonitorMonitorKeyboardPower
ASUS VE247H 23.6" LED Vizio 42" LCD Seitek Cyborg V5 COOLER MASTER Silent Pro Gold 1200W 
CaseMouseMouse PadAudio
Rosewill THOR Gigabyte GM-M6900 X Trac Ripper Logitech Z313 25 w 2.1 Speaker System 
OtherOther
Lamptron FC-6 LED Fan Controller Rosewill 40-in-1 Card Reader w/USB 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
post #2 of 16
5/21/12 at 1:21pm
That's a pretty beefy server. How many clients will you be serving?
Server
(13 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsRAM
Intel Core i7 2600k Intel H67DE PNY Verto 9600GT (Thanks to ihasfip!) 16GB G.Skill Ripjaws 1333Mhz 
Hard DriveOSMonitorPower
(3) Seagate 7200K 1TB (2) Hitachi 7200K.12 1TB Proxmox Samsung 17" Corsair GS600 
Case
Chenbro tower 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
Server
(13 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsRAM
Intel Core i7 2600k Intel H67DE PNY Verto 9600GT (Thanks to ihasfip!) 16GB G.Skill Ripjaws 1333Mhz 
Hard DriveOSMonitorPower
(3) Seagate 7200K 1TB (2) Hitachi 7200K.12 1TB Proxmox Samsung 17" Corsair GS600 
Case
Chenbro tower 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
post #3 of 16
5/21/12 at 1:27pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by wheresstimpy View Post

It needs to run email for about 20-25 people.

That many.
had a fatal error.
(14 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsRAM
E8400 DFI LP DK P45-T2RS Sapphire 4850 512MB 2x2GB G.Skill 1066 (5-5-5-15-2T 1.9V) 
Hard DriveOptical DriveOSMonitor
820GB Total LG Super DVD Burner SATA VII Enterprise x64 Gateway FHD2401 
PowerCaseMouseMouse Pad
Corsair VX550W NZXT Source 210 White Logitech G400 Razer Kabuto 
Audio
Creative Audigy 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
had a fatal error.
(14 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsRAM
E8400 DFI LP DK P45-T2RS Sapphire 4850 512MB 2x2GB G.Skill 1066 (5-5-5-15-2T 1.9V) 
Hard DriveOptical DriveOSMonitor
820GB Total LG Super DVD Burner SATA VII Enterprise x64 Gateway FHD2401 
PowerCaseMouseMouse Pad
Corsair VX550W NZXT Source 210 White Logitech G400 Razer Kabuto 
Audio
Creative Audigy 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
post #4 of 16
5/21/12 at 1:30pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by legoman786 View Post

That many.

Whoops, I missed that. My eyes naturally attracted to the specs haha biggrin.gif

Anyway, that setup might be a bit more than whats needed. I really think a single socket E3/E5 Xeon system could handle 20-25 clients easily.
Edited by ZFedora - 5/21/12 at 1:42pm
Server
(13 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsRAM
Intel Core i7 2600k Intel H67DE PNY Verto 9600GT (Thanks to ihasfip!) 16GB G.Skill Ripjaws 1333Mhz 
Hard DriveOSMonitorPower
(3) Seagate 7200K 1TB (2) Hitachi 7200K.12 1TB Proxmox Samsung 17" Corsair GS600 
Case
Chenbro tower 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
Server
(13 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsRAM
Intel Core i7 2600k Intel H67DE PNY Verto 9600GT (Thanks to ihasfip!) 16GB G.Skill Ripjaws 1333Mhz 
Hard DriveOSMonitorPower
(3) Seagate 7200K 1TB (2) Hitachi 7200K.12 1TB Proxmox Samsung 17" Corsair GS600 
Case
Chenbro tower 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
post #5 of 16
5/21/12 at 1:42pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by wheresstimpy View Post

Hey guys,
We are getting a new server built here for MS outlook. Unfortunately i don't know jack about servers and was hoping that you could tell me if this sounds ok. It needs to run email for about 20-25 people. If you see any issues, please point them out, i appreciate it. Thank you!
Here is the hardware in their quote:
-INTEL P4208XXMHGC S2600CP2 DUAL XEON E5-2620 SERVER
-INTEL BOXED S2600CP2 DUAL XEON SERVER MAIN BOARD
-AIR DUCT FCPUPMAD
-2 X INTEL HEXA-CORE XEON PROCESSOR E-2620 W/HEAT SINK HEXA CORE, 2.0GHZ, 15MB CACHE, 7.20GT/S INTEL QPI
-8 X 4GB 1600MHZ DDR3 PC3-12800 ECC RDIMM (32GB TOTAL)
-22X DVD+/- RW
-8 DRIVE HOT SWAP DRIVE CAGE
-8 X INTEL 520 SERIES 240GB SOLID STATE HARD DRIVE 6GB/S 1.15TB VOLUME, RAID 6
-INTEL RS25DB080 8 PORT 6GB/S RAID CONTROLLER W/1GB RAM
-CABLE KIT FOR RAID CONTROLLER - AXXCBL740MS7P
-INTEL P4208XXMHGC SERVER CHASSIS W/2 X 750W POWER SUPPLY

When buildings.... specification first! You are planning to spend 4-5 times what would ever be necessary. Your clients would not even notice the difference on a system that is 1/4 as much.

You want an Exchange server for Outlook?
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa996719.aspx
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee712771.aspx
Quote:
A 4 x processor core server provides a good balance between price and performance, and it should be able to host several thousand mailboxes.

Quad-core with 8GB is fine.

Why would you use SSDs for email? Go with HDDs in RAID5 for redundency.... and have a archive/backup process plan.
Once again...
(13 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsRAM
i7 920 [4.28GHz, HT] Asus P6T + Broadcom NetXtreme II VisionTek HD5850 [900/1200] + Galaxy GT240 2x4GB G.Skill Ripjaw X [1632 MHz] 
Hard DriveOSMonitorKeyboard
Intel X25-M 160GB + 3xRAID0 500GB 7200.12 Window 7 Pro 64 Acer H243H + Samsung 226BW XARMOR-U9BL  
PowerCaseMouseMouse Pad
Antec Truepower New 750W Li Lian PC-V2100 [10x120mm fans] Logitech G9 X-Trac Pro 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
Once again...
(13 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsRAM
i7 920 [4.28GHz, HT] Asus P6T + Broadcom NetXtreme II VisionTek HD5850 [900/1200] + Galaxy GT240 2x4GB G.Skill Ripjaw X [1632 MHz] 
Hard DriveOSMonitorKeyboard
Intel X25-M 160GB + 3xRAID0 500GB 7200.12 Window 7 Pro 64 Acer H243H + Samsung 226BW XARMOR-U9BL  
PowerCaseMouseMouse Pad
Antec Truepower New 750W Li Lian PC-V2100 [10x120mm fans] Logitech G9 X-Trac Pro 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
post #6 of 16
5/21/12 at 1:42pm
With those kinds of specs, you might as well be running a 50,000 client mail server. Enough for several universities/corporations combined. If my university had that kind of horsepower for their mail setup, they would be very, very, happy.


You could literally do fine with an entry-level LGA1155 Pentium, no more than 4GB of RAM, and a 250GB hard drive. Excluding the cost of the Windows Server and Outlook licenses, the hardware should not cost more than $500 if you were to build it yourself.
Edited by kz26 - 5/21/12 at 1:48pm
Mini-ITX Workstation/Gaming
(14 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsGraphics
Intel Core i5-3450 ASRock Z77E-ITX Intel HD Graphics 2500 EVGA GeForce GTX 650 Ti SSC 1GB 
RAMHard DriveOptical DriveOS
Crucial Ballistix Sport 2x4GB DDR3-1600 Crucial m4 256GB LG GH22NS90 Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit SP1 
MonitorKeyboardPowerCase
Samsung 2494SW Das Model S Professional Silent Silverstone SST-ST45SF Silverstone SG06 
MouseAudio
Logitech MX518 Realtek ALC898 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
Mini-ITX Workstation/Gaming
(14 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsGraphics
Intel Core i5-3450 ASRock Z77E-ITX Intel HD Graphics 2500 EVGA GeForce GTX 650 Ti SSC 1GB 
RAMHard DriveOptical DriveOS
Crucial Ballistix Sport 2x4GB DDR3-1600 Crucial m4 256GB LG GH22NS90 Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit SP1 
MonitorKeyboardPowerCase
Samsung 2494SW Das Model S Professional Silent Silverstone SST-ST45SF Silverstone SG06 
MouseAudio
Logitech MX518 Realtek ALC898 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
post #7 of 16
5/21/12 at 1:48pm
Pretty sure Xeon E3 LGA1155 is all you need.
Misaka
(18 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsRAM
Intel Core i5-3570K ASRock Z68 Extreme4 Gen3 Sapphire HD 7850 2 GB Samsung DDR3 16 GB (30 nm) 
Hard DriveHard DriveOptical DriveCooling
Crucial M4 128 GB WD Caviar Blue 1 TB Lite-on DVD Burner Thermalright Venomous X 
OSOSMonitorKeyboard
Windows 7 Professional x64 (Host) Crunchbang Linux x64 (Guest) HP 2311x HP PS/2 Keyboard 
PowerCaseMouseAudio
Rosewill Capstone 450 W Rosewill Challenger Logitech M570 ASUS Xonar D1 
Other
Hauppauge HVR-1250 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
Misaka
(18 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsRAM
Intel Core i5-3570K ASRock Z68 Extreme4 Gen3 Sapphire HD 7850 2 GB Samsung DDR3 16 GB (30 nm) 
Hard DriveHard DriveOptical DriveCooling
Crucial M4 128 GB WD Caviar Blue 1 TB Lite-on DVD Burner Thermalright Venomous X 
OSOSMonitorKeyboard
Windows 7 Professional x64 (Host) Crunchbang Linux x64 (Guest) HP 2311x HP PS/2 Keyboard 
PowerCaseMouseAudio
Rosewill Capstone 450 W Rosewill Challenger Logitech M570 ASUS Xonar D1 
Other
Hauppauge HVR-1250 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
post #8 of 16
5/21/12 at 1:51pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by trumpet-205 View Post

Pretty sure Xeon E3 LGA1155 is all you need.

That's what I'm thinking. It'll give him some room to expand and maybe run some additional services off the same box as well.
Server
(13 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsRAM
Intel Core i7 2600k Intel H67DE PNY Verto 9600GT (Thanks to ihasfip!) 16GB G.Skill Ripjaws 1333Mhz 
Hard DriveOSMonitorPower
(3) Seagate 7200K 1TB (2) Hitachi 7200K.12 1TB Proxmox Samsung 17" Corsair GS600 
Case
Chenbro tower 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
Server
(13 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsRAM
Intel Core i7 2600k Intel H67DE PNY Verto 9600GT (Thanks to ihasfip!) 16GB G.Skill Ripjaws 1333Mhz 
Hard DriveOSMonitorPower
(3) Seagate 7200K 1TB (2) Hitachi 7200K.12 1TB Proxmox Samsung 17" Corsair GS600 
Case
Chenbro tower 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
post #9 of 16
5/21/12 at 1:53pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by ZFedora View Post

That's what I'm thinking. It'll give him some room to expand and maybe run some additional services off the same box as well.

He should know what services he is running up front though... it is usually bad policy to run additional services 'just because' after the fact.
Once again...
(13 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsRAM
i7 920 [4.28GHz, HT] Asus P6T + Broadcom NetXtreme II VisionTek HD5850 [900/1200] + Galaxy GT240 2x4GB G.Skill Ripjaw X [1632 MHz] 
Hard DriveOSMonitorKeyboard
Intel X25-M 160GB + 3xRAID0 500GB 7200.12 Window 7 Pro 64 Acer H243H + Samsung 226BW XARMOR-U9BL  
PowerCaseMouseMouse Pad
Antec Truepower New 750W Li Lian PC-V2100 [10x120mm fans] Logitech G9 X-Trac Pro 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
Once again...
(13 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsRAM
i7 920 [4.28GHz, HT] Asus P6T + Broadcom NetXtreme II VisionTek HD5850 [900/1200] + Galaxy GT240 2x4GB G.Skill Ripjaw X [1632 MHz] 
Hard DriveOSMonitorKeyboard
Intel X25-M 160GB + 3xRAID0 500GB 7200.12 Window 7 Pro 64 Acer H243H + Samsung 226BW XARMOR-U9BL  
PowerCaseMouseMouse Pad
Antec Truepower New 750W Li Lian PC-V2100 [10x120mm fans] Logitech G9 X-Trac Pro 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
post #10 of 16
5/21/12 at 1:56pm
Thread Starter 
Thank you for the responses! Like i said, i dont know much about servers, gaming computers i can comment on but these things make me feel like a noob again biggrin.gif. Our company thought i should give this quote a looking over and i thought it looked kinda funky for our purposes. We do have a back up system for all the servers here, they are using tapes...? I asked why not external hard drives, and they told me these were better, im not convinced...?? I was a little flustered by the idea of ssd's this thing too, what happens when one goes out in six months? am i totally screwed or what?. This is just something our IT company sent us as a proposed "upgrade" for what we have (we didnt ask for a quote, lol).

OK. Now what if i said i was going to house my engineering library on here as well, which is tons and tons of solid works files... still overkill?
Wiz-Bang
(26 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsGraphics
Intel Core i7 2700K Maximus IV Extreme-Z NVIDIA GeForce GTX 590 NVIDIA GeForce GTX 590 
GraphicsRAMRAMHard Drive
Intel HD Graphics 3000 (GT2+) Corsair Dominator GT 1866 4GB Corsair Dominator GT 1866 4GB Corsair Force GT SSD 240GB Sata III 
Hard DriveOptical DriveCoolingCooling
SAMSUNG Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM  LG WH10LS30 10X Blu-ray Burner Corsair H100 Extreme Liquid Cooler 1x Rosewill Thor Series 230mm Red LED 
CoolingCoolingCoolingOS
2x Xigmatek Crystal Series 140mm Red LED 4x Xigmatek Crystal Series 120mm Red LED 4x Silenx 120mm Red Led Windows 7 Ultimate 
MonitorMonitorKeyboardPower
ASUS VE247H 23.6" LED Vizio 42" LCD Seitek Cyborg V5 COOLER MASTER Silent Pro Gold 1200W 
CaseMouseMouse PadAudio
Rosewill THOR Gigabyte GM-M6900 X Trac Ripper Logitech Z313 25 w 2.1 Speaker System 
OtherOther
Lamptron FC-6 LED Fan Controller Rosewill 40-in-1 Card Reader w/USB 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
Wiz-Bang
(26 items)
  		  
CPUMotherboardGraphicsGraphics
Intel Core i7 2700K Maximus IV Extreme-Z NVIDIA GeForce GTX 590 NVIDIA GeForce GTX 590 
GraphicsRAMRAMHard Drive
Intel HD Graphics 3000 (GT2+) Corsair Dominator GT 1866 4GB Corsair Dominator GT 1866 4GB Corsair Force GT SSD 240GB Sata III 
Hard DriveOptical DriveCoolingCooling
SAMSUNG Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM  LG WH10LS30 10X Blu-ray Burner Corsair H100 Extreme Liquid Cooler 1x Rosewill Thor Series 230mm Red LED 
CoolingCoolingCoolingOS
2x Xigmatek Crystal Series 140mm Red LED 4x Xigmatek Crystal Series 120mm Red LED 4x Silenx 120mm Red Led Windows 7 Ultimate 
MonitorMonitorKeyboardPower
ASUS VE247H 23.6" LED Vizio 42" LCD Seitek Cyborg V5 COOLER MASTER Silent Pro Gold 1200W 
CaseMouseMouse PadAudio
Rosewill THOR Gigabyte GM-M6900 X Trac Ripper Logitech Z313 25 w 2.1 Speaker System 
OtherOther
Lamptron FC-6 LED Fan Controller Rosewill 40-in-1 Card Reader w/USB 
View all
  hide details  
Reply
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:
  Return Home
  Back to Forum: Servers
Overclock.net › Forums › Specialty Builds › Servers › New small business mail server, opinions?