Small business network solution - thoughts and help appreciated!

[cptwhite_uk]

My company has recently separated from a larger parent company who unfortunately went into administration, as such I've been tasked (being the resident PC guru ) to draw up plans for a new network for the company. We're a small outfit with 5 office staff so I'm envisaging this being a relatively simple affair of networked storage with redundancy (and portable backup of some form - probably a portable drive real-time syncing the network storage using Dsynchronize)

As such I need to draw up a list of items we need to buy. Firstly I'm looking to check I haven't overlooked anything, then secondly I'm looking for recommendations on what to purchase.

We already have PC / Monitors etc (mixture of XP / 7 manchines). XP machines will be upgraded to Windows 7 in the next few months or fully replaced with Windows 7/8 machines (until then I've applied the registry hack for security updates!)

What to buy check list:

• NAS Unit - Preferably offers hot swappable drive bays x2 with RAID1 config. 250Gb - 500Gb drives would be ample - maybe opt for 2x 256Gb SSD drives, or should I just stick to server grade mechanical? Thoughts appreciated on this.
• VDSL Router with network accessible storage and gigabit LAN + 8 port Gigabit switch (if necessary)
• 10x CAT5 cables, lengths TBC (5 needed + spares + networked scanners and printers etc)
• Portable drive for redundancy/backup
• Future copies of Windows 7/8 (or new SFF desktops with Windows pre-installed)

With that said have I overlooked anything, any thoughts and equipment recommendation welcome.

[b0redom]

What are you likely to be doing in your office? Just standard MS Office type stuff and Internet access?

Assuming that to be the case:

For storage/NAS I would probably just go for a Microserver running RAID-6 with either FreeNAS or some Linux variant. There is no point at all using SSDs in NAS devices. Mechanical drives can easily max out a gigE port. When you buy disks, buy at least one cold spare.

For VDSL, I'd probably go with Draytek as they're really business grade stuff

For desktops, I'd probably take a look at NUCs. They're all in one devices, so you won't need to worry about building/component support.

Have a hard think about backups. You're probably not going to only be doing DR backups, you'll probably have people accidentally deleting the odd file and wanting it restoring. How will you do this? Make sure you test it too. What about backup frequency and retention policy? What about file versioning?

What about AV?
What about company email (and retention)?
What about security policy, will you allow unfettered internet access or do you need some sort of control?

TBH it's not really about hardware choice as much as solution design.

[b0redom]

Also, might be worth looking at Windows Storage Server for your NAS as that seems to do client backups.

[cptwhite_uk]

Thanks for all that b0redom. Food for thought, but I'm not an IT professional and will not be restricting access.

To answer your questions:
File restoration would be advantageous
Dsynchronize should have me covered for offsite realtime backup (portable drive will be disconnected on leaving the office). The NAS I assume will be RAID1 using WD Red drives so will have redundancy should a drive fail. It's hot swappable and I'll buy a spare in case of drive failure. Maybe in the future I'll set-up a VPN for the offsite backup (assuming Dsynchronize works).
I can't imagine I need to schedule backups using the above set-up?
No need for file versioning, but Dsynchronize can do this - I might set-up for limited versioning in future on the portable drive (but we've managed for 10 years without it!)
No AV transcoding needed, this is purely for basic file serving.
E-mails have already been set-up via 1and1 mail server, I intend to archive items older than 6 months to keep IMAP folder size within limits of the accounts (2Gb) and keep archives hosted on the server.
Will set-up non-admin user accounts for all users and unrestricted access to the server.

Hopefully that makes sense?



It's basically for unified storage of e-mail / MS office / photo library between 5 users. We're not talking heavy data transfer. Ease of set-up and reliability are the highest priority. Remote access would be nice as well (but just a luxury)

I've scoped out the Synology DiskStation DS214+, which seems like a good choice for the NAS. I'm not sure a 4 bay set-up is required as it's added expense for no benefit I can see?

[DeludedGuy]

Backup and redundancy would be the only thing I would iterate - when the brown stuff hits the fan the pressure is on you to make sure there is a working backup.

I would avoid any type of Windows Server platform for a company the size of yours, the licensing costs wouldn't make sense.

[scaryjim]

... I've been tasked (being the resident PC guru ) to draw up plans for a new network for the company.

... I'm not an IT professional and will not be restricting access. ...

If any of this is business critical, then stop right now, and start researching local IT services/solutions providers. Without doubting your ability with IT at all, you're not an IT professional so you shouldn't be responsible for business critical IT provision. If you have business-critical IT needs then you should have an IT professional - either dedicated or on contract - to make those decisions, and - more importantly - to take responsibility when it all goes wrong. I know small businesses and start-ups often like to think it's best to make do with what they have, it's rarely the most efficient or effective way to do business.

And, key to all this, is the fact that if you set it up, everyone else will expect you to support it, 24/7. So consider very seriously whether that's a responsibility you want to take on, when it's not your area ofd expertise.

[realstock]

Having worked at a Managed Service provider, this is the typical behaviour for a small business. I understand your predicament.

btw; I am guessing B0redom was referring to Anti Virus when he mentioned AV.

There is a free application called Synctoy from MS, that allows you to sync files between sites for free. Although this will require some configuring. Alternatively, a cloud backup solution would be a safest bet to backup mission critical data.

That NAS looks fine for your requirements. Don't go for SSDs, for business use I would use HDD considering your storing pictures on that NAS, it could easily get out of control.