Server Costs

[PLightstar]

I am lookign into upgrading our work server which is running 2000 Server and I have been pushing for an upgrade for years and finally my boss has asked me to look into it.

While looking at Windows 2003 and higher it says about CAL's I was wondering what a CAL exaclty is, does everyone who access the Active Directory on the Server have to have a CAL or is it just the amount of machines 2003 can be installed on?

Also I have been looking into Linux as an option but I am not sure if it will run DOS programs, but as the server will be mainly a file server it won't really have to run them just allow people to access the files over the network.

Just looking for some help really in regard to upgrading etc.

It is only for 20 users (small company)

Thank you in advance

 

[Kryten]

A client access license is more literal than many people thing : it's a license for other users/machines to be able to use the services on the server - i.e. if you've 20 machines that will be using active directory, FTP and anything else on your server, you'd probably want a 25/30 user CAL to leave scope for expansion, although you can normally expand a CAL fairly easily.

Should you need to run dos programs there are plenty of emulators available but not sure what use they'd be to you If it's just a file server, Linux will certainly suit you fine - same if it's serving a database via SQL and the likes, as long as you can read up and learn fairly quickly you'll find it'll do a better job than Windows, without the CAL

 

[wyrd_fish]

linux (samba) can do domain control now, but I'm almost certain it's a pain in the arse to set up


if you're not experienced with looking after a linux box, you should probably leave it out of your production environment until you are

maybe get your hands on some boxes headed for the bin and have a practice

 

[old.Osy]

As Kryten said, CAL = Client Access License

With MS products such as Windows Server, SQL, Exchange, Terminal Services... you need a CAL for each user accessing the services.

In your case, you need Windows Server Client Access Licenses, if you're only running a file server. But if you were, say... using SQL, then you would need additional CALs for SQL, which are different from the Windows Server ones.

SO for 20 users, you should get like 25-30 CALs, to cover for future. I think the Windows Server ones are the cheapest, like 25$ each.