Solutions manual for 70 215 MCSE guide to microsoft windows 2000 server certification edition 2nd edition by palmer paul conan stewart and ray

Chapter 2 Planning for Server Hardware Objectives After reading this chapter and completing the exercises you will be able to:  Explain the hardware requirements for Windows 2000 Ser

Chapter 2 Planning for Server Hardware

Objectives

After reading this chapter and completing the exercises you will be able to:

 Explain the hardware requirements for Windows 2000 Server

 Explain the importance of using Microsoft's hardware compatibility list

 Determine specifications for your server in terms of the right processor type, bus type, and

advanced bus features

 Select the right network interface card (NIC) for your server

 Calculate the amount of memory needed for your server

 Plan disk capacity, disk architecture, and fault tolerance

 Plan a backup system and CD-ROM specifications

software applications For example, compare minimally configuring a server that will be used for

a small eight-person office compared to minimally configuring a multimedia server that will house instructional applications

Windows 2000 Server Compatibility

1 As you introduce the HCL, provide some specific examples of hardware on the list For example, present representative topical areas (Audio, Display Adapter, etc.), on the HCL and give one or two examples per each area

2 Emphasize why consulting the HCL can be very important If you know of implementations in which users had problems because they did not consult the HCL, describe the problems to your students

3 There are different philosophies about selecting brand-name equipment compared to using generic equipment or equipment that is custom built Discuss these philosophies in class, comparing issues such as:

3 Research server benchmarks that relate to different levels of L2 caching and present your findings

to the students For example, consult Network World's Net Fusion Web site for benchmarks Also, discuss how L2 cache influences performance for different types of applications:

 Web site (requires more L2 cache)

 File services (requires less L2 cache)

 Multimedia services (requires more L2 cache)

 Print services (requires less L2 cache)

 Microsoft terminal services (requires more L2 cache)

4 If you have different types of Pentium computers in your school's lab, create an experiment to show students first-hand the performance differences between the different Pentium computers

2 Develop a list of situations in which you personally would deploy an SMP computer and share your list and reasons with the students

2 If you have a copy of Windows 2000 Advanced Server or Datacenter, set up two or more servers

in a clustered configuration for students to see Or demonstrate in front of the class how to set up clustered servers in Windows 2000

2 Provide students with a demonstration of different types of cable connectors and show them how

to identify defective cable connections to a NIC

Answer: error checking and correcting (ECC)

 The need for redundancy

 The need for fast read access, fast write access, or both

 The need for reliability

 The value of the data that will be stored

 Backup needs

Disk Capacity

1 Discuss disk capacity planning in terms of being an on-going process instead of a one-time

process Explain how different organizations that you know plan disk capacity, such as by using planning documents – two-year and five-year plans, for example

2 Have a representative from your school's IT department (or the IT department at a local business) discuss disk capacity planning with your students

3 Make up and present in class two or three disk capacity scenarios and have your students

participate in the capacity planning For example, one scenario might be for a lab server in a college and another might be for an accounting server in a medium-sized business

Disk Storage Fault Tolerance

 Software RAID (as illustrated by any of the above)

 Hardware RAID (such as disk mirroring, RAID-5, or a combination of these)

compare their solutions For example, the scenario might have the following elements:

 You are planning a server that will store the vacation and sick leave data for an organization that has 5,200 full time employees and 2,223 part-time employees (who have sick leave benefits)

 All employees update their own information to show time off for illness and to request

vacation time

 All employees must have instant access to look up their own records

 All managers and supervisors must have instant access to the records of employees that are under them

 When an employee leaves the organization, she or he can convert unused vacation and sick leave time to a cash payment from the organization (thus this information has a significant potential cash value)

Compressed Tape Capacity

information to tape faster than QIC/Travan and DAT at 4 Mbps for 28 GB drives and 6 Mbps for

2 If your school has an example of a CD-ROM array, give students an in-class demonstration of how it works

Setting Up and Testing the Server

1 If students will be practicing how to install server components, introduce them to the wrist

grounding strap and show them why it is important Or, consider bringing a wrist grounding strap

to class so that students can see it

1 The speed of a disk is its _

Answer: disk access time

1 What are some problems that can result when you do not consult the Microsoft HCL to configure

a computer for a server?

1 Have students prepare a timeline to show the development of 8086/8088 computers to the present

Or simply have them show the evolution of Pentium computers

4 Ask students to use the Internet to research typical server computers made by at least two

manufacturers such as Compaq, Dell, Gateway, HP, IBM, and others For their research, have students focus on determining the typical configuration of expansion slots, buses, and ports in those computers

5 Create a lab project that enables students to practice setting up a printer or another type of

peripheral using Plug and Play and a USB port

6 Provide students with two scenarios and have them calculate the memory needed for each one For example, one scenario might be a small server for 22 users who have an average use of 3 MB; another might be for a server that has 452 users (average use is also 3 MB), which functions as a DHCP server with TCP/IP and SNMP services

7 Create a lab project in which students can practice installing a SCSI adapter and multiple disk drives in a computer running Windows 2000 Server

8 If you have access to hardware RAID, prepare a lab in which students practice setting up hardware RAID and then practice setting up software RAID Have them compare the differences in setting

up the two kinds of RAID

9 Have students obtain pricing information for components used in disk mirroring and in RAID-5 Next, give them a disk capacity figure, such as 32 GB, and have students determine the cost of using disk mirroring versus the cost of using RAID-5 to store this much data

Further Readings

1 Microsoft Corporation "Chapter 7 – Planning Your Windows 2000 Server Installation." Windows

2000 Corporate Preview Guide November, 1999

4 Steven Wilson and the Storage Networking Industry Association Managing a Fibre Channel

Storage Area Network November 20, 1998 (Also see other white papers available at the SNIA

Web site, www.snia.org.)

5 Unisys Unisys e-@ction Solutions for Windows 2000 February 17, 2000 (Provides information

about the new Unisys SMP servers that support up to 32 processors.)

WORKSTATION

OR SERVER OPERATING SYSTEMS REQUIRED

OTHER RESOURCES REQUIRED

2-1: View the HCL None Windows 2000

Professional or Server (or any Windows operating system that can access a CDROM drive)

Windows 2000 Server CD-ROM

N/A

2-3: Check Plug and

Play in a computer's

BIOS

specific computer's BIOS setup

2-4: Find the NIC driver

location

or Professional (Server is preferred)

Computer with an installed NIC

2-5: View the NIC

properties and

capabilities

or Professional (Server is preferred)

Computer with an installed NIC

2-6: Obtain a NIC driver Internet Windows 2000 Server

or Professional

N/A 2-7: Determine the

memory used by IIS

None Windows 2000 Server IIS already installed in Windows

2000 Server

Answers to the Chapter 2 Review Questions

1 You are planning a server for a company that wants to implement hard disk fault tolerance The company is not worried about expense, but does want a server that has very good read and write

performance Which of the following would you implement? Answer: b hardware RAID level 5

2 Which type of NIC is likely to provide the fastest performance?

Answer: a PCI

3 Your assistant is installing a NIC in a Windows 2000 Server that is connected to a full duplex

switch port How should the NIC be set up? Answer: d for full-duplex

communications

4 Which of the following are features of a USB port on a computer running Windows 2000

Server? Answer: e only a and b

5 Which type of SCSI interface is fastest? Answer: c Ultra2 SCSI

6 You have installed a SCSI adapter and connected three hard drives to it When you start the computer, it does not recognize any of the hard drives Which of the following might you do to troubleshoot?

Answer: f only a and c

7 Which type of adapter reduces reliance on the CPU for I/O processing? Answer: b bus

mastering

8 You are looking at disk drive and adapter specifications because you want to ensure fast access

to data Which of the following is most important, when you consider the types of equipment on the market today?

Answer: c data transfer rate

9 You have a small Windows 2000 Server implementation in which you need 2.2 GB of space for data, and there are two 5-GB disk drives already installed Which of the following would be

your best bet in terms of providing protection for your data and the operating system files?

Answer: b disk mirroring

10 You need to perform a nightly backup of a server that holds 72 GB of data Which removable

medium is your best choice? Answer: c tape

14 You are working on specifications for memory for your server Your boss, who is very

conscious of the budget, says you only need memory for the operating system Is he right? As you consider the options, keep in mind that there will be 45 users of the server, which will be set

up for TCP/IP and DNS services

Answer: c No, you need memory for the operating system, users who access the server, and

services such as DNS

15 Which of the following are characteristics of Fibre Channel?

Answer: e only a and b

16 Which of the following gives you protection against a hard drive adapter failure?

Answer: d duplexing

17 Your server seems to be experiencing memory errors that will not self correct One problem is that it might not have what type of memory?

Answer: c ECC

18 One difference between Windows 2000 Server and Windows 2000 Professional is that:

Answer: a Windows 2000 Professional does not support disk fault tolerance

Answer: d Pentium III Xeon

22 You have set up RAID 5 via SCSI connectivity on your server In the middle of the afternoon,

the server diagnostic lights show that two drives have failed What is your most likely recourse?

Answer: c Perform a restore from your most recent tape backup

23 What is the minimum CD-ROM drive that can be used with Windows 2000 Server?

Answer: d 12X

24 Your boss has found a bargain in a Pentium II computer for a server What step(s) is (are) most

important in making certain that you can install Windows 2000 Server on it? Answer: e only

a and b

25 Which of the following differentiates hardware RAID from software RAID? Answer: a

Hardware RAID is usually more expensive

Students are likely to find a PCI bus, unless the computer is an older model Other bus types that students may see include ISA, EISA, and USB Students will see information about whether the processor is a Pentium, Pentium II, Pentium III, or some other type of processor The tape drive will be distinguishable via a tape drive icon, such as a Seagate tape drive If there is no tape drive, students should report this as a finding

Project 2-3

You may need to tell students how to access the BIOS or tell them how to find out, such as by

watching for a message in the boot sequence Have students record the key sequence that they used to enter the BIOS setup Once they are in, make sure students explain on what menu or screen they found the Plug and Play information

Project 2-5

The duplex mode (depending on the type of hub or switch used to connect computers) most likely will

be half duplex, but may be full duplex On most modern NICs the media type is automatically set through an option, such as Auto Select However, it may be set manually at 10BaseTx, for example Some other properties that students might examine include:

download process go faster

Project 2-7

Students will find that the amount of memory used by IIssrv.exe is about 3,216 KB, but will vary depending on what IIS features are installed For mstask.exe the memory usage is about 1,832 KB

Case Projects Discussion Case Assignment 1

The questions will be targeted to help determine key server elements that will need to be sized, which include the processor(s), memory, NIC, disk storage, and tape storage The following are examples of questions that might be asked:

 How many members are in each of the three departments at each location? Will there be other departments or groups that will access software on the servers, such as managers, board of director members, and other executive officers of the company?

 What is the speed of each LAN and of the WAN in between? What media types are used on the LANs and WANs (for NIC connectivity)? Will the servers be connected to 10 or 100 Mbps network hookups?

 How many users are likely to be on any one computer simultaneously?

 How much disk space is required for the application software?

 By how much is the database expected to grow each month, every six months, and every year?

 How many reports are likely to be generated each day on each server that is used for this purpose? How large is the largest report? What is the approximate size of an average report? How many reports are likely to be generated simultaneously?

 Will the database updates to the two reporting databases include the entire database or only information that has changed? If it is only information that has changed, how large is that update

on a typical day?

 How often do they anticipate backing up data?

 Which servers are most critical to have working all of the time?

 How important is fast response for each type of use, such as customer service access compared to generating reports?

 What is the anticipated growth in users over the next six months, one year, and two years?

 Will any other software applications be installed on any of these computers – and if so, what is the estimated disk space required?

 Will users be allowed to store information on any of the servers – and if so, how much disk space should be allocated for each user?

 Will there need to be remote access to the servers, such as via telephone lines?

Case Assignment 2

Several steps can be taken to enable fast access First is to make sure that all of the servers are outfitted with plenty of RAM RAM is an inexpensive way to assure fast server response and many server administrators pack their servers with extra memory as a way to obtain good performance Another