The Stress of IT

I just had a project installing a network for an organization over in Westerville that contained both a wireless and hard-wired component. They have a small but growing non-profit organization that works to bring jobs into Ohio and to promote one of Ohio's only growing manufacturing segment, so I wanted to do a good job on their IT project because I think what they're doing is great.

After being in IT for almost 11 years now (wow...that's hard to believe) I know better than to think everything is going to go smoothly on any project. Even very knowledgeable and experienced people sometimes find themselves beating their heads against brick walls thanks to computers and software. This project over in Westerville has one rather large issue that continues to drive me nuts even as I'm writing this. Here's the situation...

I do all of the technical purchasing for this company and bought all of the PC workstations, peripherals, printers, switches/routers, and general infrastructure. For this project I purchased a 2.4 GhZ Linksys wireless router with VPN capabilities. It took me a day or two but I have their wireless network up and running along with surprisingly fast DSL broadband (business class/always on via SBC/AT&T). My problem is the server I purchased from DELL. It's the PowerEdge 2900 and to save money we set up a Windows XP based network in the office and that is where the problem comes in. DELL, being the pain in the ass they are, doesn't support Windows XP (my theory on this is that they don't support it because it only allows them a small profit margin when resold). The only server operating systems they support are the $5,000+ server/multi-client license network systems that we don't need in an office with less than 10 people that is on a very limited, grant funded budget.

To install Windows XP I had to do some research online then download all of the hardware drivers for the server's hard disks then install them from a floppy (I hadn't used a floppy prior to this week in may be six months). So far so good this morning...the XP install seems to be taking. I'm sitting here at their office waiting for it to go through each setup step. I've been two weeks working on this project and all but two days of those two weeks was spent working on this server issue.

Lesson learned....Don't buy a DELL server for a small office network! Just buy a powerful PC and set it up to act as a server...it will be easier and will work just as well for less than 20 people. Big servers are for big organizations (or people who have money to waste on powerful network operating systems with lots of unnecessary "bells and whistles").

So the next time you're computer is driving you crazy....keep in mind that even after 11 years of working with computers almost daily I run into fiasco's that drive me crazy also. Things change so quickly it's a battle keeping up on all of the new practices and standards of every company.

Tom