RE: as400 as exchange server -- MIDRANGE-L

Ok We have 2 AS400s in our main office and 1 at a remote site.  One 720
which runs all the back office activity and backs up a 400 which performs
our online transaction processing via dial up, leased line and Web.  Not web
serving but the data base transactions that the web server front ends.  Our
remote site is a 170 that does the same stuff as the 400.

Now we use NT to run our exchange server and have 2 boxes for that.  They
are mirrored cheapee boxes.  We have one NT box that has the tape backup
drives we use for backing up all the NT boxes.  (We are looking into
Mounting the NT drives on the 720 and using the Magstar for backups)  We
then have our DNS NT server, another 3 for Load balanced Web serving that
run the CGI programs that build the interactive web pages and get the data
from the AS400s.  Another NT for Print serving 8-10 printers.  Then there is
our file server for all our PC files which is also our domain controller.

Now since we just recently upgraded our main AS400 from a 510 @ V3R7 to a
720 @V4R3, (soon to V4R4), we are looking at running all our printer, DHCP,
DNS, File and Backup on it.  This will phase out a lot of our NT boxes,
which I must say have been very stable since we hired the right person.  We
will continue to use Exchange for our Office groupware and NT for WEB
serving.  (for now at least.)

We don't have 20 NT boxes but several and they do tend to multiply.


Christopher K. Bipes     mailto:ChrisB@Cross-Check.com
Sr. Programmer/Analyst   mailto:Chris_Bipes@Yahoo.com
CrossCheck, Inc.         http://www.cross-check.com
6119 State Farm Drive    Phone: 707 586-0551 x 1102
Rohnert Park CA  94928 Fax: 707 586-1884

If consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, only geniuses work here.
Karen Herbelin - Readers Digest 3/2000


-----Original Message-----
From: boothm@earth.Goddard.edu [mailto:boothm@earth.Goddard.edu]
Sent: Wednesday, March 15, 2000 5:02 PM
To: MIDRANGE-L@midrange.com
Subject: RE: as400 as exchange server


While I agree that NT bashing does get old, and that  NT has a lot going 
for it (Hey, Windows 2000 has been out a month and sold 7 1/2 million 
copies already), I am curious about the paradigm.   They have 20 NT 
servers?  20?!? That is a big number.  Why so many? 

I ask that because I see NT servers litter server farm racks like baggage 
on  an airlines baggage cart.  But then see one or maybe two AS/400 
machines off to one side doing the work of the organization. 

What is it that all of those servers are doing?  Why do they need all the 
boxes?  What is the feature they are getting by having 20 boxes?

_______________________
Booth Martin
boothm@earth.goddard.edu
http://www.spy.net/~booth
_______________________

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