Building A Server: An Effective Upgrade for Small Businesses

 

What in the world is a server?! Are you unsure about building a server for your small business? Why do you need it? Read this article to enlighten you by gaining insights on what servers are, what it is for, and what it is like.

As technology advances every day, we have to make small steps to take advantage of each progress. We do not need to live in the stone-age-like structure of doing business. Instead, we should educate and update ourselves about the latest business tools that can help business owners have an efficient business operation and skyrocketing sales. Here is where building a server can boost your business!

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How do servers help small business owners?

 

Storage

Certainly, servers are helpful in all businesses. Some businesses badly need them more than others. For instance, if you are in a software company and frequently need to work with your staff, you will be more productive using a server to save product files, distribute sales data, or power for computing.

Likewise, if your business is primarily on e-commerce websites, business owners need to store information for all transactions, expenses, and marketing efforts. Expenses should be kept in track for analytical and tax purposes.

 

Data Back-up System

Primarily, business data should have fail-proof storage since you really can’t afford to lose it. If you are only storing this data on a regular personal computer from a local computer store, it will likely have storage drive failures, leading to losing all the data. You will need a significant amount of money to recover any lost data.

On the contrary, if you store data on servers, it will have RAID(Redundant Array of Independent Disks) format that will save your business data if one disk breaks.

Security

Several cloud services are available for you to store and manage data. Yet, cloud-based servers are susceptible to being hacked. Hacking happens when data is being hijacked in the transfer process from your location to the cloud server or vice-versa. Many business owners are still using cloud services, but owners still prefer to store in other places.

 

Quick Access

The last perk of building a server is accessing your data quickly. Video files, high-quality images, and rendered files will take a significant amount of space in your storage. On the other hand, cloud storage cost will increase depending on your provider, and on the other, it will take a long time to access the files if it is from a remote location.

Therefore, It is safe to say that having a localized server is cost-efficient in storing large files and easy to share them with other computers on a local network.

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Are servers challenging to set up?

 

It is fair to say that building a server in your business is not as simple as buying a flat screen, turning it on, and voila– it is now running! You need to learn how it works, the components involved, and the types of servers suited for your business.

 

Components involved:

Hardware

Picking the correct hardware components for your business is an essential step in building a server. Small business servers that cater to small and medium-sized businesses can be started without costing too much money. Building a server for small businesses is easy to prepare, set up, and maintain. Always choose to buy from manufacturers that can offer immediate support in case you need assistance building.

Additionally, it is also essential to consider in building a server that they should be powerful enough to perform under many loads throughout the operation. Servers should also be able to handle several users. In the same way, serves should also be upgradable as the business expands.

Owners can prepare a place where the server should be located when they can understand the physical structure.

 

 Listed below are the main types of hardware servers:

 

• Tower Servers. A tower server is like a standalone cabinet and upright that resembles a tower-style personal computer. The server requires less cooling since they have low components inside. They are affordable that is why they are the best option in building a server for small businesses on a  small budget.

• Rack servers. As the name suggests, rack servers are installed in a rack. The server takes less space than tower servers and is built with standard sizes. Standardization of sizes enables servers to be stacked in a single rack, even from different vendors. Standard sizes make it easy for technicians to replace or add servers.

• Blade servers. Blade servers are packed devices that contain blades. The blades are thin, modular circuit boards where an application is assigned to each blades. Server admins have significant control over the access and transfer of data within the network of users.

Blade servers provide a robust processing density compared to other server types. However, the admirable function may have a high price, but it is undoubtedly reliable in performance. Blade servers have swappable modular components making them easier to repair than rack servers. Unfortunately, business owners  who prefer to juggle between brands might not prefer servers like this since most are locked to work together with a single vendor.

• Hyper-converged Infrastructure (HCI). HCI system is a compact system that combines data center elements into one component. Storage, computing, networking, and management components are centralized in a single component to solve cost challenges, eliminate system intricacies, and reduce staff workload and excellent operation.

 

When building a server, the following are suggested brands for hardware components :

 

• HPE ProLiant ML350 Gen10 tower. The tower server is for small to medium-sized businesses. The server offers excellent expandability supported by a big memory, dual processor, and amazing storage capabilities. The ML350 Gen10 can now convert into a rack mount structure to support a more extensive infrastructure when your business grows.

 

 

• Lenovo ThinkSystem SR550 is a rack server that provides smalls and medium-sized businesses into the world of Xeon Expandable processing. The flexible design offers you to start small and scale up to cope with the rising tasks at hand.

 

 

• Nutanix AOS. Nutanix is an HCI that can provide a complete set of software-defined platforms that enable IT members to collaborate their tasks on the server and collectively manage them. Also, the server can offer a classified storage design giving businesses-tailored storage capabilities to all kinds of applications, including compression, encryption, coding corrections, de-duplication, and many more. Additionally, storing data locally results to a fast performance in the business.

 

• HPE ProLiant DL380 Gen7. The blade server has advanced management benefits that can deliver remote access. The server has high performance, impressive storage, and scalable upgrades. The processor inside automatically adjusts the server processes depending on the running application. Also, there is an automatic regulation of power consumption which saves a lot of energy costs.

 

Software

Server management softwares supervise and maximize the performance total health status of servers. The software also enables unified storage for records of previous server event logs and failures.

You will need the hardware like a server and require you to install the best server management software. The most recommended server management software is the Microsoft Windows Server Essentials 2019 (ESD).

Microsoft Windows Server Essentials 2019 Product Highlights:

• 1 Admin User / 1 Server
• 1 Server Installation
• Supports up to 25 users and 50 devices
• Multi-language support
• This product is a digital license.
• This product is compatible with both hardware and cloud servers.

Windows Server 2019 is the leading cloud-ready operating system for all business. The function you can get by installing it on hardware servers are also experienced when you opt to decide with virtual servers.

 

There are also other available server softwares for different functions of a server. Most of it can be downloaded on the internet.

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Different Functions of a Server

What will a server do for your business? A business owner purchases a server to handle the following tasks:

• NAS (network-attached storage) is a server function where users can share files within the local network.
• Domain server. This type of server provides security for a domain. Access levels, user ID, password, and security set up reside in dedicated server component.
• Database Servers. This type of server gives database services to other types of servers. Applications and website developers use this server hardware to store data within a database layer.
• Web server. Web servers utilize HTTP to deliver files that constitute web pages presented to using the website and function together with database servers.
• Email server. Business owners invest in a dedicated email server to optimize messaging services.

The above mentioned are only examples to write a few functions of a server. There is a wide range of variety of functions it can give you as a business owner.

 

 

Final Thoughts

Without a doubt, learning about servers is not a simple process. There is still a need to learn about in-depth information about the small details involved. But knowing the fundamental elements that surround servers will help us gain insight on how we can use this knowledge to develop our business. 

Servers are capable of operations far beyond our present knowledge. We only need to take the first step, and that is to actually have one and see how its functions benefit our business operation

And finally, if ever you need assistance with Microsoft software needs, we are more than happy to provide you with various products available on our website.