Gym Masters Case Study

Company Background Information:

Gym Masters is a company that manufactures equipment for fitness centers and gyms. Gym Masters manufactures tread mills, stair steppers, cross trainers, exercise bikes, free weights, and stationary exercise devices. They supply fitness and recreation centers throughout the United States and Canada. Gym Masters has two locations, one in Chicago and one in Toronto. Both locations have Data Centers currently filled with Windows Server 2003 servers. The Chicago location consists of an office building and a manufacturing building, both fully networked. The Toronto location has a single large building that houses offices and a manufacturing center.

In both locations the servers are centralized in a controlled data center environment. The Gym Masters management wants to upgrade the 22 servers in the Chicago location and the 16 servers in Toronto to Windows Server 2008. There is a combination of Standard, Enterprise, and Datacenter Edition computers to upgrade.

Chicago
Toronto
Server Usage and Role
3

Providing external Web site
6
4
Database applications for Manufacturing and Marketing and Supply chain
4
4
Managing Active Directory and DNS functions for the domain
2
2
Offering VPNs
2
2
Offering shared files on large scale
2
2
Coordinating printing
3
2
Providing Web-based applications to internal users.

The current server hardware is as described by the table below.

The Chicago location has a combination of 150 Windows XP and 100 Windows 7 workstations. In Toronto, they have 150 Windows XP workstations; however, they will receive 24 new computers that will have Windows 7 installed.

The IT managers from Chicago and Toronto have decided the first step is to form a transition committee to plan and track the progress of the server upgrades. The committee consists of both IT managers (from each location), two department heads from each location, the chief financial officer, the director of operations, a senior applications programmer, and a senior systems programmer.

As is common in many organizations, the information technology (IT) staff is overworked and understaffed. Therefore, Gym Masters has hired you through Aspen Consulting to coordinate and assist with developing their plans to transition to Windows Server 2008.
As the consultant of choice you are tasked with reviewing the identified requirements and preparing a report of your recommendations on behalf of the Gym Master committee. This report should contain the required direction, solutions as well as justification for your choices.

The report should at a minimum contain the following:

Identify the specific Windows Server 2008 Edition that will be use to upgrade the current server environment and reasons for upgrading to that version.
Develop a unique solution to each of the additional issues identified in the requirements and provide the following:
The Windows Server 2008 edition and role/feature that resolve the issue
Document the reasons and benefits of the above choices.
Research the server hardware that you will use to install each version of the Windows Server 2008 edition. Include the following:
Manufacturer and model
Configuration and features for e.g. disk space, memory, network cards and number of CPUs
Cost of the server as per your specification
Cost of the server edition software

Additional Business Requirements

Requirement 1 – Advance Preparations

During the kickoff meeting, you briefly mention a few advance preparation steps the committee needs to know about. In response, the committee asks you to present all of the steps appropriate to Gym Masters’ situation as part of your report.
Requirement 2 – Server Roles

The committee has recently been discussing the functions of each server. They are not familiar with server roles, but they do know how specific servers are used. Some of the server functions they mention include:
Providing a Web site
Offering applications that users can run on the server through accessing the server over the network
Offering shared files on large scale
Managing Active Directory functions for the domain
Offering VPNs
Coordinating printing
Providing Web-based applications to internal users

In your report translates each of these functions into server roles offered through Windows Server 2008. Also, suggest some other roles that are likely necessary on the company’s networks (hint: such as managing IP address assignments and translating computer names and IP addresses). Include a short explanation of each server role you mention.
Requirement 3 – IP Addressing Issues

Gym Masters Toronto location currently uses static IP addressing for all computer systems on their network. One of the difficulties is that because the IT department is understaffed, they give written NIC configuration instructions to employees, so that employees do their own network configurations. Often employees make mistakes that cause conflicts on the network and the IT staff has to check out many connections anyway. Further, if they decide on a wholesale upgrade to Windows 7 it will mean that all employees will be reconfiguring their computers at the same time.

In this context, do you recommend staying with the practice of static addressing? How might an alternative method save time for the IT staff? In your report detail your recommendations for resolving this issue to the committee.
Requirement 4: Cost to Upgrade or Replace Servers

Determine the cost of upgrading the existing servers and compare it to buying new servers. Do some research and use real costs. Make your recommendation and provide support for your recommendations.