IT Infrastructure for new office

dr strangelove

Hi all,
I need some information on building an IT infrastructure in a new office from scratch.
(I'm involved because I'm the IT guy here so obviously i know everything about IT <sigh> but to be honest I'm very much outta my depth here.)

We're opening a new office and the IT infrastructure has to be built/ installed from scratch, and to be honest, while i can think of most things, i don't know what i don't know (if ya see what i mean) so i want a professional's help.

So i'm looking for people/ companies that do this, that you would recommend.
As far as i know it'll be everything - from PCs, servers, Comms. room design, cabling, firewalls, to mouse-mats.

Cheers,

Nelbert

PC's - I think most will advise you to stick with the same stock pc. that is order 100 of the exact same pc or whatever number you's need. Will make troubleshooting a lot easier if everything is the same hardware wise.

Servers - Get the absolute best you can for your budget! The more you can spend the better. i.e could be a difference between servers that can host a load of vitrual machines and servers that can't. Virtual machines are handy for setting up multiple servers on a single physical server each running one application. i.e. if one is running your HR system and another your payroll if one goes down the other will keep working away. Unless of course the physical server goes up the creek but that's what backups and virtual machine snapshots are for (i.e you could move the virtual server to a different physical machine and have you app back up in minutes rather than hours or days.) Virtual machines let you test out system wide changes without effecting your end users until you know the changes are correct and fully working (huge help for me!)

Comms room - Ideally a 15ft+(depending on how much you need in it) square temperature controlled room with server racks centred in the room to give space in front and behind the servers. i.e. you'll need to get at the back of them and some are on rails that slide out the front.

Cabling - Cat 6 if the company can afford it if not Cat 5e is perfectly fine for most applications. For every one port in each area you think you need get 2 wired! Cannot emphasise that enough! Nothing worse than having to put switches in offices because not enough ports were wired! Getting 2 wired vs 1 doesn't double the cost, it's a small fraction more as it's the cable runs that cost time and money and running 10 cables takes not much longer than 5. Make sure the ports are numbered correctly at the port in the office and the port in the comms room! No doubling up of port numbers just confuses things for you in the long run!

Firewalls - Sonicwall units are reliable and easily configuriable (or at least the one I have is!) cost from cheap to overly expensive. Mid range will give you a good balance of performance, cost and configurability (important for you!)

E-mail - unless your a huge company and can justify the costs of time and setup and server costs I really would recommend getting hosting. It takes a long time for what you pay for an exchange server to balance out what you would pay an online hosting provider. So unless the cost and benefit (you've a lot more freedom config wise but also a lot more security concerns) is justifible I'd stay away from Exchange server.

Internet - You can get gateways that will hook up to up to 8 different modems to provide redundancy for your internet access if that is a factor.
Cost is quite low considering the benefit.


How big the company is and what they can reasonably afford will play a huge factor in the whole scenario however.
Does any of that help?

Static M.e.

How many people in the company?

What are you taking with you to the new premises?

Will the new place be cabled \ fitted out for you?

We're opening a new office and the IT infrastructure has to be built/ installed from scratch, and to be honest, while i can think of most things, i don't know what i don't know (if ya see what i mean) so i want a professional's help.

So i'm looking for people/ companies that do this, that you would recommend.
As far as i know it'll be everything - from PCs, servers, Comms. room design, cabling, firewalls, to mouse-mats.

How many servers? How much Comms?

You honestly have a lot of options to choose from, you could go a number of different ways with this and should really sit down with a company\person who knows what they are talking about.

Have you considered the costs of gettings hylon system into the comms room, what about fire alarms or water alarms? even temperature alarms?

When is the move date?

I faced a similar task two years ago and when I moved the our HQ from one part of Dublin to another (200 people, 40 servers). The workload was huge, it took up all my time for nearly two months before the move.

There are literally hundreds of little things you have to think of for a Medium sized company. Im not trying to put you off but you need to aware of what you are taking on. Even for a small company its going to be a lot of work.

Do you have statics IPs on your firewall? are they moving with you?
Are you getting new fibre lines installed? thats 6-8 weeks right there..

I could go on.. and I dont mean to sound like im ranting but I dont think you should just jump into it.

dr strangelove

Thanks for the replies.

At the minute it's still very up in the air, and i think i need to know what questions to ask before i can get more of an idea whether it's something i can handle myself, or need to get the professionals in (professional IT Consultants that is, not the coiffured CI5 operatives).

The kind of things i can think of at the moment are:

How big will the site be;
How many users;
How many PCs;
What’s the layout of the site – will it be along the lines of "X" <a satellite site we already have>;
Will it be part of a parent organization, or a standalone unit, or a hybrid like "X";
Will you have your own server room;
Will we have to fit-out the server room;
Is there an existing infrastructure, or will everything be built from scratch;
Will there be an on-site IT guy, or will it be contracted out, or me going to site once a week like with "X";
Will we be managing our own internet access - routers/ firewalls/ backup connections - or will that be offloaded to the parent company;
Will we need our own inernet/ mail/ 'other' servers

But i'm more worried about the important things i don't know to ask.....

ressem

Have you considered the costs of gettings hylon system into the comms room

Hasn't halon been banned? Or are you talking about something else?
It's dry sprinkler powder aerosol only these days unless I'm misinformed.
http://www.fireandsound.ie/dspa.html

Anyway OP.

How many users and how important is IT to the company. If the server room had to be switched off in the middle of the work day, would it result in sulking and complaints, or tens/hundreds of thousands in business losses.
Same for internet/phones/link to head office and power.

If it's a large cost then get outside help. You'll need engineering support to put in generators / redundant comms / cooling and humidification /security and your room will take priority over other areas of business.

I'm going to assume that it's a small office
Asking about the layout is a biggie. Get structural diagrams as quickly as possible, preferably before the lease is signed. Much easier to put in structured cabling before the builders put in the partitions and ceiling.

You don't want to have to push cabinets and trolleys through narrow doorways and sharply turning corridors.

If in your server room you will require active cooling and humidity control then you'll require plumbing to draw water from the apparatus to a drain.

Lift up the dropped ceiling panels and look for water pipes / any holes in concrete floors above.

If you've got a magnetically locking door, make sure that it's on a different power circuit to your server room. (fall against the door, power surge trips fuse. )

Is it a ground floor premises, and how easy is it to move large pieces of equipment into it.
Or is it a less accessible floor. Is there a lift or will things have to be hauled up stairs?

Will there be an on-site IT guy

If that's not the case then you'll want to be able to remote control and monitor as much as possible.

Even if the office is a very small scale, you're not confident in your own ability to handle this, so can you stand up to the CEO / CFO and prevent them from shoving the server room into the broom closet because it's "only one or two servers, leave the door open /add a vent and it'll be grand"?
They are usually not so bad if you can put together your arguments in a structured clear way.

One way is to draw up a list of the hardware /software assets and services that will need to be installed in the office.

Put them in a grid. Add in the time and cost to repair / replace. Add an estimate of cost to business in the case of failure (talking with managers to gauge this). List the physical areas of the office that make the service provision more fragile.
Then you can start looking at the cost appropriate to setting up the server room network/ phones and priority desktops.

Static M.e.

Hasn't halon been banned?

Don't think so...I'm off to the Batcave to check it out

Not mentioned on the canister, still pretty sure its Halon though..curious

CptSternn

dr strangelove wrote: »

Hi all,
I need some information on building an IT infrastructure in a new office from scratch.
(I'm involved because I'm the IT guy here so obviously i know everything about IT <sigh> but to be honest I'm very much outta my depth here.)

We're opening a new office and the IT infrastructure has to be built/ installed from scratch, and to be honest, while i can think of most things, i don't know what i don't know (if ya see what i mean) so i want a professional's help.

So i'm looking for people/ companies that do this, that you would recommend.
As far as i know it'll be everything - from PCs, servers, Comms. room design, cabling, firewalls, to mouse-mats.

Cheers,

Ring Hewlett-Packard in Leixlip - they offer packages for all offices, and take care of everything across the board.

ressem

Yep, H&S guy here confirmed.

31 DECEMBER 2002

The last day that existing Halon systems may be recharged with recycled or reclaimed Halon.
After this date, if a Halon suppression system discharges it is effectively useless. The equipment it is designed to protect will be vulnerable until a new system can be purchased, installed and commissioned.


31 DECEMBER 2003

By this date all existing Halon systems must have been decommissioned and the Halon itself must have been disposed of by an approved contractor. Halon portable extinguishers must also be taken out of service by this date. Although Halon systems are still permitted in certain specialist applications (mainly military*) the export of Halon is severely restricted. Halon therefore now has a negative value, requiring certified disposal.

*To find out more about the exemptions, call Chubb's Halon Hotline on 0800 010106.

http://www.chubb.ie/chserver/request/setTemplate:singlecontent/contentTypeA/webdoc/contentId/494/navId/00000200a00i00c

Every time you set fire to your server room, you're hurting baby seals.:eek:

Ring Hewlett-Packard in Leixlip - they offer packages for all offices, and take care of everything across the board.

Off Topic. Apart from speccing enough memory in the PCs, and those lousy printers. Grumble still trading on the good rep they had in the 90s for bulletproof equipment.

FruitLover

31 DECEMBER 2003

By this date all existing Halon systems must have been decommissioned and the Halon itself must have been disposed of by an approved contractor

Jaysus - I have definitely seen Halon systems still in operation in many server rooms and datacentres since 2003!

ToxicPaddy

Dr strangelove,

We did a major recent upgrade on all our IT infrastructure and systems in the office here about 18 months ago and I was involved in managing the whole thing..

I can send you on some handy info and some links to companies we dealt with who know their stuff and believe me, outsourcing as much as possible is the best way to do this.

To start with, my advice is to do the following:

Find a single point of contact within the company, be it the financial controller, the MD, the tea lady, anyone who has the authority to sign off on PO's etc. This person will need to meet with you at least once a week and get regular updates on the works. Management change their minds, you need to be well aware of this in advance to help steer the works in the right direction

Get a defined budget, not a rough idea, but an exact budget, on paper from the management/MD/FC.. this will determine exactly what you need to start with and prioritise. Its no use budgeting for one thing only to find out you're going to run out of money half way through the project

Get a specific list of requirements from the management on what they want as the end result. Start with headcount, do they want 10 or 1000 employees in this building and the type of services each user will require, the rest such as server and comms infrastructure can be determined after this has been decided.

Liaise with a facilities person, if you have one in the building, these guys will be your best friend when it comes to stuff like positions of desks, structured cabling, floor box locations, cooling, power and power management etc

Finally, you need to step back and see this from a project management point of view more so than an IT point of view, I know its hard to do, but if you plan everything in advance and do it well you will save yourself a lot of hassle

Tox

dr strangelove

I can send you on some handy info and some links to companies we dealt with

Ah, yes, that would be great, thanks.

I'm already thinking about out-sourcing about 99% of the work. I'd love to be involved in setting it up, i think most of it would be over my head.

ToxicPaddy

pm sent.. good luck with it all..

Boskonay

Get a big fat internet pipe in there, and outsource all the infrastructure so you dont need a comms room at all = save a mint every year and get a raise

BoB_BoT

would you still not need a server to admin the clients? What happens if "the fat pipe" fails. How much is a connection with significant bandwidth gonna cost? Leased line? Fail-over? Is the data being encrypted properly? Hosted servers aren't bad, but they're not the dogs bollox either. How much are you going to spend on routers? etc...

CptSternn

Boskonay wrote: »

Get a big fat internet pipe in there, and outsource all the infrastructure so you dont need a comms room at all = save a mint every year and get a raise

+1

Thats why I said ring HP

Managed solutions = no yearly overhead. One flat fee, everything is sorted. Never have to upgrade, never have to hire people, no maintenance or downtime that you have to worry about - just a set fee you pay every year and all is done sure.

rolion

Guys,we are living here,where the best product is UPC 30M...where do you get the ideea with big fat pipe !? From States ?

Magnet has 2m/2m starting from 450 per month...that is 5400 ex per annum !IrishBroadband has 6M at a cost of ...dunno !
What can you do with 2-6 M ?? You'll need at least 100M and that should be redundant for main line,then another one for remote and vpn so..that's adding up at three lines,100M/10M at least...costwise..tens of thousands !

Can i present myself in front of the CIO and say...a big fat pipe managed by ABC...at a cost of hiring 2 internal IT people ! And...when line goes down...internal staff plays games,and games,and games...not even checking external emails or online games ! !

i consider it out of options,sorry ,no offence !

CptSternn

You obviously haven't done this before mate.

First off, there are dozens of companies around the country that can get you a nice connection. Business connections are not home connections. If you ring around you will find Eircom, BT (their business unit still operates in ROI), Cable & Wireless, etc. all have nice big pipes available anywhere you need them.

Second, your concerns about the pipe going down and you losing money is unfounded. That why you have an SLA with your solutions provider. If the pipe goes down, you get paid. Think of it like insurance. It all goes into the services contract.

I am a consultant for a few solution providers in Ireland. I can tell you from experience, depending on the contract, if a server goes down or the internet connection stops even for a little while the company effected stands to get like €250,000 an hour until the issue is resolve. Granted this is on larger enterprise customers, but depending on the size of your business and the impact of downtime you will get money back to cover any losses due to downtime.

Boskonay

Also depends on what you are using the kit for. A typical web based app takes nominal bandwdith, even a terminal services / virtual desktop session can be as little as 60-100kbps.

Well spec'd, complete outsourcing with a 'fat' pipe' can save fortunes