Check this SBS08 quote for me

The Spyder

2[H]4U
Joined
Jun 18, 2002
Messages
2,628
Hey guys,
I am helping a good fellow at a local company out who needs a new server installed. The software company for their POS app recommended SBS08 Premium and a basic $3.5k E2200 server.... The company is the right size for SBS08 and I am waiting to see if they do need the "premium" part of SBS. They currently have 3 POS stations and want to add 2 more. Total of maybe 10 users? Want Remote Access/VPN functionality.

Anyways, here is what I spec'd.

Dell T310
Xeon 5340 2.4ghz
8gb ram
4x250GB Raid 10
RD1000 + 2 320gb cartridges
3yr warranty
Redundant Powersupplies
SBS2008 Premium with 10 CALS

Came in right at $5k.

Here is what got me- they wanted a estimate for the server install.
I could only give them a rough idea. A similar setup took 22 hours. Is there a formula or estimate others use to calculate this?

Nice full rate job with future support.
One of their locations is over 2 hours away, so I did ask for 1/2 rate travel time.

Sound good?

Thanks!
 
i always seem to under quote flat rate

do you have a dell rep?
 
don't mark up the hardware, but charge them somewhere in the neighborhood of $100/hr for service
used to work for me, your mileage may vary
 
We almost always quote 20 hours for an SBS install unless there's more than 10 workstations. Our normal rate is $125/hr.

Quote 20 hours and tell them that it could be slightly more or slightly less.
 
Not enough information...
Honestly just building SBS and setting up 3x workstations for POS, you can bang that out in 5 hours.

Are you migrating data from previous workstations?
New workstations, or are you going to spend hours upgrading/cleaning/updating old workstations, old cloners made up of motherboard of the month club crap parts, cheap NICs, still running XPsp1 with Norton 2003 on them with craploads of malware?
Are you installing the POS software or are the vendors?

VPN not needed with SBS unless you're doing WANs, it has RWW portal via web browser

Performance will be MUCH better if you split up 2x arrays..RAID 1 for the OS, and RAID 1 or RAID 5 for the Exchange Store, storage, SQL, and shared apps.

Do they have all the information for their e-mail setup? POP3 info/credentials, will you continue with POP3 connector or do SMTP direct or better yet SMTP smart host? Previous e-mail to migrate into Exchange?

Training end users in using the RWW, remoting into their home PCs and showing them how? Document steps?

Training end users for Exchange, public folders, Sharepoint?

With SBS, almost any kid can do a barebones setup, make yourself shine with training and showing the clients all the power of SBS. This is where you can get minimum 4 grand for doing a small setup, and work up from there.

You'll want to beef up the backup too, unfort SBS08 doesn't directly support the RD1000, so gotta turn to 3rd party backup software. And I always get minimum 6 cartridges...5x for full backup each weekday, and 6th for offsite end of month.

Biz grade antivirus also.

Need beefy battery backup
 
The last few SBS 08 installs I have used 20+ hours, that is with migrating users off old domain, importing hosted exchange, esetting up phones and home machines.

SBS 08 is taking a little longer then expected.

I am doing one client that has a older SBS 03 network (1 employee 5 machines). Wiping each machine with Win 7 64 bit, charging him $100 per machine since its easy work, setting up a new SBS 08 box, with a full day of labor to set everything up.

Pretty easy setup since its just 1 employee. 1 machine will be designated for a field worker. Mostly just software install.

AOL user as well. So gonna sign him up with a forwarding service and pop the mail in with the connector.
 
My old rates from about a year ago for a SBS build was at least 20 hours @ $125/hr if it was local, or I'd bill $150/hr for an out-of-town rate.

Usually I was migrating data and really getting a good polish on the system. Most jobs would end up around 30 hours with the included training, systems cleanup and getting the business a failure plan.

Definitely use third-party back up solutions and business level AV.
 
I usually charge actual time, but give a good faith estimate of the number of hours I think it will take when I quote the server. Just make sure that the customer is aware that it is an estimate and could go over/under.

As for the hardware, I quote it at the same price that they could buy it for by going to Dell.com directly. I can buy at a minimum of 6% off of that, depending on the config. Generally it's more. I still make fair margin on decent machines, and the customer sees that they aren't getting gouged.

Unfortunately, the market around here doesn't allow me to charge what most of you guys can get.
 
To add to others, I would be concerned about the server you chose, and how you configured it. The T310 is an entry level server, and has some bottlenecks. It is only a 4-bay server, limiting your total number of drives to 4. Period. Experience over the last 10 years has shown me it is likely with time your client will need more storage space. With this configuration, you are painted in a corner. I wouldn't consider anything less than T410.

Also, what Raid controller option did you choose? By the price, my guess is the S100 integrated? If so- I would reconsider. This is a software raid- and coupled with SATA drives is a poor match for SBS. Spend the $$, and buy a server with a dedicated Raid controller, and use SAS drives. SATA is fine for file servers, DCs, and other functions, but on an SBS box running virtually EVERYTHING on the Domain- no. They are slugs.

I'm assuming you chose Raid10 to compensate for the performance hit of SATA? OK choice if forced to use this server with the 4-drive limit, but a much better choice IMO is the larger server, and split the array into Raid1 & Raid5.
 
^ remember he said this is 3 users right now, 2 later, at most 10.

T310 is a great server for that, and the raid he chose forces up to the Perc controller.

T410 is a nice machine, as well as the T610, but they pump your dell.com price up a good grand or more.

I do T300 or T310 on most of my setups and they are great, most of the client only have about 100GB worth of data.
 
^ remember he said this is 3 users right now, 2 later, at most 10.

T310 is a great server for that, and the raid he chose forces up to the Perc controller.

T410 is a nice machine, as well as the T610, but they pump your dell.com price up a good grand or more.

I do T300 or T310 on most of my setups and they are great, most of the client only have about 100GB worth of data.

Like I said- judging by the price my guess is the S100 controller- just a guess. The S100 DOES support Raid 10, and the S100 is not a perc- it's a software based raid, hence my concern. 310 may be a nice machine, but it's still a 4-bay server, and that makes for limited expansion. That was my point. No one has a crystal ball, but if you know your client you can look at their business and determine what future needs may be. IMO, 10 users in a software raid, with SATA on an SBS box is a mistake. Spend the money and put is SAS and be done with it. But opinions are like a**holes... everybody has one. :D
 
For $5k you could get a HP ML350G6 with a Quad Xeon, 8GB RAM, 4x 146GB SAS in RAID5 with a real RAID controller 512MB BBWC, SBS2008, etc.

I just put in another SBS2008 server that the client went out and bought on their own. They got 2x 160GB SATA in RAID1 for the OS and 3x 750GB SATA in RAID5 for data, sexchange, sql, etc. Worst idea ever. I've never seen performance so bad before in my life. Of course they have about 25 clients, too, so that doesn't help. I asked them if they could send it back and they told me no, their other IT guy had it for a month and couldn't get it running right . . . . .

My personal opinion is that SATA drives have no business being anywhere NEAR an exchange server. Unless you have at least eight spindles in a decent RAID config, then I could excuse it. I've seen Exchange 2007 run quite well on a 12x drive SATA array....
 
What's the problem with SATA for a small company like this? You think that they're going to tax the performance of the drives with 3 users? Lol, sir... lol.
 
What's the problem with SATA for a small company like this? You think that they're going to tax the performance of the drives with 3 users? Lol, sir... lol.

2 things jump to mind...

First...based on quite a bit of experience with many many server builds, I tend to agree about SATA and servers. Even plain vanilla servers, I've done a couple of budget SATA boxes for DCs and file storage..and I was embarrassed by the performance. Add to that, some end users asking "how come it's so slow?". I rarely do SATA servers anymore..except for duties where I don't need performance...like a 1-2 person terminal server with light software.

How many Small Business Servers have you installed and deployed? Have you any idea how "heavy" they are, and how demanding they are of disk throughput? Exchange alone!

Second..."Point of Sale" software! Logically "speed" is demanded with point of sale software. Who the hell wants a sluggish register with a line of impatient customers waiting to checkout? No store owner that I know of. I started my computer career as the hardware/network guy for a software shop that wrote/sold a custom point of sale/book-keeping software package for gift shops. So I'm familiar with point of sale and its demands.

Pricewise I just purchased a server for a client of mine, T610 they're replacing their old SBS03 box with a new larger faster SBS08 box. No SATA there, all SAS..5x drives..RAID1 'n RAID5, and with 6x cartridges for the RD1000 backup drive, quad core xeon, 8 gigs,....server came to mid 6k range (sans OS since they do TechSoup)
 
What's the problem with SATA for a small company like this? You think that they're going to tax the performance of the drives with 3 users? Lol, sir... lol.

If they're running SBS2008 as the OS on that server, then yes, they will tax it with SATA disks. I've seen it. It sucks.
 
^ lol at AMD_RULES, hijacking the thread and then changing his post.

... I haven't noticed an issue with SATA on small setups. SBS 03 and 08. When possible I push the SAS, but again it does increase the estimate price buy atleast a grand (cost of 250gb sata to 146gb sas on dell.com is a ~300 per disk upgrade).

2 jobs I am doing Jan... T310 - 6 workstation Architect, 2.66 Quad Core, 8GB, SBS 08 5 User, 4 250GB Raid 5 (i do 3 drive then 1 hotspare).

T610 - Quad Core 2.26Ghz, 16GB, 7 146GB SAS (2 Raid 1, 4 Raid 5, 1 Global hostpare), 30 user SBS 08, Redundant PSU.

Will have pics next week hopefully =)
 
I've got a few customers on SATA SBS03 boxes. They are all <5 clients, except one that I didn't install, just inherited. Those really small customers just can't justify the extra cost in many cases. Yes, it's slow, but it gets the job done.

My in-house SBS box is even a single spindle SATA setup for the OS and another for Exchange. It's ungodly slow to boot, but once it's running, it's fine for my employees and testing.

Slightly off topic, but has anyone here played around with SBS on a SSD?
 
Back
Top