How many users can one Xserve support?

[infinitysupport]

I posted this question over in Apple’s user forums and got zero response, so I’m re-posting here hoping that someone will.
[url]http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1495353&tstart=0[/url]

I have one Xserve (10.5.2, 2x3GHz, 5GB RAM, 1.34TB RAID 5) that I want to support the following services for my medium-sized business:
DNS, DHCP
AFP, NFS, SMB
Open Directory
Print
Software Update

I also want to have mobile sync’d network home folders, but only for ~/Documents and iCals and Address Books (I don’t want everyone’s MP3s or family photos).

I occasionally will use NetBoot/NetInstall, but only 1-2 users at once.

I am getting ready to migrate my company to OpenDirectory and 10.5.2 for all users and was hoping someone here might be able to tell me how many users I can reasonably support with one Xserve.

Also, is it a bad idea to have everyone using “mobile” accounts? It seems like it would be less strain on the server to have the occasional sync from users than everyone reading & writing all the time.

Thanks.

[premiermac]

I’d think that would be a fine server for plenty of people; at least a hundred or so, but it really depends on demand. Are you sure you need all of those services? Do you really need print? Think it through a little more thoroughly. You may consider another inexpensive server or two for some of the stuff like DHCP and DNS, simply to avoid having all the eggs in one basket.

[infinitysupport]

I didn’t specify the number of users because I was hoping someone would throw out a number instead of Apple’s generalized platitudes.

We currently have less than 50 employees.

This is not our only Xserve, but the other one will need to be updated to Leopard before I can use it to provide OD replication, etc.

Once some of the more vexing Leopard Server problems get fixed (AFP fails, DNS setup problems, etc.), I plan to transition everyone to this newer server, then update the older one and provide some redundancy and load-balancing between the two. In this big move I’ll be (trying) to transition everyone from “local user” mode to “managed directory” mode and I want to make sure that one Xserve can handle that many home directories, authentications, etc.

I would like to have a Windows server providing DNS and DHCP simply for the dynamic DNS updates of DHCP clients that have yet to be implemented on the Mac side, but that’s not in the budget right now.

Thanks for your help. Any other advice?

[premiermac]

You don’t need the Windows server. Just use ISC dhcpd; it’ll do dynamic DNS plus failover to the other server. Easy to install with MacPorts, and easy to configure with Webmin.

[infinitysupport]

I know that there are many options for handling DHCP and dynamic DNS on the OS X / Unix platform, but I want it handled natively by the OS or Apple. I’ve looked into dhcpd before, but the point of spending several thousand dollars on an Apple products and support is that I get a (mostly) reliable product with 24×7 support.

Besides, wouldn’t that be keeping all my eggs in one basket? 😉

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