Some pretty good hardware. On the new server, do you mean 16 TB HDD? SASs are a great idea. The part I am confused about is if you are not entertaining Cloud and you do want to go with Remote Desktop Server, then you will need two servers. Today.
I admire your wanting to learn by doing, and sometimes the saying is just jump in and get your feet wet. But, for this project, I would let the attending do it and you can be the resident.
I would email the email address in the PM.
