Home Forums Discussions General Discussion Setting up SBS 2008 then migrate from v3 to v5

I thought I'd start a new thread with a new title more fitting to my tasks.

I started this journey when I tried migrating my v3 to v5, and was unable to get around the tuner not finding the path to the migrated database.

After much reading and deliberating, I decided I would take everyone's advice (especially Bert's) and get a real server (I was using two Windows Home Servers). After slinking around eBay, I landed what I thought was sufficient - an IBM X3200 M3 with RAID1, 4GB, and SBS 2008 R2 (not premium). I am buying 4 more GB of identical memory (I was worried about mixing memory after I first learned about not mixing UDIMMS and RDIMMS). I was not going to expand the RAID for now, unless there are compelling reasons. When I first turned on the server, it went completely through the first install, up to naming the domain name and server names, with no way to abort. So now I am at the stage of trying the rest of the suggestions of Bert's suggested technet post on installing SBS 2008.

http://blogs.technet.com/b/sbs/archive/2...erver-2008.aspx

After I have the server finished, I will upgrade some client machines (some have Home versions of XP and Vista, and I think that's not compatible with AD?). Then I will install v4 on the server, migrate the data, tune, then upgrade to version 5.

Being new at this, I want to get everyone's opinion on what I am doing, especially those who have gone down this path before. Does what I plan sound correct? Pitfalls, gotchas, and caveats please.

Thanks.

You can't put home versions of OS on a domain. At least not XP and I don't think Vista's. Basically, that is what makes them a home version. Microsoft leaves out the networking piece. It's probably on the disk just won't let you install it. Personally, if you are starting over, I would just get WIN7 Business and be done with it.

What bit OS are you using. 32 or 64? If 64, then I would increase the RAM. If 32, you can't.

I will help along the way.

The server has SBS 2008 R2, 64 bit. It has 6 physical DIMM slots, four of which will be occupied by 2GB RDIMM (8 GB total).

I have some unused WinXP Pro licenses. My initial thought was to upgrade the XP Home computers to those. I have a few Vista Home computers, and you are right, maybe I should just go for Win7 instead of Vista Pro. I worry about whether the old boxes can run the newer OS without more hardware upgrades, availability of drivers etc. I have about 1/2 Dells, but some are really off brands. My main work computer in the exam room is an HP touch screen running Vista Home.

One consideration has always been money. That's why I got eBay server instead of going with Dell. Even with corporate discount, the cheapest usable server with 2008 foundation was about $2000, and that's 4GB memory and RAID1. I saw threads on this board for server quoted at $5000 and that's just not affordable. If I can get away with cheaper options for clients, I would love it. After all, they will all work fine, I hope. I wish Microsoft sold cheaper OS, Win7 foundation for $9 or something.

Can you pass some of the specs on your old computers Windows 7 does pretty good with old hardware to a point of course.

Not sure which way you should go. But, the only advice I have for the future is stay away from all "Home" products especially if you are moving toward a server/client domain. If you get WIN7, get Business or Pro. Don't need Ultimate.

I really wish Microsoft would get away from all of these choices and just make one OS that works for everyone. If you want to sell certain things extra like networking capabilities, then that would be fine.

In the last week, I ordered and received 4GB more RAM, and two more hard drives. Unfortunately, the only configuration I could get is two RAID1 arrays of 250GB each.

Tomorrow, I will follow the Small Business Server 2008 - Build document and configure SBS. I will also install Win7 onto Vista Home machines, and XP Pro onto XP Home machines.

Then, if there is time left, I will try to install V4 and migrate the data. I am confused about tuners though. There seems to be a V3->5 tuner, and V4->5 tuner. No V3->4 tuner? If successful, I will then upgrade to V5 from V4. I assume there is no migration since they are both SQL? Do I need to tune after V4->5?

Weekend IT projects are so fun, especially when I get into uncharted territory. I am doing this myself partly to learn, and also to have some non-medical fun. So I configured my SBS Server, did a few tweaks as suggested by blogs and SBS MVPs, and was going through the steps suggested by the management console. I even signed up a new domain name through GoDaddy although that led nowhere since it takes 72 hours to propagate the new domain name. But there were glitches.

The server could not be seen on the network, nor connect to the internet. After much internet searching, I found that I missed a step the pros thought was obvious. The IP address ranges had to start with 192.168.x,n (and two others). That' not my existing network, so I had to reassign IP addresses to all my computers. Because I am in a production network and this process will likely take many weekends, I went with the non-best practice of keeping the router as the DHCP host instead of the SBS2008 server. The next step will be to individually upgrade all the client computers to Pro versions. I hope it's just going to be time consuming but not challenging, as I plan to do in-place upgrades dictated by the licenses and packages I already have on hand, from XP Home to XP Pro, Vista Home to Vista Pro and Windows 7 Ultimate.

However, I got adventurous and tried to have a spare computer that already has Vista Pro joint the server. Although the server can be seen now as 192.168.1.2, entering http://connect on the client did not go anywhere. Bert is correct. Sometime even http://connect is not obvious. Any ideas? Is there an actual IP address instead of the connect command that I can put in on the client?

There is a tuner for 4 to 5. There are some changes to the database that need to be made. Codified vaccines for instance.

I am sorry that I have may questions in the posting. I can install V4, and subsequently migrate old data from V3 to V4, but cannot find a V3->4 tuner on the list.

Jack,

Wish you would have consulted with me first. Setting up a domain is easy and hard at the same time. We have to get back to best practices. First, as you know, no Home version of any OS that I know of can connect to a domain. So, you need to be with XP Pro or Vista Business or whatever. I think I would get all WIN7 Business if possible. If you can, save the $20 and don't get Ultimate unless you really want BitLocker, which I doubt you do.

OK, after that, Best Practices. And, I am going to be firm to drive home the point:

If you want the domain to work properly, you MUST use DHCP on the server. SBS or any server for that matter wants to control everything; has to control everything. For active directory to work correctly, you need the server to be the DHCP server. Not sure what was going on with the private IPs you talked about. Anything with 192.168. and you are golden. Just as you did, make the router 192.168.1.1 or 0.1 or 16.1 -- these are the usual. Make the server in the same subnet of 192.168.1.2 just as you did. These are both static. Everything else should be dynamic or dynamic/reserved. In order for HTTP://connect to work, the clients have to be DHCP enabled. You can't assign them IPs and expect them to connect. While you can connect them manually, you really want them to connect via the connect wizard. This sets everything up the way it should be set up. You can still have the workstations use Workgroups.

Allow SBS 2008 to assign the addresses. You will end up with every client looking like this:

192.168.1.10 IP Address
255.255.255.0 Subnet Mask
192.168.1.1 Default Gateway (Inside/Private address of router)

192.168.1.2 DNS (All clients should point to the server IP)

Once this is done, your network will be fine.

I am not saying you cannot use the Router for DHCP, but it just is not a good idea.

Things like Printers and Scanners that are networked, should use DHCP and get addresses from the server and then be reserved so their IP address never changes.

First thing I would do would be to go back to how you were, stay with 3.0, and try to get all WIN7 or at least all Vista Business. If you have Vista Upgrades, I can make them full versions for you.

As for the database tuner, I keep looking for it, but someone must have it, and support should be able to give it to you.

Thanks.

I am definitely going to upgrade all clients to Pro or better. However, I will have to upgrade client computers one at a time, when I have time. In the meantime, the old network setup will still have to work as we use AC v3 until we are ready. Correct me if I am wrong, but I have to finish upgrading all computers before I can start using the server as DHCP since it won't recognize Home versions?

My weirdness with IP addresses arose because my former addresses started with 105.105.x.n.

I will be going to San Francisco next week, and another week for upgrading client Windows.

Once I have upgraded all computers, I will turn off the router DHCP, and somehow turn on the server's. I will still stay on AC v3 in production but begin a trial upgrade process to v4 and then v5. If successful, then I will ______ (somehow update the SQL with then current data? uninstall and then reinstall?) As usual, I will be doing this on nights and weekends, so I feel safer if I gave myself lots of time to play, instead of having to commit to migration over one weekend with no tech support.

Did I miss anything?

Thanks again for all the help and support.

Not much. DHCP service is probably turned off in services. When you get around to it, you can check there. Plus, you can get to it in a number of places in SBS such as Server Manager. Not a big deal. Yes, you can use your router. On the other hand, if using the router, you could just as easily use static if you need to.

Going to either v4 or v5 shouldn't be hard. You should be able to go directly to v5, but that has been an issue for some or you, can't remember, so trying v4 may work. You never have to uninstall SQL. If going directly to v5, you just install, and it will ask you migrate your data and you're done.

OK, I upgraded all my computer OSs to networkable versions, and am ready to work on connecting them to the new SBS 2008 server, which I will do tonight.

In the process, I connected two of my computers to the new AD-aware network, and was going to go through the process of installing AC v3 on the server, copy the live data files to the new server, and then migrating to v4 or v5 see if there are any problems, before I do it within the live environment. However, I have two questions.

1) what happened to the tuners? The new web pages for "Upgrade to Amazing Charts Version 5.0" from both v3 and v4 detail steps in installation, but the tuners are now not part of the process. Do we not need them any more?

2) If I succeed in full migration with this trial data, is there a way to re-import/convert/migrate live data that has a few more days of data into the trial database, or do I have to re-install?

3) I guess on a related note, if I install v5 on a second server as live replacement backup, are there files I can just copy over from the live server that has data, or is there more to it in the SQL world? Before, in v3, all we have to copy over are the mdb files and the import data files.

More problems. Referring to above post, I was going to install AC v3 on SBS2008 and then attempt to upgrade. I got stopped at step 1 - I could not install V3's MSI on SBS2008, because of error 1721 - there is a problem with this installer package, a program required could not be run. The MSI message did not give any clues as to what was missing.

Has anyone ever tried installing V3 on SBS2008?

Try one or both of the following:

1. Start in Safe mode
2. Log on to the computer as local administrator
3. Bring up a command prompt -> Start, Run, type cmd.exe and OK
4. At the command prompt, type msiexec /unregister and hit ENTER
5. At the command prompt, type msiexec /regserver and hit ENTER
6. At the command prompt, type exit and hit ENTER

Now, try your install. If this does not work, try,

1. Open a command prompt
2. At the command prompt, type sfc /purgecache, then hit ENTER
You may need to provide Windows installation source files. If not, you will receive the following message:

Windows File Protection successfully made the requested change.

3. At the command prompt, type sfc /scannow and hit ENTER
4. When finished, type exit at the command prompt and hit ENTER

Bert, your depth of knowledge never ceases to amaze me.

It's only because I have been there, dun that. Fixing it yourself always teaches you more. Thanks for the compliment.

Thanks, Bert. I thried htat, but it did not work. Nevertheless, I just copied the old AC 3.7 files to the server, data served to clients worked from there without server installing AC 3.7 for a few days, and just upgraded from that data.

I think my Saga is almost over. I finished tweaking SBS2008 per the SBS Build document on Technet Wiki, even got Remote Workspace, SharePoint, and Exchange working.

Then I installed AC v5 on the server on Tuesday night. Glitches included the installer not liking other SQL servers on SBS (had to stop all SQL services), UAC (turn off), antivirus (had to stop all services) and firewall (had to grant permission to port AC uses). Glitches on client installs included path problems on AC wanting to install into new AC 5 path instead of local client (had to uninstall AC 3.7 first), strange behavior installing from server (copy installer to local drive), and usual preconditions (turn off UAC, run as administrator, turn off entire antivirus service). Overall, it was a satisfying experience with help of a couple of angels. It was a bit hurried because I had to start at 5am PDT (earliest angel support) and begin patients by 9am (was 1/2 hour late in getting first exam room computer upgraded).

Thank you, Bert, for all your guidance and suggestions.

Next: learn all new features and figure out how to make "meaningful use". I am sure I will have lots of questions there, but that's another posting.

Wow, Jack. That's amazing. I feel bad you had to go through all that. I didn't have any of those issues. But, to have RWW, SharePoint and Exchange working is more than half the battle.

I think everything is working fine . . . except for one thing. Fro some reason, retrieving a message/chart takes almost 15 seconds before it responds. Everything else is faster than before I usually have less than 10 messages. I noticed this in 3.7, and compacting and repair did not seem to improve it. In v5 initially this problem did not seem to be there, but maybe I was not really working - just testing. I tried the new Amazing Utilities, but checking and optimizing did not improve the retrieval time. Any thoughts?

Spoke too soon. While adding risk factors, Amazing Charts gave me a Run Time Error #7 - Out of memory. Clicking the error box caused it to close.

Just a quick note - I've been running SBS 2008 for 2 years and I really didn't think about running AC on the server. An SBS server is busy - it's running Active Domain, Exchange Server, DHCP servers, antivirus programs, providing several shared public resources, possibly a fax server, outlook web version, internal business website - etc. Microsoft really doesn't want you to put your line of business software on the server - that's why they provide the premium edition. You don't need the Premium edition, but you should consider having a Windows 7 Pro machine to run the AC SQL database.

Interesting post. I suppose you could look at it that way. Please allow me to take the other side. Microsoft would go out of business if they didn't want you to put your applications and databases on their servers. Servers can be used and, indeed, are named sometimes for their uses, e.g. file servers, application servers, web servers, etc. Small Business Server was specifically designed to combine all of these things for the SMB.

Yes, SBS 2008 or 2003 for that matter do all of the above things. But, it does it with one hand tied behind it's motherboard and doesn't blink an eye if someone throws on SQL Express. SBS 2008 on server hardware is much better equipped and a lot less taxed than WIN7. I can't fathom having a server and not running AC on it. If you go to My Computer's Properties and check the Advanced tab, on a client you will want it set to Programs. This is what it does best. On a server, you want that checked to Background Processes, because you don't physically run programs on servers (for the most part).

Active Directory is not a reason to not put AC on SBS, it is the reason to put AC on it. Active directory maintains a hierarchy of data such as hardware and faxing, objects, and users and administrators. It allows admins to manage the network and users. A server with SBS gives the admin much more granular control of permissions.

Then, there is the greater ability for multiple hard drives and RAID, volume shadow services for every hour or whatever you decide backups, better backup capabilities, etc. If you install SQL on WIN7, you now have, in effect, two servers. The whole idea of a client/server model is a central repository for files, drivers, applications and databases. Best practices dictates that ALL data in an office be stored on one drive or one partition. That one partition should be backed up nightly. It is not as easy to back up email and other data on a server while backing up AC on the other computer. And, I mean complete backups, not just AC's .enc files.

It sounds like what you have proposed works very well for you, and I am certainly not going to tell you otherwise. But, I am so passionate about this, I am begging Jack to run AC from the serve.

Getting back to the quote, I am not understanding why Microsoft doesn't want business software on their servers. How does Premium change that besides SQL and the extra license for Windows Server 2008. This is meant more for terminal services than for running an application and database.

Again, my opinion, no offense.

But, Kevin is a computer superuser, so he may know way more than I do on this. I guess just a good debate.

One thing that Kevin could be referring to in Premium is the additional licensing of Server 2008, which could be used for LOB applications, although you would need to have new hardware or have enough RAM for Hyper-V virtualization.

I actually have a premium license, but chose not to set up another server just for SQL. It seems to be working fine for the most part.

I don't know the inner workings of AC, but it seems that not closing AC clients frequently enough (I don't log off my office computer at night) seems to be causing slow-downs in retrieval of messages.

I love hearing from different people on how things work for them. I especially appreciate the real world experience Bert has with AC. Kevin seems to be getting more out of SBS features. Personally, I like the idea of putting AC on the SBS server. Actually, all the rest were just bonuses for me - I worked without the benefit of AD, Exchange, SharePoint, RWW etc, and I am sure the users (who currently rave about the new features) would not have known what they were missing. IF a suitable machine was on sale, I could have easily swung towards using just a plain server instead of SBS. The feature that I like the most is RWW - so much cleaner and faster than LogMeIn. However, I still use LMI from the iPad.

Wow!

Finally someone who can tout the benefits of:

-- SharePoint (please give what you use it for

-- Exchange Server in house

-- RWW (the most secure remote software for remoting in -- plus you can access Outlook Web Access and ALL of your clients from one place.

I use SharePoint for internal communications and announcements, as well as policies and procedures. There are some other assorted parked documents, such as network referral directory, some formularies, etc. The shared folder was getting unmanageable. The search function in WSS3 is a welcomed improvement on WSS2 or file manager searches, and is so much more robust.

I find OWA to be more dependably usable for my staff than a separate email client that I have to configure (Pegasus, Outlook). So I have forwarded the public business email addresses (@hometownedoc.com) to the new abbreviated ones (@htfm.biz) and have all staff use that via OWA for both external and (longer) internal email. I use IPmsg for quick internal messaging, and AC for patient related trackable messaging.

I use RWW for charting on AC from home. I still keep LogMeIn so I can use the iPad (could nto find an adequate RDP client) and for the odd time I have to do things that RDP does not allow (or I haven't found out how, such as transmitting Alt-Ctrl-Del).

Good to hear how others do it. We have over 400 contacts in SharePoint all searchable in many ways. I would say keeping folder libraries are the best as we keep all of our files organized in folders in separate libraries. Very cool. Works great and easy for staff to make a new folder.

Announcements are good especially if staff have their notifications set. Calendar is awesome. It's just very cool and helpful for staff to open their browsers and have the "Companyweb" open. Everything you need to work is right there.

I have read about users using OWA. I never understood since Outlook rolls out automatically when you connect to the domain and seems more manageable than OWA. Of course OWA (Outlook Web Access) is the web version of Outlook and appears identical -- for those who haven't seen it.

Again, Remote Web Workplace is more secure than LogMeIn, GoToMyPC, RDP or even VPN. It is a very robust feature. The RDP app I use on my DroidX is just called Remote Desktop and CTRL ALT DELETE is readily available. LogMeIn works just as well and is easier to set up to all workstations.

I find it really helpful to have both LogMeIn and RWW. There are times when RWW just won't work as well, such as when troubleshooting server problems. But if I just need to use AC from the hospital RWW is faster. Before I upgraded to a Gb network at the office, it seemed slower than LogMeIn.

By the way Bert, what are your SQL access times on your network? Mine have been creeping upwards and I'm thinking about 'switching' to a managed switch.

Mine are extremely fast. It's funny, because I bought a rather expensive Linksys/Cisco switch three years ago with PoE and QOS and now I am probably switching to VoIP, and it is perfect.