Server Advisor for Small Businesses

Getting it right - What to consider when choosing your first server?

What office space do you have? Where will the server be kept?

Servers come in different shapes and sizes that are categorized into racks, towers and modular. Always keep in mind that one size does NOT fit all.

Tower Servers are built for stand-alone operations and occupy the least amount of floor space. They can fit underneath or on top of a desk and are designed to be quiet for an office environment. These also make great first servers because they offer plenty of power and are similar to a desktop computer. However, they do take up more room and can be bulky when it comes to adding additional servers.

Rack Servers are designed to be installed within a rack chassis that holds multiple servers on top of each other. These are great if you want to be prepared to scale your business and want to consolidate IT.

How Will You Be Utilizing Your Server?

You’ll need to know what primary tasks you’ll be performing and then determine what hardware you’ll need to consider, so you get the most out of your server.

Will you be needing to print and use email, or do you have databases or business applications? The type of applications will determine the type of processor, memory, and storage capacity you’ll need.
A file server will need multiple bays for hard drives since it’s primarily used for storage, while a database server will need more processing power to handle lots of user queries.

Another piece to think about is having hot-swappable components in your server. We live in a world where we are always on the go and can’t afford to have server downtime. Having hot-swappable hard drives or power supplies will allow you to replace a hardware piece without the need to power down. You can continue to run the server and keep working without interruption.

What Is Your Budget?

Servers are available in a range of price points, depending on the specificity of your workload. It’s up to you to determine what workload to run on your server. Make sure you consider your business long-term. In the long run, a more efficient server will reduce your total cost of ownership. Consider a server that will be able to adapt to your growing needs and future technology changes. Having scalability offers potential savings, plus you’ll have the most up-to-date hardware.

For example, one-socket servers are great for a small or growing business. Did you know, according to a Gartner analysis, “By 2021, dedicated x86 single-socket servers will be able to address 80% of the workloads in use in enterprise data centers, up from 20% in 2018.¹ ” These servers will be able to complete your tasks at a high-performance level.

1 Tony Harvey, “Use Single-Socket Servers to Reduce Costs in the Data Center,” December 5, 2018.

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What are your long-term growth plans?

Speaking of scalability, think about how many people access the network and how much space and power you use today. Then think about how much that will change in the next six months, a year or even five years. You want your server to be able to grow with you and adapt to your needs.

Why should you consider an easily scalable product? Because it will impact your total cost of ownership and business. Scaling late in the game may require the need to purchase more servers than originally expected. The same goes for the software that’s available. If you don’t have a way to handle these updates and increases, you may lose efficiency, and the quality of service may suffer. You want something that will grow with you and not hold you back.

How much, and what type of data do you manage?

Security is a huge risk for all businesses. You can’t afford to leave your data vulnerable to security breaches, cyber threats, and other vicious virtual attacks.

All Dell EMC servers are designed to be cyber-resilient and come with built-in security programs so you can easily automate.

Your server plays a critical role in your business and selecting the right one can play a major role in your business growth and IT goals. If you seek reliable, affordable, and scalable servers, consider the one or two-socket Dell EMC PowerEdge rack or tower servers.