Open Dental Forum

I am about to purchase a server to store my open-dental info on and wondered if it was adequate. I guess my first question is my tech guy said to get 8-10GB and dell replied back ---Windows Server 2003 standard edition allows a maximum of 4 gigabytes of RAM. Is this adequate?

Is 5 cals enough if I am starting with 5 computers? Can I add cals later without much trouble or should I be upgrading that now? I will ultimately have 7 computers long term.

This is what I have configured. Does it appear to be okay for this purpose? Thanks.

222-6792
1 Quad Core Xeon Processor E53102x4MB Cache, 1.60GHz, 1066MHz FSB, PE 1900
311-6842
1 Quad Core Xeon 2nd Processor E5310, 2x4MB Cache, 1.60GHz 1066MHz FSB, PE1900
311-6154
1 4GB 667MHz (4X1GB), Dual Ranked Fully Buffered DIMMs
310-5017
1 No Keyboard Selected
430-1765
1 Broadcom TCP/IP Offload EngineNot Enabled
341-3963
1 73GB 15K RPM Serial-Attach SCSI 3Gbps 3.5-in Cabled Hard Drive
341-3018
1 PERC 5/i, Integrated Controller Card
341-4026
1 1.44MB Floppy Drive, Internal Black
420-7118
1 Windows Server 2003 R2 Standard Edition with SP2 Includes 5 CALs
310-0024
1 Mouse Option None
430-1764
1 Embedded Broadcom NetXtreme II5708 GigabitEthernet NIC
341-3050
1 PowerVault 100T, DAT72 Tape Backup, 36/72GB, w/Controller Internal for PowerEdge 2900
313-4571
1 48X IDE CD-RW/DVD ROM Drive for PowerEdge 2900/1900
310-8292
1 Electronic Documentation and OpenManage CD Kit, PE1900
341-3963
1 73GB 15K RPM Serial-Attach SCSI 3Gbps 3.5-in Cabled Hard Drive
420-2958
1 Yosemite Backup Enhanced Pro Suite
341-4019
1 Integrated SAS/SATA RAID 1 PERC 5/i Integrated
985-3307
1 Dell Hardware Warranty Plus Onsite Service Initial Year
980-7030
1 Basic Enterprise Support: Business Hours (5X10) Next Business Day Onsite Service After Problem Diagnosis Initial Year
985-3298
1 Dell Hardware Warranty, Extended Year(s)
980-0412
1 Basic Enterprise Support: Business Hours (5X10) Next Business Day Onsite Service After Problem Diagnosis 2 Year Extended
985-3317
1 Basic Enterprise Support:Business Hour (5x10) Hardware-Only Technical Phone Support, 3 Year, Declined Software Support
900-9997
1 On-Site Installation Declined
341-1525 1 TAPE MEDIA,DAT72,1 Pack

Thanks. Lisa

If you are going to have a maximum of seven computers, you might not even need a real server unless you're going to run some other application that may need it. Open Dental works fine from a regular computer that acts as a central depository of information for the rest of the computers on the network. For example, I have five computers on my network, and the computer that acts as the server is about five years old and has a Pentium 4 processor and 512 MB of RAM. I know that when I replace it I'll get something better, but not a Xeon processor server with so much RAM. I'll probably get a regular desktop computer with one or two GB of RAM. Anyway, as it is right now, I have no problems whatsoever running Open Dental from my old machine.

2 gig is more than enough with mysql
need mirror drive for your data to be safe
never get Maxtor drive from Dell they fail every 4 months

you can save a bunch if you have someone setup a linux server for you instead of paying for windows server and the Cals...you can have hundreds of computers connected to a linux server with NO FEES.

I agree with Jorgebon, if you only have five computers now(and don't plan on going over ten any time soon), there is no reason in the world you even need a dedicated server except for the RAID capability (two mirrored drives in case one fails). Just use one of your computers as the server and it will work great. You can still get RAID for one of your main computers and it will work great. (I ran XP, but Vista should be fine as well.) Did this for many years until we needed >10 workstations and now we use linux.

I don't think you would ever notice a difference in speed with only five workstations and you can save lots of $.

I have my 5 computers hooked up to a switch. One machine with a 2666MHz Pentium 4/768MB RAM runs security software monitoring 4 cameras as well as mysql for the OpenDental database. It works acceptably. Usually no other software is running on the machines except OpenDental. The providers may use a Word Processor.

My only problem with low RAM (<512MB) relates to multiple persons logging on in multiple accounts with multiple instances of OpenDental and Office applications running.
I doubt OpenDental takes up a whole lot of room, but having multiple users logged in caused problems on a reception desk 1666MHz Athlon XP machine with 256MB, and the main server/desktop with 768MB. I solved it by having everyone log on to the same Windows XP account (only 1 log in instead of 4) and then log into OpenDental with their own password. I also simultaneously swapped that machine with a 2.08GHz Athlon 64 with 2GB.

I will soon move the cameras and database across to a different machine with an Intel Quad 2.4 Core-2 processor/2GB/$50 graphics card. I used a Quad-core because of the price/performance ratio, and to allow later expansion - I will add more cameras - requiring more processing power. The subsequent machine I assembled uses an Athlon 64 X2 (dual core) a cheaper mobo, cheaper memory and an integrated graphics card. Total cost less than half that of the Core-2 Quad. The idea was good but the machine itself is unsatisfactory with poor data fidelity when testing/benchmarking.

Any other machines for my office will likely have 2GB, but the bulk of that RAM will go wasted since each machine will only have 2 Windows XP user accounts (Admin & Office), and only one account will be used most of the time (Office). Usually no other software is running except OpenDental.

I doubt you need a floppy drive anymore. Tape backup may be over kill, though I guess with lots of images might be an interesting idea for backing up multiGB of data? I would go for a DVD Burner for archival instead of CD-RW/DVD ROM. I currently do not use images and the database zips to just over 5MB on an almost daily basis. Total backups have only just crossed 1 CD - and I could probably get rid of the very early ones. edit...
You definitely do not need a dual Quad core machine. Perhaps a dual core. Definitely not an expensive Xeon requiring expensive memory --- unless you can afford it and want it for the sheer fun (3D shoot-em-ups) which I would recommend you play on any other workstation.