Benefits of Upgrading Your System, Research Proposal Example

Prologue

‘Ivy Leagues Incorporated’ is a ‘small medium enterprise’ that sells widgets. The organization, having a single office has nearly 250 employees. The network operational processes are conducted within the organization. The application software is “Microsoft Windows XP” in all the workstations. The email utility is Novel 5.0 and there are no client upgrades.

This proposal highlights the network and computing equipment reliability, meeting the current technology trends and security factor of the organizations. The emphasis will also be given on the current network infrastructure and servers providing services to the organization business processes. Full consideration is given for not replacing the current servers, but to use them in a more efficient way as limited cost is also a crucial factor.

The issues related to the current network environment of the organization are scattered. The application software installed in the workstations and server are not standardized, which may result in hardware and application compatibility issues. There is no data access policy defined. Hardware of the workstations is not competitive to meet the current technologies efficiently.

The initial step is to standardize the application software and servers. The hardware also requires to be updated for enabling full efficiency of the network. Identified server will replace on purpose as the new system will support multiple features. Hardware upgrades of some servers are also required.

Highlighting Issues

The issues are divided in categories in order to accentuate each issue in detail

Hardware not sufficient

‘Ivy Leagues Incorporated’ has 11 servers in total, all providing administrative task of a different kind. Before purchasing the computing equipments, some factors need focus. The factors are, whether the new motherboard will support the next generation of components?(Morris 72-78) Except the IBM Xeon based database server, all the servers are not meeting the minimum hardware requirements. This is severely impacting the business processes and efficiency of the network. The application and file servers are handling request of 270 hosts on a Pentium 3 based machine resulting in exceptionally slow response time.

Servers adequate

There are total 12 servers for supporting business processes and administrative tasks on 270 nodes. 12 servers are too many for supporting a 270 nodes network with common requirements. System engineer at Cisco systems, Ian Kennedy says that the ‘small medium enterprises’ do not want to spent a vast amount on network costs, but they still require complicated network requirements to ensure the performance and reliability of the networks. SME maintains a robust network to stay competitive in spite of their size(Twenty 26-27). Keeping the complexity of the requirements of the organization, some of the servers need to be replaced.

Modifying Network

Hardware Upgrade

Upgrades and changes are highlighted in blue and green in Figure 1.1.

The software firewall is upgraded because more processing power is required, because it filters the ‘real-time’ unwanted traffic ‘inbound’ and ‘outbound’ from the network. The firewall system receives the inbound traffic and works on these parameters: IP source address, Protocol destination address, User datagram protocol, Transmission control protocol and Internet control message protocol (Ehimen and Oyakhilome 75-80). The hardware for the application server is also not recommended and need to be upgraded. The application server performs the processing of the business logic (data processing). It is a two tier client server course of action which is most common. In this case study, application server is processing the business logic and the user interface. The data is retrieved from the database (“Application Server.” 1). The email server will also be upgraded for optimal performance in processing the electronic mails of the organization.

Installing new Server

The organization needs a centralized controlling administration. This is provided by joining the workstations with the domain controller. The two servers, Primary NDS and Secondary NDS are replaced by the Active Directory server. This server will control the access policies and administration centrally. Active directory will support the upcoming trends as it supports both back tracking and forward tracking capabilities. The DNS functionality is built-in in this new Server.

Upgrading Application and Email software

The systems running windows 2000 upgrades to Microsoft Windows Server 2003 if there hardware is already upgraded. The exchange server upgrades by the Microsoft Exchange Server 2007.

Conclusion

By spending the amount which is below $ 4000, the systems of the organizations will become robust, effective, reliable and secure. The implementation of active directory will control the administrative issues centrally. The user access policies are implemented within the organization eliminating vulnerabilities to the organizations database. The removal of the two domain servers advances and speed up the process for domain resolution as active directory supports this feature in a more effective way. The new, improved exchange server will boost the performance of the email delivery and transmission, enabling the effectiveness of the organization which may impact the customer. The application server upgrade will result in a hassle free computing environment within the organization, keeping the stress level low of the employees resulting in better performance, which is beneficial for the organization.

Works Cited

 “Application Server.” Computer Desktop Encyclopedia (2010): 1. Print.

Ehimen, Okonigene Robert, and Ikhajamgbe Oyakhilome. “Development of a Software Based Firewall System for Computer Network Traffic Control.” Leonardo Electronic Journal of Practices & Technologies.15 (2009): 75-80. Print.

Morris, James. “Radical Hardware Upgrades. (Cover Story).” APC 27.11 (2007): 72-8. Print.

Twenty, Jessica. “Networking for Smaller Firms.” Computer Weekly (2005): 26-7. Print.