[There's a reason that Yoda is the unofficial mascot of SBS. Size indeed matters not.] I'll take fries with that - THE OFFICIAL BLOG OF THE SBS DIVA
Thu, Mar 26 2009 23:10 bradley

I'll take fries with that

Karl has a post today about an operating system push back...

http://smallbizthoughts.blogspot.com/2009/03/is-operating-system-push-back.html

The push back of Essential Business Server. 

Let's put aside the larger price tag. (It is a bit steep in my opinion)  Let's put aside the fact that the name could be a lot better, (It sounds like it's not less features than Small Business Server when it has more) Let's not talk about how many of the var/vaps with pre-existing deals with firewall vendors want to maintain that relationship thus one of the first questions is whether or not they can rip out that ISA/TMG firewall and replace it with their firewall product that they prefer. 

Let's talk about how it could be better positioned.

As a Combo meal. 

I agree that down here in the S space to get my firm to buy three servers is a very hard sale.  But that's where I think that Microsoft and the hardware vendors need to sell a Combo meal. 

Don't sell three servers, Sell one HyperV server with three parts of the meal or server roles on the box.  For a firm to be compliant with some parts of regulations these days you need separation of duties that SBS 2003 and SBS 2008 can't muster.  So have a combo meal offer where all three servers are virtualized on one piece of hardware.

This is where virtualization can provide the green of IT in the SMB space as well.

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# re: I'll take fries with that

Friday, March 27, 2009 12:11 PM by AmyB

But you have to remember that EBS isn't designed for your market space. It's for much bigger businesses. The range is 50-250. But like SBS it has a sweet spot and right now that sweet spot is 100+. Those businesses are poorly managed and have 10-15 server today. EBS is a consolidation solution, they put in 3 EBS servers and likely eliminate 5-6 existing servers.

Add virtualization to the mix and you've got an even more compelling message.

# re: I'll take fries with that

Saturday, March 28, 2009 3:09 PM by harry brelsford

Thanks for highlighting this - I feel this is one of the Conversation we need to have and both you and Karl have brought this to the forefront. I've cross-linked so taht I can hopefully drive awareness to this convesation!

Witness: harrybrelsford.wordpress.com/.../smbspringwebinar

# re: I'll take fries with that

Sunday, March 29, 2009 8:59 AM by John

"For a firm to be compliant with some parts of regulations these days you need separation of duties that SBS 2003 and SBS 2008 can't muster."

Susan,

Maybe I am missing the whole point here.

I think your statement is FUD. MS sells additional licenses to Windows 2008 server separately; you may add as many as you need to your SBS domain for isolation of services. What regulation requires more than that?

John

# re: I'll take fries with that

Monday, March 30, 2009 2:25 AM by bradley

It's actually not FUD.  Check out the PCI-DSS requirements.

2.2.1 requires -- "Implement only one primary function per server"

SBS fails.

If you set up a SBS 2003/2008 standard take a look at the PCI documentation that requires that the database be separate and that there be a DMZ, and that 'there is no direct route inbound or outbound for traffic between the Internet and the cardholder data"

www.pcisecuritystandards.org/.../pci_dss_download.html

No fud.