Which Operating System?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Sam
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Sam

I'm looking at buying an Operating System for a Access
2003 data application stored on one computer. The other
computers would have read only access. The database will
be updated on one computer that it is saved on. This
would be like a server. I'm looking at four computers.
Which operating systems should I get? Windows XP Home, XP
Pro, or Windows 2000 Server?

Can I use XP Pro to do the job and I'm looking at
something that isn't that expensive because the budget is
tight. Any ideas?
 
Even if the database is on a server, you still need Access installed on each
workstation. Access isn't a server application: it's a client application.
That means there's really no reason to use a Server OS.

Windows XP Home Edition will be adequate if money is an issue.
 
Get XP Pro or the server OS. XP Pro, like NT4WS and Win2kPro are limited to
10 simultaneous peer connections. If you need more than that, you'll have to
go with the server OS. You may want to take a look at the Small Business
version of the server. It has modem sharing, fax sharing, Exchange Server,
and other items. The SBS 2000 was great, but SBS 2003 has many improvements
that make things even easier. The SBS 2003 comes in 2 versions, the more
advanced one also includes ISA server and SQL server. The server will also
function as your Internet connection, especially if you have ISA server. ISA
server includes a firewall and is a caching proxy server. The latter is very
nice if you have a slow network connection because it will cache files that
have been downloaded recently so that the next user gets them from the
server instead of over the slow connection.

Once you have the server, you can also get some good server backup software
that will backup your workstation computers. I'm using Veritas Backup Exec
v9 on an SBS 2003 server. It includes the ability to backup to a hard drive,
so you can put in an extra hard drive or two in the server to hold backups
instead of buying an expensive tape drive.
 
I'm looking at buying an Operating System for a Access
2003 data application stored on one computer. The other
computers would have read only access. The database will
be updated on one computer that it is saved on. This
would be like a server. I'm looking at four computers.
Which operating systems should I get? Windows XP Home, XP
Pro, or Windows 2000 Server?

Can I use XP Pro to do the job and I'm looking at
something that isn't that expensive because the budget is
tight. Any ideas?
Click to expand...

Any of these will work. Be aware that Access is by its nature a "file
server" database, not a true client/server. You should have the
computers networked, and "split" the database so that the tables are
in one shared .mdb file, and each of the other three computers has
Access installed and a copy of the "frontend" database containing the
forms, reports etc.
 
XP home does not have 'domain login'.
You may find that you have to set up mapped drives
rather than using UNC drives (just so that the connection
login validation can be done).

Note that Access does NOT work well in situations where
one user has read/write access and the other users are
read-only. Read-only access will be disabled while you
write to the database.

(david)
 
Sam said:
I'm looking at buying an Operating System for a Access
2003 data application stored on one computer. The other
computers would have read only access. The database will
be updated on one computer that it is saved on. This
would be like a server. I'm looking at four computers.
Which operating systems should I get? Windows XP Home, XP
Pro, or Windows 2000 Server?

Can I use XP Pro to do the job and I'm looking at
something that isn't that expensive because the budget is
tight. Any ideas?
Click to expand...

You should get windows 2000 server ok.

Cheatah Search Beta CEO Ryan
 
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