Platinum Sponsor Highlight: Microsoft US Windows Server Business Marketing Organization Donates Windows Server 2003

[Jason Dunn]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/evaluation/overview/enterprise.mspx' target='_blank'>http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/evaluation/overview/enterprise.mspx</a><br /><br /></div><img src="http://www.digitalmediathoughts.com/images/wss_masthead_ltr.gif" /> <br /><br /><b>Vendor:</b> <a href="http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003">Microsoft US Windows Server Business Marketing Organization</a><br /><b>Prizes:</b> <a href="http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/evaluation/overview/enterprise.mspx">Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition</a> x 2<br /><b>Total Value:</b> $7998 USD 8O ($3999 USD each)<br /><br />"Windows Server 2003, Enterprise Edition, differs from Windows Server 2003, Standard Edition, primarily in its support for high-performance servers and its ability to cluster servers for greater load handling. These capabilities provide reliability that helps ensure systems remain available even if problems arise. At a high level, Windows Server 2003, Enterprise Edition, provides support for:<br /><br /><b>• Eight-way symmetric multiprocessing (SMP)</b> To increase server performance and capacity, you can add processors, an approach to increasing your network capacity is known as scaling up. The enhanced support for SMP allows you to add processors that work together—that is, multiprocessor servers. Windows Server 2003, Enterprise Edition, supports up to eight processors in a single system or partition.<br /> <br /><b>• Eight-node clustering Server clusters</b> up to eight nodes are available only in Windows 2003, Enterprise Edition, and Windows 2003, Datacenter Edition.<br /> <br /><b>• Up to 32 gigabytes (GB) of RAM</b> By adding memory, a computer can work with more information at once. Windows Server 2003, Enterprise Edition, includes enhanced memory capabilities that let you increase the memory available for server processing to as much as 32 GB of RAM. For memory support beyond 32 GB, see Overview of Windows Server 2003, Enterprise Edition for 64-Bit Itanium-based Systems."<br /> <br />What do you need to do in order to win? Well, this giveaway is a little different than the other ones: Windows Server 2003 is a fantastic platform for streaming Windows Media from, and because of that (and the fact that these are such expensive prizes) I'd like to give it to someone who would really put it to good use. <b>So here's what you need to do:</b> post a message in this thread explaining how you'd use Windows Server 2003 Enterprise to enhance what you currently do, or to do something new. If it involves Windows Media, all the better, but that's not a requirement. How can Windows Server 2003 enhance your business? What would you use it for? The best two responses, chosen by myself, will win the software. Get to it!<br /><br />This is the last giveaway partner for the Digital Media Thoughts grand opening contest, so this Monday the 21st we'll start giving away all the prizes, one group per day, until we're all out of prizes. Remember to pass the word along so people get <a href="http://www.digitalmediathoughts.com/forums/profile.php?mode=register">registered in our forums</a>!

[entropy1980]

I'd use it in my Digital Video class I am teaching this upcoming year (a a high school here in CA). We are using Adobe Premiere Pro and that has tapped out our budget (that and all the other equipment) Currently to address the need for a file server to store all that video we are looking at setting up a Samba server on a Linux box to be able to share with the Windows machines in the class because of prohibitive licensing costs which isn’t necessarily ideal considering the overhead of having to maintain a Linux box. It would be great to be able to run Server 2003 to make the setup homogenous well put together conclusion to an important part of the class….. how to store all that video! The box is a new Dell dual Xeon.

[hang5lngbd]

I am the IT department (pro bono) for my church and we have a Windows 2000 Server that we use to stream our messages to the internet. But the hardware is so old that we don't have the ability to stream it live. The messages are recorded onto CD, then copied onto the computer, coverted into .asf files and then put on the server for streaming.
This software will greatly reduce the cost required to get us up and running with a new server so that we can get live streaming audio and video. The church is ready to move forward, but the expenses are just too high at this point. This software will bring the project within our budget.

Check my little church out at http://lagunaefc.org

[that_kid]

I'd donate this to my church as we are in the process of hosting all our stuff in house. This would be perfect because we use windows media for our online streams and we could also setup our internal Network.

[Tim Williamson]

I'd sell it on eBay and use the proceeds for school. Then I'd use the computer skills I learn in school to better evangelize everything that has to do with digital media. In addition, I'd highly recommend DMT to my clients as the only web site they need to visit for the latest in digital media news. :wink:

[foldedspace]

I haven't gotten my official invitation as of yet, but I'm scheduled to leave in early November for an IT assignment somewhere in the Pacific with the Peace Corps. I'm guessing that I'll have no budget once I get on-site, so I've been spending my own money on software and hardware to take with me to do the job. Since I won't know exactly what I'll be doing until I get there (and that will likely change anyway), I've tried to cover as many bases as possible. A copy of Server 2003 would be a great addition.

[David Horn]

Hmm. A tricky one. My school (leaving next week to go to university, but would like to give them a good leaving present!) relies a lot on using digital media (videos, music, photos etc) to teach classes. They also have a fairly good IT infrastructure, as in a Windows XP Pro machine (at least one) in every room, and either 100Mbps or Gigabit network structure.

The teachers do use these to teach the classes, but some stuff is on DVD and the teachers fight over it, and some stuff is still on video. What I'd do is digitise all this stuff, so any department can stream footage relevant to their lesson to any computer and projector in the college. That way's there's no more fighting for digital resources.

Jason - I've no idea whether two ideas are allowed, but if not, please delete one. (use your best judgement :P)

Second idea: I've no idea whether this will even work, but I guess server 2003 is the best thing to do it with! In the UK, many teachers are frightened of disgruntled students launching false claims against them. ("Mr Jones touched me in ways I've never been touched before..." - Ahem.) This is to get back after some small greivance. This destroys a teachers life and career, even if they're proven not guilty. So, what I'd do is stick a cheapo web cam in every room, and have footage (black and white, maybe 5FPS at most) stored on this server (as there's a PC in each room it shouldn't be a problem.) Then if a student says something, it can be quickly proved true or false.

[mcsouth]

Well, I can't claim to have an altruistic motive, such as supporting our church or school, but given that our family is spread far and wide (my brother and his wife live in Vancouver, BC, my sister is in Bermuda, my parents and youngest brother live in Manitoba, and we - my wife and kids - live in Pennsylvania), I would use this as the backbone for a family server, dedicated to storing and sharing pictures, video, etc, of our families. I have a small website for my own family hosted by our local ISP, but it is limited in how much content we can put up at any one time. Instead of just buying more capacity with the ISP, I could look at hosting a family site myself......(of course, this could also serve double duty as my home media server... :wink: )

[ctmagnus]

Two reasons:

1) Media server

2) Mirror the entire Thoughts Media empire! (for speed/redundancy purposes) :mrgreen:

[David Prahl]

I'm looking for a new OS for my overclocked P4... :twisted:

I've told nearly every nerd I know about the DMT contest. Hopefully they took the time to sign up. Good luck to all!