Microsoft Licensing Help

[Penguin Enigma]

Hey,

Just want to say any help would be greatly appreciated, I've been reading for days now but haven't got a clear answer and finding a reseller has been painful.

Recently joined a new company and basically, I'm now their IT Department.

Their licensing is a mess and not everything seems to be fully legal and they want to upgrade anyway, so I've been looking at licensing options. But it's slowly killing my brain...

I've got about 100 Nodes (15 Office workstations, the rest take outside calls and access DB's) and about 10 Servers.

Hoping to go to Server 2K3 and Win XP Pro. And the difference between access licenses is making me blink.

The machines taking outside calls would all login using a single user account, they would access most of the servers almost constantly. All the servers need access to each other of course. And all the office workstations to the servers.

Maybe this is stupidly easy and I'm missing something, but anyone got any clue on what I need?

Oh and ur, if anyone knows any suppliers in/near/that can send to, Calgary, Alberta, Canada. That would be excellent, since trying to find one has been horrible as well.

Thanks Again.

[r8500]

Well, I am trying to understand what you are asking, but I will lead you as best I can.

First off, you will need a licenese of Windows XP Pro for every workstation that is gong to be used/upgraded. That is the easy part.

You will need a license for 2003 server for every server that you want to have it running on, so in this case, possibly 10.

You say there are 100 nodes, and only 15 of those are in the office, the rest are taking outside calls. How are they connecting to the network?

[Penguin Enigma]

*nods* Got the basic licensing easy enough, its the access licensing that I'm confused on.

Basically the other machines take outside calls on a PSTN (phone/dial) network with a special card, then are connected to the network through a regular NIC, switches, CAT5E, where they access the DB's on the servers for interaction with the calls coming in.

As I understand it, I need 15 Per User CALS for my workstations (they sometimes move between computers)

It's the 85 other machines, which use a single login, but which need to access the servers I'm unsure about. Which seem to sometimes have multiple connections to a server at once, due to how the custom programmed applications connect to the servers.

I'm not sure if those 85 should be based on a Per Server CAL, or if Windows even allows a mixed licensing environment (I haven't found anything that says yae or nae). Or if a Per User CAL would allow multiple connections (though if I understand what I've read, likely not).

And as well, does the Server License include a CAL for interconnection of the servers? Which occurs under certain DB access situations?

Urm... I hope that all made sense and could be followed. If not, just poke me and I'll try and expand, thanks for helping.

[r8500]

Well, since every user is going to need to access every server, you not only need 15 cal's, you need 15 on each server.

Then there is the question of the other 85 users who will be using one log in. In reality, to keep it legal, you should have a full set of licenses for them, even though they are all only using one log on. Where it gets expensive, is you are supposed to have licenses for them, for every server they are going to access.

You can not run a mix of per user and per server licensing. Well, technically you can, however, not on the same server. One server can run one, the other can run the other. You see what I am getting at?

Shoot me a PM or an e-mail with the exact setup you are looking at, including which server is doing what, and I will map it all out for you in writing so you know what you need to buy to get legal.