Installation guide

Chapter 4. Examples of Windows Terminal Server and MetaFrame design 31
Both were formatted using NTFS. A third, FAT, partition formed the E: drive. Using imaging
software, such as Symantec Ghost, images of the operating system and data drives can be
created and stored on the E: drive.
It is a good idea to make a new image after the initial installation and then prior to any major
change to the server. Then, in the event of a system failure, you can rapidly bring the server
back online by restoring it from these backup images.
4.3 Large WTS and MetaFrame environment
A large customer needed a reliable, expandable, and centralized Citrix MetaFrame XPe
environment for 1,000 users. The customer had several existing servers at their
headquarters, including IBM
~ iSeries™ servers running business applications and
Lotus Domino™, and xSeries servers as Windows file and print servers. The customer
wanted to maintain this centralization. They wanted to keep major computing resources close
to their support staff for better service, manageability, and increased security. The customer
wanted Citrix MetaFrame to provide a full-screen desktop and several applications, such as
Office XP and Lotus Notes, to their users. The desktop was to be secured and simplified for
all users.
The customer’s headquarters was running a switched 10/100 Mbps Ethernet network with
Gbps backbone and frame-relay links to many remote offices. An implementation requirement
was to have the terminal servers join the company’s existing Active Directory so that users
could log on to any terminal server using the same account and password. A dedicated Active
Directory Domain Controller was assigned to the MetaFrame server farm to authenticate
users and to store the users’ roaming profiles. The server also had Terminal Server Licensing
enabled, which tracks the number of licenses that the customer had purchased for all of their
terminal servers.
The Citrix MetaFrame’s server farm is stored in the data store. The data store can be either
an Access, SQL Server, or Oracle database. The function of the data store is to provide a
repository of persistent farm information for all servers to reference, such as published
application configuration, licenses, and servers in the farm. To ensure a reliable and high
performance store, Citrix recommends using enterprise databases such as SQL Server or
Oracle for larger MetaFrame server farms. A dedicated server running SQL Server performs
the data store function.
We recommended that at least two domain controllers run to provide fault tolerance. The
MetaFrame domain controller was installed on an x335 server because it can be rack
mounted and has high availability options such as hot swap hard drives and redundant power
supplies.
We recommended that the customer implement several small MetaFrame servers rather than
one or two large ones. This allows the customer easily to scale the solution as user numbers
increase. It also means that fewer users are affected in the event of a system failure. The
other servers can support the slightly increased user load if one server is shut down for
maintenance or repairs.
The customer chose the x335 for the server farm. Using our CPU and memory guidelines, we
determined that each x335 could support up to 70 concurrent users. This is a conservative
estimate that should ensure excellent performance for all users. Our memory guideline
determined that supporting 70 concurrent users required 1.6 GB of RAM, which was rounded
to 2 GB. Each server was fitted with two Intel Xeon processors.