How to set up a server and 4 W7 computers

[scott46]

We have a small office consisting of four Windows 7 computers and a server with Windows Server 2008 Standard. We use the server just to store our shared data, no programs. Each of the four offices has one ethernet port with each port going to an equipment room too small for the server. They connect to a 16 port switch and Comcast gateway in the equipment room which gives them access to the internet.

- Can we hook the server and one computer to a switch or router in one office and use the one port in that office to connect to the 16 port switch where the other 3 computers connect?

- What settings do we need to use on the server to allow it to share data with the four computers?

Thanks for any help. Oh, I'm not a network guy but I know which end of an ethernet cable to plug in... 😉

 

[USAFRet]

- Can we hook the server and one computer to a switch or router in one office and use the one port in that office to connect to the 16 port switch where the other 3 computers connect?

A switch, yes (probably).

- What settings do we need to use on the server to allow it to share data with the four computers?

Completely unknown without a lot more info.

 

[drtweak]

IF you have just the 4 offices, and as long as the Comcast router has 4 ports on it then you can connect each of the 4 offices to a port on the router, then use the switch in one office that the PC and Server connect to and then the switch to the jack in the office going back to the router.

That will work.

As far as sharing data, how sensitive is the data? It is best to have a domain but you are small, so we need to adding MATCH usernames and passwords on the server.

So if PC 1 has a username of lets say tombrady and a password of tom123 then you need to make a user with the same username and password.

NOTE: The User name and the Logon name are TWO different things. Now the windows side they are USUALLY the same but on the server side not always.

It all depends if the server was setup as a domain or not. The way you know is you need to right click on Computer form the Start Menu and go to Properties. Then under server name if it just sever the server name then it is not on a domain. If it says something like servername.mybusiness.com or .local then it is a domain server.

For example. I have a client. Their server is named pinn1. If it was NOT on a domain the computer name will be Pinn1 but because they have a domain called DENT the full server name is pinn1.DENT.local

Find that out first then we can move on how to properly share files.

If you don't care about security at all then we can set it up so anyone on your network can read and delete any file but that is not recommened.

 

[scott46]

IF you have just the 4 offices, and as long as the Comcast router has 4 ports on it then you can connect each of the 4 offices to a port on the router, then use the switch in one office that the PC and Server connect to and then the switch to the jack in the office going back to the router.

That will work.

As far as sharing data, how sensitive is the data? It is best to have a domain but you are small, so we need to adding MATCH usernames and passwords on the server.

So if PC 1 has a username of lets say tombrady and a password of tom123 then you need to make a user with the same username and password.

NOTE: The User name and the Logon name are TWO different things. Now the windows side they are USUALLY the same but on the server side not always.

It all depends if the server was setup as a domain or not. The way you know is you need to right click on Computer form the Start Menu and go to Properties. Then under server name if it just sever the server name then it is not on a domain. If it says something like servername.mybusiness.com or .local then it is a domain server.

For example. I have a client. Their server is named pinn1. If it was NOT on a domain the computer name will be Pinn1 but because they have a domain called DENT the full server name is pinn1.DENT.local

Find that out first then we can move on how to properly share files.

If you don't care about security at all then we can set it up so anyone on your network can read and delete any file but that is not recommened.

All 4 computers can read and delete files because we all work on common files on the S drive but we all have our own U drive that is private. During a recent move, some settings got changed. The server had a static ip but someone changed it to DCHP. Too many cooks... Anyway, once we get back to being able to access the shared drive and access the Internet we will replace the 16 port switch with a hardware firewall that has 8 ports. Does this seem reasonable?