Conclusion and Future Considerations

The launch of Windows Server 2003 marked a major milestone toward halting the proliferation of small servers that potentially waste computing resources and increase management efforts and costs.

But the success of Windows Server 2003 as a platform for consolidation will depend on proper implementations and continued improvements to the entire Windows Server System.

Success Requires Planning

Although it may at first seem simple to reduce the number of servers running a business’s IT infrastructure, particularly during migration from one version of a server OS to the newest release, careful planning is required. Considerable effort is required to determine the following:

• Which applications are running on servers throughout the organization
• Any incompatibilities among applications that would impact heterogeneous consolidation
• The resource requirements of each application
• The appropriate systems management procedures and tools required to manage consolidated servers
• Any organizational