I am planning on using DFS-R to publish data to about 200 branch offices with the posibility of using DFS-N, but i have a few questions.
First a little information.
We have 10 Active directory sites (one for each region) and all servers will be running 2003 Standard (there might be a mix between R2 and non-R2 and i am pretty sure they all have SP2). most locations are connected with a pretty slow wan connection.
- Since i don't have a seperate AD site for each branch office will clients connect to thier local server (connected via LAN), or to a random server in the same AD site (even though it has to access it via the WAN)?
- I keep hearing about connection "cost" but i don't know if that's latency or if it's based on AD sites. if it's latency then i would think that's what i would want. because i would assume that the local server would always be chosen because it responds the fastest.
- Should i make all 200 servers a namespace server? Why?
- All client workstations are running Windows XP SP3 or newer, do i need to deploy a patch for failback, or is that part of the current versions of the OS's now?
- Failback seems like a good idea, right?
- I have read that the hub should only have 100 spokes or less. what options do i have considering that i plan on having 200? Add a hub?
Yeah Buddy!