When your running a Lan Center you will often need ISOs for you games to load. It would be nice for it to be economical to put these ISOs on ever computer but unfortuantely its not.
So, your next thought will be okay I can set up a file share on my smartlaunch server and share it that way. That’s actually good solution but has several drawbacks.
- If your using a non-sever os like XP, or Vista you are only allowed 10 concurrent connections
- You are putting a strain on your smartlaunch server. I try to keep the box I’m actually running my Sl server on as unencumbered as possible
- If you do goto a Microsoft Server Solution it is EXPENSIVE. And for the limited methods you will be using it doesn’t warrant the extra expense
But there is another options. You can use a linux file server for all your filesharing needs. Linux isn’t nearly as hardware intensive and does a great job of file serving. Cause you will eventually have ALOT of files you share over your network. Its just simplier and less time intensive to do it this way. So I found an article on the internet a while back that did an excellent job of teaching you how to setup your first linux fileserver using xubuntu. This guide also includes how to make the server headless (No monitor, Keyboard or Mouse) which great meaning you can keep it in your server room in a cool enviroment and not have to touch it physically. But it also goes into using it for torrents and much more which you won’t need. But none the less it is a great guide and can be found here at bit-tech.net. I could have written a great guide to help out but honestly I don’t see the point in re-inventing the wheel and these guys wrote a great step-by-step guide and should be given credit for it.
This is actually pretty much the same setup I’m running also so it has been tested with Vista and does work great and I’ve had no problem mapping drives either. The key that makes all this work is the Samba Fileshare Server that they instruct you on how to install.
