Dedicated Model

Hosted Microsoft CRM comes in two configurations; a shared model and a dedicated model. The following describes the dedicated model of Hosted Microsoft CRM in more detail. As always, we like feedback and are happy to answer all your questions.

Before we get into the dedicated model, we feel it is important to point out that the dedicated model of hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM is not the most common model. The most common model for consuming hosted Microsoft CRM is what is referred to as the Shared Model.

Now that we have touched upon the most common model, let’s get back to the dedicated model. While keeping costs as low as possible and potentially avoiding any onetime setup fees is certainly attractive, occasionally a Dedicated Model will be required by the customer. The bottom line here is that a dedicated model is going to cost you more because the resources are dedicated to your organization. The following are a few good examples of when a Dedicated Model would be required:

  • Unmanaged Code – code not developed/managed by xRM or Microsoft
    • Custom Workflow Assemblies
    • Plug-in
    • Custom Web Applications
    • Custom SQL Reports
    • ISV Tools
    • Other Integrations
  • You would like to use your own Microsoft licenses (Windows, SQL, CRM, etc.)
  • High Security - your company requires physical isolation
  • Single Sign On

The above are only the most common reasons customers request a dedicated model. Unfortunately, making matters even more complicated, if and when you feel that the dedicated model is the best fit for your organization, there are two configurations; virtualized and physical. There are onetime setup fee associated with each.

For a dedicated virtualized environment the onetime setup fee is $3,500. When we do leverage virtualization, we use HyperV (Windows 2008 R2). All of our CRM environments for 15 users or more are physical servers.

For a dedicated physical environment the onetime setup fee is $7,000. Usually a good rule of thumb for when you will outgrow a virtualized instance is at approximately 15 users. This is not an exact number, especially since we have no idea what types of activities you will be performing and at what frequency. Regardless, if you have more than 15 users we strongly suggest a physical environment. We also support starting with a virtualized configuration, then upgrading to a physical configuration when need be. If you select this path, we credit you for the initial $3,500 if and when you move to a physical configuration. Just like the Shared Model, in the Dedicated Model everything is multi-tenant and we estimate being able to run approximately 150 users in the physical configuration. Additionally, just like the shared model, there are monthly recurring fees per user. To keep things simple, use $44 per user per month as your recurring cost. For more details around monthly recurring prices please click here.

As an additional point of clarification, people often ask what the onetime setup fees are for. The onetime setup fees are not simply just provisioning a new virtual machine (virtualized configuration) or physical machine (physical configuration). Onetime setup fees include, but are not limited to, VLAN and network configuration, firewall access rules, backup software licenses and configuration, additional Microsoft licenses, and installing and configuring Microsoft CRM and its pre-requisites, etc.

Q: What are the complete specs on the server(s) in a dedicated model (Hard Drive, RAM, Processor)?

Hard Drive – appropriate storage will be allocated from SAN. Local storage will be RAID1 SAS drives of 73GB or less
6GB of RAM (additional RAM up to 64GB can be allocated as necessary)
Dual Socket Quad Core 2.27GHz LV Processors or higher

Q: What does the server architecture look like? What software components will go on each server? Are the servers all set up for failover?

The infrastructure consists of multiple servers to allow for load balancing and failover. The front end servers are in an active/active hardware load balanced configuration. The data base layer consists of a clustered SQL environment in an Active/Failover configuration. SSRS is leveraged via dedicated reporting hardware.

Q: Will the Firewalls and Switches be dedicated to your environment or shared with other clients?

Yes. However logical interfaces on the firewall are leveraged to ensure network traffic separation and independent firewall access rules. VLAN technology leveraged on the switches to ensure traffic separation and isolation at the switch level.

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