Is a firewall router for SBS 2008 important?

John, Your SBS 2008 system is no longer the security interface that everyone goes through, so for that reason you must use a firewall on your network. With SBS 2003 you could have 2 x NICs - one facing the internet and firewalled and one internal that all your PC's communicated via and connected to your LAN. On SBS 2008 you can only have 1 NIC, so SBS 2008 and all the PCs are on the LAN. You will need a secure gateway that should be firewalled. DHCP & DNS still need to be provided by the SBS 2008 server otherwise the desktop PC's will struggle for AD and other information. Thanks David

David, thank you for your quick reply.  As mentioned previously, I run a small Insurance Agency with one employee plus myself.  With the help of your book Small Business Server 2008, I hope to do much of the work of setting up a new server before I call in the "expensive tech guys" to help with the stuff I can't figure out on my own. 
 
I am a very much a "do it yourself" person and enjoy a challange.  I have to tell you that after researching available books about SBS 2008, I was absoloutly thrilled that I found your book.  It is perhaps the best computer book that I have ever read.  It's very well written and quite easy to understand, even for an insurance salesman! 
 
It goes without saying that I have lots of questions about installation of my new SBS and configurations, but your book has been a wonderful resource.  I have read most of it and have read several sections many several times.  I realize much of what you have not explained in the book would be common knowledge for those who typically install and administrating SBS servers.   

There are significant differences between the SBS 2003 and 2008 versions and many improvements that are much appreciated.  Again, you book has been very informative.  I hope that you, or others on your blog, will continue to answer some of my newbe tech questions about SBS 2008.  I have done two trial installs so date and don't expect to go live with SBS 2008 for several weeks.  I did not want to migrate from 2003 because most of my "simple office needs can be added to a fresh install instead of migrating as I had done before from SBS 2000.  
 
Thanks a Million!
 
John GorcZyca, AKA Z-man

A firewall of some form is required as SBS 2008 is a 1 NIC solution, meaning that the network needs to be protected outside the SBS 2008 box as it only firewall's itself.

 

Thanks

David