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Windows 95 and its built-in peer-to-peer networking may be fine for sharing files and a printer among a handful of PCs. But what if your business is growing rapidly and all those PCs are fighting over resources like a roomful of preschoolers?

If your old ad-hoc network can't cut it anymore, maybe you should step up to a dedicated network server. And if that's the case, or if your existing server is simply beginning to show its age, a new generation of low-end servers makes this a great time to upgrade.

Servers have traditionally been expensive and complex, requiring the attention of a full-time network administrator. But as the desktop PC price war percolates upward, major PC vendors are beginning to offer well-appointed servers for less than $3000 (see "Network Power for Small Business"). In some ways, these systems resemble beefed-up PCs. They come outfitted with the same Pentium II processors and the same amounts of RAM that you typically find in today's power desktops. The key differences: These servers are equipped with speedy SCSI hard drives and network management utilities that make setup and maintenance easy enough for even nonexperts. "At this point, the hardware is pretty much a commodity," says Chris Carrigan, associate analyst at Summit Strategies. "The real differentiators are software and service."