we have an old gateway server here at the high school running novell 4.... we recently aquired anout 8 newer servers and we would like to know if you remove the drives from the current server and put them in the new server if they will work without any issues...we have no time for alot of downtime so this is the only idea

I have never done this. I think there will be issues because the device drivers needed for the new server will not be in Netware 4. Basically that is the NIC and the hard drive controller. You won't have a lot of downtime if you set up Netware 4 on the new server, and then copy over the user data afterhours. The main challenge is to recreate your Directory Tree. There are various ways to do this. You should search at Google and novell.com If you have a lot of users (I assume so, being a high school) you can use UIMPORT to first export the directory information, then import it to the new server. More info: http://support.novell.com/techcenter/articles/ana19950402.html It may sound onerous to do this research, but basically if you don't research, then ANY migration, be it Windows or Netware or Linux, will almost certainly end up in tears. And don't forget to do 2 backups beforehand. "If we don't succeed, we run the risk of failure." - BILL CLINTON