Has anyone played with Windows Home Server? For lack of a more eloquent description - it's the bomb! Not quite what I expected, but sweet! I just got my setup in. I'll write a more in depth review and post it on my blog once I have time to test more.
The system I bought is HP's precanned media server, which doesn't even have a monitor. It's a relatively small box with fancy LEDs that actually convey status and a switching power supply that plugged right into my Korean outlet. I upgraded it to almost 2 Tb - yep, 2000 Gigs, and the whole system came easily under $1000.
Home server is a stripped down version of Windows 2003 Server - you may have beta tested it as early as about a year ago. The main cool features are:
1. Very manageable through a simple remote interface.
2. Magical disk storage that allows you to easily add/remove drives that all go to the same logical volume "pool", I guess...You can enable "Folder Duplication" (based on Volume Shadow Copy), which ensures 2 copies of each file at twice the disk space. I assume it stripes data across drives for performace like RAID. So, don't duplicate your "downloads" share, and duplicate your useful data. Who cares with this much space.
3. Workable automatic backup scheme. How hard has this been in the past? Entire client computers are backed up with an initial snapshot and some sort of differential/incremental backups. It's smart enough to avoid swap files, windows temp, etc. The default setting does 3 rotating: daily, weekly, and monthly backups. You can grab files from any backup or restore entire computers from snapshots. Sweet! Not that this is nearly as important as it was because I now store all data on shares on the network. Take a cue from work!
4. Remote access - I haven't played with this yet, but all descriptions point to greatness. You register a Dynamic DNS address that becomes yours. So, regardless of your ISP you get, https://joebloggs.homeserver.com, or whatever. The built in web page allows secure file transfers including browsing your pictures, etc. You can then remote control the server or any of your workstations. You can also get plugins to fire up your workstations with wake up on lan, etc. It sounds like gotomypc but better and free.
5. Some multimedia functions - photo webshare, iTunes server, works with media center to stream videos, etc, etc.
That's about it. Too cool...What do you guys think?
The system I bought is HP's precanned media server, which doesn't even have a monitor. It's a relatively small box with fancy LEDs that actually convey status and a switching power supply that plugged right into my Korean outlet. I upgraded it to almost 2 Tb - yep, 2000 Gigs, and the whole system came easily under $1000.
Home server is a stripped down version of Windows 2003 Server - you may have beta tested it as early as about a year ago. The main cool features are:
1. Very manageable through a simple remote interface.
2. Magical disk storage that allows you to easily add/remove drives that all go to the same logical volume "pool", I guess...You can enable "Folder Duplication" (based on Volume Shadow Copy), which ensures 2 copies of each file at twice the disk space. I assume it stripes data across drives for performace like RAID. So, don't duplicate your "downloads" share, and duplicate your useful data. Who cares with this much space.
3. Workable automatic backup scheme. How hard has this been in the past? Entire client computers are backed up with an initial snapshot and some sort of differential/incremental backups. It's smart enough to avoid swap files, windows temp, etc. The default setting does 3 rotating: daily, weekly, and monthly backups. You can grab files from any backup or restore entire computers from snapshots. Sweet! Not that this is nearly as important as it was because I now store all data on shares on the network. Take a cue from work!
4. Remote access - I haven't played with this yet, but all descriptions point to greatness. You register a Dynamic DNS address that becomes yours. So, regardless of your ISP you get, https://joebloggs.homeserver.com, or whatever. The built in web page allows secure file transfers including browsing your pictures, etc. You can then remote control the server or any of your workstations. You can also get plugins to fire up your workstations with wake up on lan, etc. It sounds like gotomypc but better and free.
5. Some multimedia functions - photo webshare, iTunes server, works with media center to stream videos, etc, etc.
That's about it. Too cool...What do you guys think?