KWSupport : WHS

WHS - Now ready for Business PrimeTime?

kwsupport — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 23:12:00 GMT

One of the knocks on Windows Home Server (WHS) is that it contains the word 'Home' in its name. If that issue has kept you from selling or installing WHS in businesses, then check out the news from HP -- they have released WHS with a new name: HP StorageWorks X500 Data Vault!

The equipment is almost identical to their HP MediaSmart Server models, except with a faster processor, and SKU's with larger (1TB and 1.5TB drives) in them.

I install WHS in all my business client offices -- even those with SBS servers. Are you?

WHS & SBS: Approved for Backups

kwsupport — Sat, 22 Aug 2009 12:54:00 GMT

For more than a year I have been promoting the use of Windows Home Server as a local backup solution in a Small Business Server (SBS2003/SBS2008) environment (per these two blogs: blog1 , blog2). I already have WHS installed at most of my SBS customer sites.

It now seems as if Microsoft is now willing to say "Yes" -- that using WHS to backup your workstations and servers is a viable and supported scenario! Read more on Microsoft's Technet site.

Microsoft Karaoke Server???

kwsupport — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 00:24:00 GMT

I just stumbled across a new software product from Microsoft called SongSmith. I can see it now: WHS + SongSmith = Microsoft Karaoke Server!!!

WHS Business Opportunities

kwsupport — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 14:56:00 GMT

If you are a Microsoft Partner, there will be a 5W/50 webinar entitled “Business Opportunities with Windows Home Server – Updated with PowerPack 2 Content” today at noon (EDT) given by Grey Lancaster and Kevin Royalty. If you think WHS is only for homes, then you're still thinking within the box! WHS is a perfect fit with SBS 2003/2008.

WHS and the Acer Aspire easyStore H340

kwsupport — Wed, 27 May 2009 20:42:00 GMT

Talk about a deal too good to refuse! Acer recently came out with their WHS server, that competes straight up with the HP MediaSmart Server. For the rest of this post, I will refer to it as the 'easyStore'. A week ago I stumbled on a deal through NCIX (USA) that was offering the easyStore for $399, with a 1TB drive and 2GB memory, and for a limited time was throwing in a second 1TB drive. I jumped at the chance. And it arrived by FedEx this afternoon.

Within 30 minutes I had it unboxed, powered up, installed the WHS connector to my Win7 laptop and now running a full backup. A few random thoughts:

It comes with a real honest-to-goodness printed manual (in 6 languages)!
Astethics of the external box is very nice. Black color, USB port in front, 4 more in the back along with an Ethernet port
System started up and was up and running without a hitch or issue. I like that!
WHS PowerPack 1 is already installed on it. Be sure to get Power Pack 2 installed on it!

What's new or different with the easyStore versus HP?

The easyStore comes with an IP Configuration tool to adjust the server's IP settings. Since this works from the rmeote WHS console, you no longer need to access the server via Remote Desktop to make such changes.
Acer has implemented a one-touch USB backup. What you may say? Simply put, plug in a USB drive that contains various media files and press the USB button. The easyStore will automatically copy all the files on that USB drive to the Public shared folder on the server, and automatically place each file in it's appropriate sub folder (Music, Photo, Video)! How cool is that. You no longer have to logon to the WHS console in order to access the USB drive and copy files.
The easyStore comes with a 6 month subscription to McAfee's Total Protection software pre-installed
The easyStore also comes with the WHS Lights Out addon that allow you to suspend or wake up the server at specific times, such as when its time to backup workstations.
The easyStore also comes with Digital Media Server (DMS) and an iTunes Server.

For a more in-depth review, along with pscreenshots, check out Andrew Edney's blog post on the Acer easyStore.

Once my first backup is completed, I'll test adding the second drive to this server and report on my findings!

WHS and Power Pack 2

kwsupport — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 18:25:00 GMT

Microsoft released Power Pack 2 for Windows Home Server today (KB 956587). This is a free update that offers several new features. It does require you to already have Power Pack 1 installed.

SBS, WHS and Backup Software

kwsupport — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 06:32:00 GMT

One of my mottos has always been: "You cannot have enough backup!". So, I am always investigating and testing backup software. When Microsoft first releasd Windows Home Server (WHS), I knew that this was a product I would be testing. Well, tonight, it saved my bacon!

My own SBS 2003 server that has been running for years experienced a serious hard drive failure. Fortunately I do use Raid-5 disk configuration. So I shut down the server, replaced the drive, fired up the server to rebuild the Raid, and then rebooted. But apparently something else was amiss, as Windows would not boot up properly, reporting a failure or corruption with Active Directory. After trying a couple of other options unsuccessfully, I decided to see if WHS would get me back online.

Yes, I use WHS as my backup software of choice for backing up my SBS 2003 server! (P.S. The WHS Team has an informative article here).

So, I pulled out my WHS Restore CD and booted my server off the CD. However, it did not load a driver for my NIC card. No problem, as I knew the drill: go to another workstation, fire up the WHS Console, view the backup directory for the computer in question (my SBS server), and copy the contents of the WHS Drivers for Recovery folder to a USB thumb drive, and rename the folder to DRIVERS. I then took the thumb drive back to the server, where the WHS restore screen has a convenient button to install additional drivers. An hour later my server was back online and operational!

Lessons learned? There are lots of vendors offering backup software solutions for the Windows marketplace. I have used Acronis, ShadowProtect, and others. These are all good products. But WHS is a real winner for me, and for many of my small business customers. I have WHS installed and backing up both SBS 2003 and SBS 2008 servers, plus serveral peer-to-peer networks. It just works! It has even recovered a Windows 7 Beta laptop for me!

Now, someone may say that offsite (or remote online) backups are required, and I would not argue that point at all. Remember: I believe in multiple levels of backup solutions. But for the small business and home environments, WHS is an excellent backup software solution.

Cheers!

WHS Restore CD and Realtek NIC

kwsupport — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 20:05:00 GMT

I've been testing out the Windows 7 beta on one of my laptops this week. And following my own best practices, I made sure I installed the WHS connector on it and made several backups during my testing. So, yesterday I tried (unsuccessfully) to join the Win7 laptop to a SBS2008 domain. (Yes, I'm aware of my changes required on SBS 2008 to allow Windows 7 to join the domain via http://connect). But still, it failed.

So, when I got home I wanted to restore my laptop to its state before my attempt to join it to a domain. Talk about wasting valuable time!

First, I couldn't find my Restore CD. So, I downloaded the WHS Restore CD (PPK1 version) from Microsoft's web site. But, in trying to burn the ISO image, I encountered two bad CD's in a row. Fortunately, the third CD worked. Once I got the CD created, I booted my laptop from it only to find that it could not find my WHS server. Think, Kevin ... I told myself ... it has to be an issue with the NIC driver. Sure enough, a quick Google (errr, Live Search), and I found instructions on how to grab the drivers from the WHS Backup directory, put them onto a USB stick, and then at the appropriate time request the WHS Restore CD to scan for additional drivers.

No good. Still could not see the server. More searches and I discover that other people had encountered the same issue. Common denominator? A Realtek NIC was involved! I went to the Realtek support site, and download the drivers, and put them onto the USB stick. Still no good! More searches all indicated that grabbing the drivers from the Realtek web site should do the trick. So I went back one more time, and for some reason, the files I download this time from the Realtek site were different than the drivers I had downloaded 20 minutes before. (I later discovered that my original search for Realtek drivers had taken me to an outdated web page on their support site).

I dumped the drivers onto the USB stick and voila! --- the WHS Restore CD found my server, and six minutes later I had my laptop restored.

Hope this helps!

-kw

WHS PowerPack 1 Reminder

kwsupport — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 18:27:00 GMT

Just a reminder to those of you who were on the WHS PowerPack 1 beta: Remember to uninstall PPK1 beta, and then after rebooting WHS, be sure to run Windows Update pull down the final release version of Power Pqck 1 (KB944289).

I love my WHS! (And it's saved my "you know what" one more than one occasion)

Enjoy!

More on my TrendMicro WFBS Update

kwsupport — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 13:19:00 GMT

I upgraded my Trend CSM 3.6 to their new Worry-Fress Business Security (WFBS) Advance 5.0 solution for SBS, and like the hero from the movie The Rocketeer, I can say, "I like it!". Without even digging into all the new features, I can say that the spam filtering is much improved, and the Trend console seems snappier and more responsive. The console interface otherwise is the same as before, except with a fresh, up-to-date look to it.

On the new feature side, they have a new 'location awareness' settings for laptops that move around inside and outside the office that I want to try on my laptop. This version also supports Windows Home Server.

The inplace upgrade went very smooth. I simply downloaded and installed WFBS Advance right over my current CSM 3.6 setup. One word of caution: I was installing this via an RDP connection to my SBS server, and perhaps three times during the installation process, it will appear that your RDP connection has been disconnected. Don't do anything - it will resume on its own.

Cheers!
-kw

Trend Micro renames/enhances CSM

kwsupport — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 01:48:00 GMT

For those of you using Trend Micro's Clent Server Messaging (CSM) suite for your SBS servers, you should know that Trend Micro on June 2, 2008 recently rebranded the CSM product to "Worry-Free Business Security Advanced (WFBS)" and released version 5.0.

If you are using CSM 3.5/3.6 and are under maintenance, you can upgrade to WFBS Advanced at no charge.. Upgrading to WFBS will preserve all your current CSM configuration parameters. Click here for instructions from Trend Micro on how to upgrade to WFBS. To download the WFBS Advance installation file (768MB), click here.

I'll post back after I've installed it on my test server.

-kw

WHS Data Corruption followup

kwsupport — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 00:41:00 GMT

Endgaget posted "new" information about the data corruption problem with Windows Home Server. There are many replies posted at that site that would try to convince you that WHS is not only "not ready for prime time", but possibly will never be ready for prime time.

So, in the interest of keeping our heads cool and calm, understand that there are plenty of people (including myself) that are running WHS successfully.
- If you're running WHS on a single disk drive, you will not encounter this problem.

And if you do have multiple disk drives,
- If you are using WHS to backup your workstations, you will not encounter this problem.
- If you are using WHS to store copies of your favorite photos, videos and music to share with your family, you will not encounter this problem.
- If you have a file you need to edit, and you first copy it to your workstation, then edit it, then copy it back to your WHS, you will not encounter this problem.

I may be over-simplifying the description of the problem, but the data corruption is essentially restricted to directly editing/modifying data files stored in the the WHS' shared folders. If you have a photo stored on WHS, and you try to edit that file directly using Photoshop, you might corrupt the file.

In my view, WHS is still 1.0. I have no problems testing it and using it. If I need to install it in a live site, I will probably do so with a single hard drive until the problem has been resolved.

-kw

WHS and A/V Alert

kwsupport — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 19:56:00 GMT

I had a nice surprise today while I was downloading and preparing to install Vista SP1 to my workstation. Normally I do not heed the warning to disable the antivirus program, but for some reason today I decided to do so.

While Vista SP1 was busy installing, I turned to my WHS console and, lo and behold ... I encountered the following critical alert message (click here).

-kw

WHS Web Site Links

kwsupport — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 14:13:00 GMT

Here's a list of helpful web sites for Windows Home Server information. This will get you started ... you're on your own after this!

Microsoft's WHS
WHS Microsoft Forum
WHS Microsoft Team Blog

Terry Walsh' We Got (WHS) Served
Philip Churchill's WHS Blog
I Hate Linux
Ramblings of a Home Server User

WHS Q&A

kwsupport — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 13:20:00 GMT

[Edited 2-15-2008]

I gave a 2 ½ hour presentation and demo on WHS to our local Tampa Bay SBS User Group. Plenty of good questions, several which I could not answer. I'm posting the feedback and responses I received on those questions in hopes it helps someone else. Thanks to everyone who either asked the question, or provided an answer!

1. In a clean WHS environment (no SBS, etc.), how is name resolution amongst workstations and server handled? Any performance issues?

Ø KW: UPnP for discovery, NetBIOS for most name resolution.

Ø CEK: WHS acts exactly like a standalone, non-domain joined, W2K3 server in regards to name resolution.

2. How many simultaneous remote users will WHS support?

Ø KW: Haven’t tried, probably no more than 10. There’s no explicit limitation in IIS, however

Ø CEK: No limit, other than the fact that no more than 10 users can be defined

3. Can I have more than 10 people all using a common login/password access WHS shared folders simultaneously

Ø KW: I don’t believe so; this is effectively Windows Server 2003 with 10 CALs

Ø CEK: Not quite an accurate answer. There is no technical limit on the number of concurrent connections

4. Will WHS Connector software work if a user logs onto his workstation with user name of ‘Administrator’?

Ø KW: Yes

Ø CEK: Sort-of. If the password for computer\Administrator is different than server\Administrator credentials will be required whenever you try to access server resources. We do not recommend this.

5. Will WHS work with a true NAS device for backups, or does it have to physically connected/installed on the WHS server?

Ø KW: No (to working with a NAS device)

Ø CEK: I’m not sure I understand the question. What is a “true NAS”? What does “physically connected” mean?

Ø CR: If the iSCSI NAS appears as a local drive on the server, which it should, then you can use it as if it were just another drive. (This may not be technically accurate, but it appears to be effectively so - if you can see the drive in diskmgmt.msc, it works correctly for WHS.)

Ø CEK: iSCSI != NAS
NAS : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network-attached_storage - NAS uses file based protocols over the networking connection. SMB/CIFS or NFS typically.
SAN: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storage_Area_Network - SANs use block based protocols over the networking connection. SCSI over storage specific connection, iSCSI over TCP/IP connections.
All this crap is so confusing. So I like to be annoying and push people to use the standard terminology :-). However, in spirit you are right CR. If you were to enable WHS as an iSCSI Initiator and you had an iSCSI target lying around (say a W2K3 Server with an iSCSI target installed) you could use that storage "as a disk" in WHS. (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISCSI for terms).Someday we may see USB/Ethernet HDDs come with iSCSI targets built in (e.g. at a price point competitive with USB HDDs). That would be cool, but it ain't happening for a while.

Ø CR: You are right, of course, most NAS are simply SMB/NFS. SANs are iSCSI or Fibre. During the beta, I used a huge EqualLogic SAN as a "drive" in WHS. Had PS3800XV with 16 15k SAS drives.

Ø JL: For Home Server's "storage pool" to work the underlying drive must be block level access such as a regular HDD or a USB/1394 connected drive. I think the Dev team only allows externally connected block level devices such as USB or Firewire. Since NAS devices use file level access it cannot be managed by the "storage pool" because NTFS cannot manage the blocks as required.

Ø CEK: The answer is, then, “no”. WHS only supports drives that are accessible via the block level which in practical terms today means PATA/IDE, SATA/eSATA, SCSI, 1394, and USB.

6. Does (or will) WHS support backing up Macs?

Ø SB: Teacher I know this one! Dual boot to a XP or Vista (Bootcamp for example...) Log into the home server..have it take an image backup of the entire system including the Mac partition. If you are a WHS PM after backing up that Mac via bootcamp via XP to WHS blow that Mac partition away. Restore the image. Amaze your friends with a fully working Mac backed up and restored from a WHS. It has to talk "Redmond" but it can back up "Cupertino".

Ø EN: This is the ONLY option for Mac backup with WHS at this point. If you don’t have an Intel-based Mac, or if you don’t have Bootcamp configured to dual-boot the Mac, you will not be able to get your Mac backed up by the WHS backup tools. You can have a Windows environment running under Parallels or Fusion backed up to WHS, but those will not see any of the Mac disk to back up to WHS. So while the answer is technically “yes,” for the vast majority of folks out there, the practical answer is “no” right now.

7. When using Firefox browser for remote access, I see that it only gives me access to the shared folders, and not the shared computers. Are there any other limitations with specific browsers?

Ø KW: The Computers tab is only supported in Internet Explorer (use the IETab Firefox addin if you really want to use Firefox) There are some display limitations in non-IE browsers as well.

Ø CK: Any functionality that requires activeX controls is limited to IE6/IE7 (x86). On x64 machines the default IE is the x86 version so that is not a problem. The functionality that requires ActiveX controls is anything having to do with remote desktop which, specifically, is “access to the home server console” and “access to home computers”.

8. For a 2 person law firm, could we have WHS handle Quickbooks and Timeslips (using a single hard drive due to current issue with data corruption)

Ø SB: I would backup QB to the local drive. Never rely ONLY on the database on the server. QB is flaky enough all by itself. Always back up and park a copy someplace else. The 2008 version has a nice automatic routine. Always ensure that it's not backed up to the same device it's saving to. This is a rule of QB in general.

Ø KW: You would want a custom built WHS PC, not the HP MediaSmart Server, but I don’t see why not.
Ø CK: The best experience will be had by buying an OEM Windows Home Server such as the HP MediaSmart Server. “build your own” is something we don’t discourage, but it is really only for hard core enthusiasts. There are sooooo many variables in hardware and so forth and our investment in setup was focused on enabling OEMs and System Builders, not end-users.

9. If WHS is backed up to external USB hard drives, could we restore that backup to different hardware (including a VM instance)?

Ø KW: If you mean “backed up” as in Power Pack 1 server backup, then I think so. It’s just files at that point. You can’t back up Windows Home Server data using traditional backup tools, however

Ø CK: Server Backup (in Power Pack 1) only backs up shared folders and the backup database. It does not back up server settings, add-ins, or the server OS. But you could certainly restore a Server Backup to another instance of WHS, even if that other instance was running in a VM (you’d just have to install that WHS instance first).

10. Does WHS support hot-swappable hard drives (assuming hardware supports it)?

Ø KW: Not in the sense I think you are probably looking for. WHS doesn’t care one way or the other, as long as the drive isn’t in the storage pool. If it’s in the pool, you can’t swap it without WHS complaining loudly

Ø CK: It is important to disambiguate between “hot-swap” (being able to replace a drive while it is actively in use) and “hot-plug” (being able to unplug/plug-in drives while the power is on). “hot-swap” really only applies to very high-end enterprise class storage systems. Windows Home Server supports (assuming the underlying hardware supports, and SATA does) “hot-plug”. You have to explicitly tell WHS you are removing the old drive (using Server Storage “Remove”) and then tell WHS you have added a new drive (using Server Storage “Add”).

11. Does WHS support 64 bit workstations (XP / Vista)?

Ø KR: Vista 64 = Yes, XP 64 = No

-KW

Use WHS to back up SBS

kwsupport — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 14:26:00 GMT

Why not? Simply install the WHS Connector CD from the SBS console, run the setup.exe program, enter your WHS server's password, and let it configure itself, and you're done. One piece of advice: I would suggest scheduling the SBS Backup utility...(read more)

Accessing WHS remotely

kwsupport — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 21:51:00 GMT

After getting WHS up and running , I wanted to see what it would take to access WHS remotely. Because my router already forwards such ports as 443, 3389 and 4125 to my SBS Premium server, I was stepping into fairly unknown waters for me. As I tell people...(read more)

Installing WHS behind SBS

kwsupport — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 19:58:00 GMT

This will be a two part blog. In this first section, just quick comments about setting up Windows Home Server (WHS). In a follow-up blog, I'll identify what I did to make WHS accessible remotely, with SBS2003 / ISA2004 in the picture. Step 1: Setup...(read more)

WHS in house!

kwsupport — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 19:24:00 GMT

This will be the first of many blogs, I'm sure, about the Windows Home Server (WHS). Much like my initial attraction to SBS back in the year 2000, I believe WHS will make a significant impact, not only in home scenarios, but in SOHO environments....(read more)