TECH

Picked this up from various web sites out there.

Microsoft Windows Home Server. This cylindrical, glowing piece of machinery is basically an easy to use, plug ‘n play server for the family. You can share all your movies, pictures, music, files, etc. with up to 10 users wirelessly and can access your files anywhere in the world via a free personalized domain.

Microsoft is actually using these as OEM devices and customizing them to different manufacturers needs. HP is releasing their version in Q2 this year with a storage capacity between 500GB and 1TB. There’s also four USB ports and three extra drive bays in case you run out of storage. Price? Rumors are that it’ll be in the $500-ish zone.

One challenge facing Windows Home Server (WHS for short) is that it is an OEM-only product, meaning that you won't be able to head out and buy WHS at your local retail joint.

Storage and backup
What's in the box? There's the obvious stuff you'd expect to find in a "Home Server," like securable file and print sharing that you can centrally manage. Home Server does not provide a centralized Active Directory, Home Server will sync user accounts and passwords between client machines and the server, so if "Jonboy" changes his password on the downstairs PC, that change will sync to the Home Server.

There's also a fairly robust centralized backup system which will track "previous versions" of files that have changed or have been deleted. Users can opt to store data directly on the server, or the server can be configured to do periodic backups of local machines. Or both.

WHS is about more than file storage, of course. WHS supports disaster recovery functions, including scheduled snapshots of client systems that can be fully restored by booting off of a CD that connects to WHS. This is a killer feature because it obviates the need for all kinds of tech support stemming from a spyware infestation or a hardware install gone bad.

Microsoft has tapped Single Instance Store (SIS) technology to reduce the size of backups. Files are backed up, and then monitored for changes. When changes are made, only the changes are added to the backup, making subsequent backups both fast and small in size. Furthermore, the backup system monitors your entire network for duplicates. If you have Quiet Riot's greatest hits on one PC, the system will not back up that same album on another PC if it determines that the copy is identical. This greatly reduces the size of multiple-system backups, since many system files and applications will not be backed up more than once.

The Home Server will also monitor the health of your PCs, including drive health. Notably, WHS will report the complete status of the Security Center on Windows Vista PCs.

Sharing and searching
In terms of storage for files, music, etc., users of the WHS won't see a "C:\" drive, but instead just a single storage pool which can be almost endlessly expanded thanks to WHS Drive Extender. This is accomplished with a new twist on dynamic disk control. Adding more space will be as simple as adding more hard drives (internal or external, ATA/SATA or USB/Firewire) and using a tool to add that drive's capacity to the central store. The use of dynamic disks will also allow for a degree of data redundancy. This isn't RAID, but something more akin to data mirroring. WHS will duplicate data among two or more other disks (if present), so the system should be protected against the failure of any one particular disk.

One item worth noting is that the file sharing is handled via SMB, meaning that Linux and Mac clients can use WHS. In fact, you can even back up these clients by having them store their own backup images on the server.

On the entertainment side of the fence, WHS' storage system is designed to be used for sharing digital media, including that which you create with various devices like cameras and camcorders. The server will stream music and video to anything that supports Windows Media Connect, including the Xbox 360, which means that Windows Media Video will rule the day on WHS. While we like the idea of streaming media, the format limitation is something that irks us, especially when we know that greener pastures are coming in the form of media- and format-agnostic solutions. Then again, no one is going to buy WHS to just to stream media.

In terms of interaction, WHS is designed as a headless server package. Microsoft has developed client-side software to handle most routine management tasks, but management can also be done via web browser. The Remote Administration tool that runs in Internet Explorer will also allow you to remotely see PC desktops and shared files. As a nice touch, you can download entire directories from the server, and it will compress the download into a zip for you, on the fly.

In fact, Microsoft is planning a Windows Live tie-in that will allow you to remotely connect to your Home Server or network to upload or download files or make changes to settings. You can grant this capability on a per-user basis, too. This tie-in with Live will allow for users to register their own domains with the service, even if their IPs are not static.

Windows Home Server will be entering beta sometime in the next 60 days, with general availability following 120+ days after that. As such, we won't see Windows Home Server in action until the second half of the year. Minimum system requirements are quite low: 1GHz CPU, 512MB RAM, 80GB of free space on the primary drive, and an Ethernet connection.