How would you change Windows Home Server?

Windows Home Server hasn't quite taken a full year to make its way from being a mere announcement all the way into your living room, but it came darn close. That being said, we're not fielding any excuses as to why you haven't had enough time to at least test out the RC1, get a feel for what WHS devices would eventually be unveiled and read up on outside reviews, alright? Granted, you may have been put off by the on-again / off-again release date debacle surrounding HP's MediaSmart Home Server, but even if you weren't keen on the unit that practically became the early face of the software, we're confident that many of you were able to find a box that tickled your fancy from the cornucopia of alternatives.

Now that Microsoft's latest flavor of Windows is out in the wild for anyone who cares to acquire it, we're wondering just how satisfied you are with the final product. Has it totally revolutionized your (previously non-existent) backup schedule? How functional have you found remote access to truly be? Has this quelled the bickering between your offspring over who gets to use the PC with all the Tears for Fears tracks on it? Feel free to share with us your favorite add-ins (along with ones you're currently working up), and don't hesitate to dole out as much criticism / adoration as necessary to get yourself noticed.

[alexdodd @ Nov 16th 2007 8:08PM]

How about some real RAID support that can be optionally turned on. Its based loosely off server 2003 that supports software RAID1,5 at least AFAIK. I'd love to use this as long as i knew i was using a sensible RAID option, i don't care about the fact that i could put extra disks of any size in later on...

[futurepastnow @ Nov 17th 2007 1:25PM]

Yes! Give advanced users the ability to use real RAID if they want.

[Mark @ Nov 17th 2007 2:46PM]

Because it's completely unnecessary. You need RAID for data redundancy or additional speed. Given that this isn't a PC that you're going to be using you don't care about additional speed and data redundancy is already provided. Now stop being an idiot.

[Carlton Bale @ Nov 17th 2007 9:31PM]

One often overlooked benefit of RAID is storage density. The data redundancy provided by WHS makes terrible use of storage space. If you want redundancy on all of your files, you lose 50% of your available disk space. So if you have (8) 500GB drives, you'd have 2TB of available space and 2TB devoted to redundancy.

I would love to see WHS integrate a file system similar to the unRAID system as implemented by Lime Technology. See http://www.lime-technology.com/wordpress/?page_id=47 for details. It offers all of the benefits offered by WHS: multiple sizes of disks can be used, disks use a normal/non-striped file system that can be mounted and read outside the array (if the server fails), easy array expansion, easy replacement of smaller disks with larger disks, etc. But it also offers much more efficient storage density. If you have (8) 500GB drives, you'd have 3.5TB of available storage space with only 500 GB devoted to redundancy.

UnRAID does not offer the write performance of a traditional RAID5 array, but neither does WHS (writes to staging drive then copies to "final" drive. Both are plenty fast for a "limited user number" home environment. And an unRAID configuration can easily serve 5+ movies to different clients at the same time, so read performance would not be a problem.

There is nothing that would prevent Microsoft from implementing this system on Windows Home Server. It's just a Reed-Solomon parity scheme with some disk management automation built-in. If WHS had this type of space-efficient redundancy, I'd purchase it in a second and recommend it to everyone. But as-is, I'd be wasting way too much disk space on redundancy when I could be using it for storage.

[Mark @ Nov 18th 2007 12:00AM]

The problem with unRAID is that it doesn't provide full-blown redundancy. If you have multiple drives (say 5) and two of them fail you have no way of reconstructing the information stored on them. It's a software-dependent data safety system that attempts to reconstruct the missing data based on the content of the other drives. On the other hand in WHS if you lose 2 of your five drives and they don't contain each other's backups you will lose nothing. What it turns to is a trade-off between money and your data security (as always). Microsoft made the decision to go with data security. The question is: why not provide both?

a) Microsoft just like every other corporation out there is a for-profit company. It will do the least amount of work possible to get the most amount of money. Adding a feature like that is a lot of work and likely patent licensing with arguable return on investment.
b) Joe Blow (for whom this software is made by the way) won't understand the difference between unRAID's approach and WHS's current approach. He'll see that both can provide data safety, choose the way that gives him more storage, ignore the red warning that tells him one of his disks is nearly gone (because he can still access his data) and will then get really angry when another disk fails and he can't get at his data anymore. People have an unfortunate habit of messing around with options they don't understand and not doing proper research.

This is just an opinion but: I don't feel that it would be responsible to sell a product mainly intended for data back-up that doesn't offer at least double redundancy of data, especially given that the target audience isn't us, it's Joe Blow, who will buy the server and assume that all of his information is guaranteed to stay locked in that little box for all eternity (acts of god excluded).

[Carlton Bale @ Nov 25th 2007 5:47PM]

Mark: In general, I agree with you, but there are two small flaws in your reasoning. First of all, WHS does not provide double data redundancy; it provides single redundancy. There is the primary copy of the data and the backup copy. unRAID also provides single redundancy: the primary copy of the data and the backup that is stored in parity data. (If 2 of 5 drives fail, you would lose the data on the failed drive, but the data on the other drives would still be readable. WHS would have to have strong and frequent warning messages in the event of a drive failure.)

Something else to consider is that WHS has basically half the storage density of unRAID-type storage, so it would require roughly twice the number of hard drives (for equivalent available space) and would have twice the opportunity for a disk failure.

Also, an unRAID-type configuration does not preclude the ability to mirror important data on more than one disk. That would give true double redundancy: mirrored backup and parity backup.

I think the target audience for WHS isn't ONLY "your average Joe." True, not everyone would be interested in flexible software RAID (similar to unRAID), but some would be. It would be nice if MS addressed the needs of both audiences. If WHS had this type of advanced disk management, I'd purchase it immediately. Otherwise, it's just too expensive to add 2 disks every time you need more storage space and only get the available space of one of those drives.

[Carlton Bale @ Nov 29th 2007 1:06PM]

For anyone interested in having a "flexible, parity-based drive extender" (a.k.a. unRAID) feature added to WHS, please vote for this feature on the official Windows Home Server feedback page:

https://connect.microsoft.com/WindowsHomeServer/feedback/ViewFeedback.aspx?FeedbackID=306080

[TDOGDFW @ Nov 16th 2007 8:11PM]

I'd like it to be the streaming device for movies and music to my extenders (XBOX360). As it stands today, I have to leave my PC on all the time. If my Home Server is going to be on all the time already, why can't it do the streaming?

[barlo.mung @ Nov 16th 2007 8:25PM]

Sounds good, but the question was how would you change it?
WHS already streams to an xbox 360.

[TDOGDFW @ Nov 16th 2007 8:34PM]

Seriously? You don't get the MCE experience from Windows Home Server - do you? I don't know, but I didn't think it would act as a Media Center to extenders.

[barlo.mung @ Nov 17th 2007 12:02AM]

Seriously. It doesn't do the recording aspect of Vista/WMC but it does do the streaming, which is what you requested.

[Namarrgon @ Nov 18th 2007 6:22AM]

Well... yes, it streams to a 360 (or a PS3), as it provides a standard UPnP AV/DNLA server, a la Windows Connect. This allows you to stream WMV files (and JPEG, MP3 etc), but not other formats.

It is not MCE, so you can't use the 360 as an MCE Extender with it.

[csjk789 @ Nov 16th 2007 8:15PM]

i'd take the hardware and install a hackint0sh version of 10.5 server.

[m16 @ Nov 16th 2007 8:16PM]

Make it truecrypt compatible. The WinHS drive system doesnt recognize volumes mounted by TC.

Also, make the Home Server systems cheaper to the consumer to overcome the temptation to use an old PC and install Samba...free.

[Russ @ Nov 16th 2007 8:21PM]

How about the OS that is supposed to be the end all/be all for media sharing in the home actually have TV recording capabilities? It's incredibly efficient to have a second server just recording TV, storing it on the WHS, only to recall it again through the WHS hen the extenders need it.

[ztiger93 @ Nov 17th 2007 1:35PM]

hear, hear! one tivo to rule them all... that's what i'm after.

[solomon @ Nov 16th 2007 8:21PM]

I've been using it for awhile and it's pretty damn perfect. Be neat to add more server add-in's so it could be my mail server / web server / NAT Firewall like a real server. But for what it does now, it's pretty impressive.

[uopercival @ Nov 19th 2007 12:13AM]

I've been using it for awhile too and this was also the first thing that came to mind when asked 'what would you improve'.
It's definitely the addins, the ones out there are half decent, but I would like to see more.

I had a concept for one but alas I'm not a programmer. Software wise, it would be some type of web interface so that you can remotely monitor your home, ie: temp, alarm system, hvac, etc. Could even set it up so that it would email or text you when there's some type of alarm or warning etc. On the hardware end, it would be based on the Arduino board, nice and simple with lots of flexibility.

[JT3 @ Nov 16th 2007 8:23PM]

When it can back up Vista 64, i'll be interested.

[gadgetfreak @ Nov 17th 2007 10:49AM]

can you add a link that shows the incompatability to Vista 64?

thx

[JT3 @ Nov 17th 2007 5:46PM]

It can't backup a system with Vista 64

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Home_Server
http://mswhs.com/2007/11/02/installing-the-connector-software-on-vista-x64/

[matthew @ Nov 16th 2007 8:23PM]

wow... most of the gripes listed here i assumed WHS did already. i'll stick with clark connect and mythtv

[arteekay @ Nov 16th 2007 10:17PM]

Most of the gripes here are asking for features already provided, by people that haven't seen more than a screenshot.

[phinn @ Nov 16th 2007 8:24PM]

Format and install Linux server.

[Ethan @ Nov 16th 2007 9:43PM]

Then it wouldn't be WINDOWS Home Server, would it?

[Daniel Smith @ Nov 16th 2007 8:26PM]

Being that I've beta tested it since february I think I got a good idea of what it needs. Overall it's awesome but the next version could add more features. Such as

1. ability to record live TV and act as a media center then you wouldn't need a media center and a WHS, you'd just need a WHS and a media extender like an xbox 360.

2. integrate into the performance and reliability monitro of Vista so you can easily rollback to a backup before the graph plummetted to zero. Since reliability monitor gives a good graph of your computers health if you could a WHS backup from within that program that'd be neat.

3. better account heirarchy and security. currently within the WHS console there's no admin account meaning that user A can go in and change user B's password without user B's permission even if user A doesn't know user B's original password to begin with. This would then make user b unable to access WHS. Also user A can go and delete or view B's backup without B's permission meaning a loss of privacy. So in a business enviroment which WHS isn't designed for but can do a good job in, shady employee A can look at files normally protected by a login password on the bosses physical computer through WHS without having to know the bosses password!! This isn't a huge deal at home unless you have files (read as pr0n) you want to keep from your kids with WHS your kids can go and access even change your password without your permission. Hence why there need to be admin and standard user accounts.

4.an ability to quickly know what clusters have changed on the hard drive and only update those. currently everyday WHS scans all drives for changes just before it does it's daily backup. If there was a way it could make a log or have access to a log that kept track of the changes as they occured instead of rescanning all the drives for changes everyday it'd greatly speed up the backup process.

5.The ability to restore from a WHS backup without access to WHS server. Say if you're on vacation or business trip with your laptop and it crashes you won't be able to restore from backup until you get back home or to the office. If there was a way you could choose a backup from the list stored on WHS and export that backup to external storage whether it be dvd/cd, hard drive or even usb flash devices and then do a restore while you're on the road that would be awesome!!

That's all I can think of right now. I've already notified MS of my wishes especially #3 and hopefully these will be added in the next version or as an update.

[Pc_Madness @ Nov 17th 2007 3:04AM]

I have to agree with your first point (the others don't interest me). I'd really like to have a heap of Media Center boxes on my tvs and perhaps my Home Server recording tv or sharing tuners/files out to the other boxes for whatever reason. It'd also be nice to have VMC as well if you want to hook it up to a tv.

[Reid B. @ Nov 16th 2007 8:37PM]

Recording TV is a big "Meh" to me. Most broadcast TV is shite anyway.

What this really needs is RAID. That folder duplication thing is pretty weak redundant protection. I will supplement with Jungledisk and Amazon S3 offsite backup. But still no resiliant RAID solution makes for sloppy recovery.

The other thing, I want to see a Flickr plugin.

I don't know if the itunes server really functions like a server being that itunes itself is so damn hostile toward any rationale approach to library management.

Other than that, I am very impressed.

[Bryan @ Nov 16th 2007 10:06PM]

The other thing, I want to see a Flickr plugin.

It's like they read your mind.

[Bryan @ Nov 16th 2007 10:09PM]

Sorry. First time, and didn't realize that there's no HTML tags.

Here's the link to PhotoSync, which is a Flickr plugin for WHS (albeit still in beta):

http://www.edholloway.com/archive/2007/06/21/PhotoSync-Beta2-for-Windows-Home-Server-is-Available_2100_.aspx

[Michael LaFramboise @ Nov 16th 2007 8:44PM]

While this comment somewhat applies to Home Server, I guess it'd be better suited for the entire Windows OS...

UNIFY ALL THE DAMN STYLES! - or rather use only one damn style at a time... Why is it that from a design perspective Windows has always been such a mess. I mean hell, take a look at the screenshot of Home Server in this article... Main window is Aero/Glass - then some other window within the app pops up w/ the "classic" windows 95 style, then when you change anything you get the 'allow/deny" popup which uses the Aero Basic style.

Funny remembering how many Mac fans whined about there being both brushed metal and aqua in Tiger. :p

[Daniel Smith @ Nov 16th 2007 8:54PM]

They can't do much about that since you access the WHS via remote desktop protocol so the WHS console is using the graphics capability of WHS server which is based on server 2003 and therefore can't aero. The aero box around it is cause the screenshot was taken in vista. here's another tidbit for you the mouser cursor also changes from the new Aero cursor to the old school server 2003 cursor as you move the mouse over the WHS console window and then it immediately changes back to the aero cursor as you move back into vista territory. If this pic was taken in server 2003 it wouldn't look different. Again this is cause WHS console window is accessed via RDP and it's not a local program installed on vista it's a local program on the WHS server and since the server is running on 2003 which doesn't have aero graphics it's not gonna look unified.

[Michael LaFramboise @ Nov 17th 2007 2:31AM]

sigh, excuses excuses... oh what trickery Apple must have used to make the OS look good all of 8 years ago or so when OS X was just in development...

[feffrey @ Nov 17th 2007 7:39AM]

Better solution: On every computer change the style to windows classic. Now everything runs faster and is all the same.

I am not sure what to change with whs. I won;t leave my server 2003 until server 2008 comes out. While I think it is a neat idea, idk if the average computer user will ever use it.

[Dustin Solis @ Nov 16th 2007 8:47PM]

"How irritated are you that you can't just load up WHS on any old PC / case-o-discs?"

--What? Huh? What's this system builder OEM version on Newegg for?

[Porfirio Reyes @ Nov 16th 2007 8:48PM]

I'm lovin WHS so far. The whiist addin is bad ass and I can't wait for more addins to come. My Vista MCE streams all my media from it and I don't see why WHS should have dvr/tuner capabilities. It is't meant to replace your MCE/Extender, it's meant to be tucked away in some corner without you ever noticing it unless you connect to it.

[mottl3y @ Nov 16th 2007 8:53PM]

Some good suggestions.

adding to what solomon said, I'd be keen for some exchange capabilities. Sure it's not meant to be corporate software, but being able to share calendars, access your email from any computer, etc etc would be pretty awesome.

I'm still waiting to update my clarkconnect server when they get the horde system fully working.

[2manygadgets @ Nov 16th 2007 8:57PM]

I agree that WHS needs some sort of RAID system or virtual pooled storage like Drobo or ZFS. The duplicate folders system is a nightmare for users. If you don't duplicate a folder and lose a drive, how would you know which files you may have lost?

Also, I wish the backup was silent on the client side (like RetroSpect) so my wife doesn't need to see a bunch of warning messages on her laptop if it was turned off overnight and not backed up. It should just proactively backup in the background.

[Michael Glatz @ Nov 16th 2007 9:10PM]

This is an excellent program that is so ideally suited for our small publishing firm that we thought it was made just for us when initially announced. Within our small firm, where a number of the staff need to have concurrent access to varied files in order to publish Military Cruise books for the USMC and U.S. Navy, this is an ideal solution. The Beta Test allowed us to build our company with WHS as the data backbone of the firm, although we were also using external hard drives as primary backup systems. Now however, that WHS is primetime, those external backup drives have been integrated into the server itself. The computer was build by us for this specific application and we spent a sum of only $765 for the needed hardware and software. Not bad for almost 1.5TB of backup/storage power. Previous to this program the job entailed cutting numerous DVD's or CD's on a daily basis. How would we improve the program? We would think that separate and multiple backup time settings for each and every user would be a big plus, so as to not interfere with operation. This is definitely going to find more uses as time progresses and available applications become available.

[VasR @ Nov 16th 2007 9:25PM]

Enhancements:
-Integrate WebGuide WHS (currently MS owns the rights) so that the user permissions can be inherited from WHS and use WHS interface.

-Add AVI (xVid, MP4, DIVX) transcoding to the DNLE server.

- Allow deactivation and removal of external drive from storage pool without WHS moving/deleting files off the drive (files are still there but WHS will not add the drive back to the pool without reformatting it).

[Mr. Vage @ Nov 16th 2007 10:22PM]

I second number 2. For both WHS and Media Center.

[John @ Nov 16th 2007 9:29PM]

More codec support for streaming to the 360. WHS uses Windows Media Connect which is not even supported by MS anymore and it cannot stream h.264, Divx or Xvid. It's ridiculous that I have to use Windows Media Player or the Zune software on another PC to stream these (and other) file types on the 360?

The ability to backup the 360 like I backup my PC.

This probably won't happen, but would love to see a Media Center version that can accept cable card tuners and act as a DVR which then can be streamed to extenders in the house.

[Chris @ Nov 17th 2007 9:18AM]

Correct me if I'm wrong, which I very well may be, but if they add the codec support to the 360 won't that solve the problem.

[Gavin @ Nov 16th 2007 9:42PM]

I would love to have a user console or to be able to create shortcuts on the desktop that launch a specific app in the console so we could have centralized applications for users.

For example if you wanted to run a torrent addin client on the server that all users can use to download torrents so they don't have to keep their own machines on.

[KiwiDamo @ Nov 19th 2007 5:12AM]

Fair comment, for multiple BitTorrent users it would be great. Though, I am running uTorrent directly on WHS and having no problems dealing with it via remote desktop.

[mat @ Nov 16th 2007 9:44PM]

WHS is a fairly decent product and very stable.

I had a backup plan before, but this has changed my backup plan and storage options. Now when my cousins or friends come over they can backup their computer to my server and not have to worry about backups themselves.

About the only negative I can comment on is the fact that even with a 1 gb connection, it is very slow at moving files over the network when you move large files into a shared folder. WHS seems to want to start balancing as soon as you start moving files and your connection will sometimes flat line (go to 0). My guess is this will be fixed sometime in the near future, so I'm not too worried right now.

WHS is also not a toy. Most of the people I've seen who have issues are those who want to play with it. I had tons of trouble until I stopped playing with it and let it do its job. No special screens or other little hacks that people like me love.

Outside of that, like I said, WHS is a great product for the money. Instead of me having a toy to play with everyday, it sits in the corner and does the job that I need it to do. I did not want something I'd have to play with everyday... I want something that works without me thinking about it. That is why this product works.

I turned off remote access, so I can't comment on how well that works. I tried it with the beta product and it seems alright. I have a notebook that travels with me so I don't have files on whs that should be with me but I forgot them at home... does not happen. That is why I purchased a 200 gb 7200 notebook drive. lol

But I guess the other part is that this product has taken the "raid" and other tech stuff off the mind of normal people. Want to add more storage? Get any drive you want, don't worry if it is not the same make, model and size of the HD in the computer. Want to remote access? Don't worry about it, here is an address... only need your password. Want to save space by only backing up certain folders? Click here to make it happen. Want to backup all your computers? Install this app and do a quick setup. Want to get the health of all computers? Do nothing, but make sure your WHS app is green.

Really, how simple can it get? MS gets some things wrong, but this it got right.

[Bryan Mancuso @ Nov 16th 2007 9:49PM]

"How irritated are you that you can't just load up WHS on any old PC / case-o-discs?"

Not entirely sure what that is all about...I did the whole DIY Newegg deal since I already had a processor sitting around, and stuffed it into a Shuttle barebone computer with a 750GB hdd.

I would absolutely love to see a Exchange WHS edition for 5 users or something so I can have access to Outlook Web Access and sync with my HTC Touch on the go...

It already had the Dynamic DNS capabilities and the free domains...that is half the battle. Another quarter of the battle is Server 2003... I am not sure how the Domain stuff would work though...they would probably have to rewrite a lot of the Exchange code to circumvent that, since WHS is apparently incompatible with Domains.

Here's to wishing.

[Chris Thompson @ Nov 16th 2007 9:51PM]

I've been using this since about the time the first beta came out in a VM and then put it on a real machine this summer. I'm really impressed--especially with the web interface and the ability to use RDP without having to remember an ip. What's better is it automatically updates DHCP addresses when they change. One thing that gets me though is that the certificate is invalid so I always get a warning and IE flips out. Other than that, it's a really sweet system. Not to mention Run:DCPROMO turns the thing into a domain controller hehe...at least on the version I have, they might have gotten rid of that file by now.

[V @ Nov 16th 2007 10:25PM]

I haven't tried the full release of WHS, but on RC1 I couldn't get the server to enter and stay in S3 sleep/standby. It would always wake up every 30 minutes. I checked for any automated tasks and such, but had no luck. It's not a hardware issue as in XP, I could put the machine to sleep with no issues. I don't need a 24/7 file server and only need access to it for brief periods and leaving it on wastes electricity and needless hardware use/abuse. Anyone, been able to get their WHS' to go and stay in S3 until needed?

[Christian @ Nov 16th 2007 10:41PM]

Make it a Mac! LOL