Windows Home Server

whiskycycle · 23 Jan 2009 at 21:04

Supertaff said:
Even though you probably won't connect it up to a monitor, unless your Motherboard has a built in GFX you can't remove the gfx card from the system totally.

Complete video removal is possible.

I'm running completely headless on mine.... definitely need a card in there for setup, but it's ripped out as soon as I'm done. On the mobo I'm using, the BIOS is set to ignore POST errors and it tootles along fine without it. I reckon with sufficient fiddling, coffee and visits to WeGotServed and Home Server Hacks, it would easily be possible to do a headless installation not unlike some of the Tranquil boxes, using a bootable USB stick or a DVD image of some kind.

If I need to do any heavy & direct tinkering, I'm at the point where I'm pulling it apart anyway, so random PCIe card gets dropped in for brief tinkering and removed once I'm done.

Day to day operation of the server (via the WHS Console or RDP) is spot on without the card in place as well.

EDIT: was headless until the onboard gb ethernet decided to poop out around 11pm last night when we were watching something. Several fix/reinstallation/other OS attempts on the mobo gave no joy, so a 100mbit card had to go in briefly to get some bits off that hadn't yet been backed up elsewhere.... now running a Gigabyte GA-MA74GM-S2 as the shop couldn't source an identical replacement this morning when I went. Six SATA ports to fill (5 already) plus a couple of PCIe SATA cards bought for other things. Gonna need a new case after all this!

wonder_lander · 23 Jan 2009 at 21:24

You can add a drive to the WHS with data already on it but not add it to the pool. This will then allow you to copy the data locally instead of over the network into whichever shares you want.

Once you've copied the data you could then add the drive to the pool which will of course erase all its contents before it does.

PaulB · 23 Jan 2009 at 21:38

Bry said:
Its got 5 drive bays plus 1 e-sata port.

The first drive bay (furthest right) is the system drive and no matter what is not raid enabled.

If you specify 4x raid then the other 4 internal hdds are in the raid and the external sata is not.

If you specify 3*raid with 1 esata then only 3 of the 5 internal hdds are able to be raided with the external sata port.

Tbh if you are running WHS I wouldn't worry too much as its not wise to raid whs (kinda defeats the point.)
If you are going to run linux and use raid 5 then probably best to go with the 4x option. Unless you specifically want to add an external sata drive into the raid array.

Nice one, that's cleared it up for me.

Had no plans to use raid anyway - I quite like the way WHS works with the duplication.

Thanks for taking the time to reply.

BoomAM · 24 Jan 2009 at 20:29

Tbh, if youve got the choice between software RAID & hardware RAID, you should be using the latter.
Its quicker, not as resource heavy, more resilient & not dependant on the host OS.

edgedemon · 24 Jan 2009 at 20:34

BoomAM said:
Tbh, if youve got the choice between software RAID & hardware RAID, you should be using the latter.
Its quicker, not as resource heavy, more resilient & not dependant on the host OS.

For resiliency yes, but it depends on the user, some people my not be willing to lose the space needed to implement raid.
I'm curious though, I though WHS coudn't be installed onto RAID volumes?

PhillyDee · 24 Jan 2009 at 21:19

edgedemon said:
For resiliency yes, but it depends on the user, some people my not be willing to lose the space needed to implement raid.
I'm curious though, I though WHS coudn't be installed onto RAID volumes?

It can be, but any problems and microsoft will not help.

I have RAID ability, but I like the fact that I dont have to worry, if I lose a disk, WHS automatically re-copies (Assuming free space). I can turn off and stick a disk in for (almost) instant useability.
If the OS dies, I can still get the files back by reinstalling.
I can mix disk sizes easily. And I can decide what exactly I want duplicating. I dont have to worry about putting it on the correct disk etc.

BoomAM · 25 Jan 2009 at 01:33

edgedemon said:
For resiliency yes, but it depends on the user, some people my not be willing to lose the space needed to implement raid.

If the user is that concerned about their data then it should be a non-contest, hardware RAID.

Whilst i do think what WHS is doing with its 'resiliency' thing is quite good for the end user, to rely on it as a reliable way to backup stuff is just plain daft.
It still inhibits the same flaws as other OS level RAID solutions.

I'm curious though, I though WHS coudn't be installed onto RAID volumes?

Dependant on the RAID controller being used, WHS might not even be aware its even on a RAID array.

wonder_lander · 27 Jan 2009 at 21:55

Anyone else using crashplan with their whs install?

yashiro · 27 Jan 2009 at 21:58

Drive Extender

Windows Home Server Drive Extender is a specialized case of JBOD RAID 1 implemented at the file system level, separate from what is offered in Windows' Logical Disk Manager. When a file is stored that is to be duplicated, a special pointer called a tombstone is created on the main storage drive's NTFS partition that points to data residing on other disk(s). When the system is idle, the OS re-balances the storage to provide the required redundancy while maximizing the storage capacity in each drive. Although not as robust as true RAID, it provides many of the benefits that RAID offers, including a single hierarchical view of the file system regardless of which physical disk the data is stored on, the ability to swap out failed disk without losing redundant data, and the system seamlessly duplicating the data on the replacement disk in the background.

It is also possible to tell Windows Home Server to not duplicate data on a per-share basis. In this case, Driver Extender will store files on different disks and use tombstones to point to them, providing faster read access when the end-user requests multiple files located on different disks, similar to the speed benefit provided by RAID 0.

Just so people are aware of what WHS does.

Skeeter · 1 Feb 2009 at 19:57

Got my WHS up and running.

Does anyone know of a way to backup the server itself? I want to have a backup of the C: drive on the server, or atleast know that should the HDD on my server with the C: partition on it die, that I can recover it and still have all my files in tact?

Any ideas?

Predator · 1 Feb 2009 at 20:11

Yup, here you go mate.

http://www.mediasmartserver.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=2066

Skeeter · 1 Feb 2009 at 20:19

Appears to backup the client backups... Im looking for something that backs up the WHS itself (the Server 2003 with front end stuff), or a proccess that will easily allow me to restore my WHS ont a new HDD without having to format everything/recopy?

theheyes · 1 Feb 2009 at 20:52

Does WHS have ntbackup?

HEADRAT · 10 Mar 2009 at 11:51

Never install PerfectDisk, it killed some of my PC backups, no real biggie as I just deleted them and backed them up again.

<Note to self, if it's working fine the just leave it the **** alone>

Datamonkey · 10 Mar 2009 at 12:38

Running the latest version of perfect disk 10, i think its 10, and not had any issues. but i do clean out the backups on a monthly basis.

Love the note, bet you dont pay attention to it though

i know i never do lol

HEADRAT · 10 Mar 2009 at 13:01

Honestly, most of the problems I get are from "fiddling" with things that are working fine, I really annoy the carp out of myself

I'm running on a nice clean build of Vista X64, got just about everything I want installed in < 30Gig, I feel Vertex SSD's coming on!

See what I mean, dammit, more fiddling .... I'm an addict.

PhillyDee · 10 Mar 2009 at 15:22

Know what you mean Headrat, its for that reason rebuilt it and stopped myself from fiddling about 3 months ago. Now it runs spot on and never hiccups!

HEADRAT · 10 Mar 2009 at 15:43

I'm pretty tempted to get one WHS just for PC backups and another for a fileserver.

I'm getting much better at just having a very light OS drive, with just the OS and Office etc. on it, everything else goes on a seperate drive. You can easily re-install games and stuff so I just don't but it on the OS partition, back-up and restores are quicker and you use less disc space on the server.

Datamonkey · 10 Mar 2009 at 15:54

Lol im the same,

I have my xps 1530, which i dont touch as a rule of thumb, i keep my life on it.

The wifes workstation which is a home built 3210 xeon with a quadro gfx card (she's a cartographer and geologist) never gets touched, not allowed to fiddle with that, unless it is down lol.

But my main rig core i7 920 @ 4ghz under water with a 295gtx, im constantly rebuilding trying new things and such with it. having the backup of a clean install pre driver install on the whs is a godsend though. Can restore over the network in less than 15mins.

I have the hp 475 home server, the xeon workstation was my home server originally. but decided to get the hp as its only drawing 80watts with 4 x 1tb wd re3 drives. This is being measured by the ups its connected to. during a back up the server draws 91watts, thats the highest i have seen it go so far.

I also have a 1tb nas drive which i use to back up important stuff from the server to, using karens replication tool which is set to run once a week. And then i also have a single 500gb usb drive connected directly to the server, which backs up the wifes important data over night lol.

Edit

Oh yeah forgot to mention, the xeon workstation is also running 2 x 1tb re3 in a mirror config.
my gaming rig is running 3 x 250gb forget what they are 7200.11 in raid 0 for gaming performance.

Tomsk · 14 Mar 2009 at 00:16

Dumped my eeeBox and Drobo and now have a WHS server.
Specs:
Gigabyte GA-MA74GM-S2H AMD 740G (AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4400+ 2.40GHz
4GB of RAM (I had lying around)
OCZ StealthXStream 500w Silent ATX2 PSU
Coolermaster Elite 335 Case
MRi 4 port SATA150 (SiI 3114 chipset)

Installation and setup was a breeze with everything working out of the box. Still running the evaluation version as I mess about. Eventually the 500GB will become the system disk and I should have another two 1GB drives to add as well, when I dismantle my WD MyBook NAS.

One question:
Can I restore a backed-up PC onto a new larger HD?