Windows Home Server Questions?

The problem is, if you use an underlying RAID of any sort, your ability to replace a drive in WHS will be diminished, if not completely negated.

At a minimum, you would need to:

  1. Remove the drive from the WHS Store
  2. Remove the drive (again) from your raid using the RAID procedures that apply
  3. Hope it all goes right

Any mis-step along the way, especially at the RAID level, will wipe out your WHS system.

It just isn't worth the risk. It's better if you do what MS says, and then mirror whatever shares you feel need mirroring.



[LYL]Homer;1031982551 said:
It's not JBOD. It's more "dynamic software JBOD". If one drive dies you don't lose it all.

The official WHS forums talk about people who are using RAID5 arrays with hardware controllers successfully. I'm not sure about the which ones work and which don't, check those forums and ask questions there if you need to. Software RAID is definitely NOT supported under WHS.

On a related note, I was looking at the fragmentation of my drives last night and reading up in the WHS forums. Looks like Defrag is not suggested as it can interfere with the Shadow Copy business. Diskeeper 2007 WHS edition is suggested. Free 45 day trial in 6th post in this thread.

Diskeeper reports my drives as:

SYS (C: )
DATA (D: )
DATA (Mounted at C:\fs\B)
DATA (Mounted at C:\fs\D)
DATA (Mounted at C:\fs\F)
DATA (Mounted at C:\fs\M)
DATA (Mounted at C:\fs\O)
DATA (Mounted at C:\fs\Q)
DATA (Mounted at C:\fs\S)

Edit: This thread reminds me that I need to sell off my Dell Perc5i setup since I didn't need it with WHS. Nice side benefit is that it made my WHS build cheaper without having a RAID5 card. I'd probably get better performance with the RAID5 but everythings seems to run fine and without much lag without the RAID5.
Click to expand...
 
Nothing compares to WHS ability to save space.

WHS does not back up based on files. It backs up based on clusters.

The conector software is what determines what has changed on each PC.

WHS only stores a cluster once. For example:

Let's say you have 10 computers on the network, each running the WHS connector, and each being backed up every night. They all run XP. Those machines will have 1000's of identical clusters based on the XP OS installation alone.

If the same cluster exists on all 10 machines, it is only stored on the WHS server once. Not 10 times.

Rinse....Repeat..... thousands of times :)



priyaradha said:
Hey guys this thread is really useful for new users like me who need more info about whs. My question is how good is the compression rate when backing up client pc's. Right now i use Acronis to back my pcs. I use the high compression settings so my 200gig hard is partitioned to 20gig for the OS. Acronis compress it from anywhere to 9~13GB. How does WHS compare?

Also I would be buying 4x500gig sata II hard drives which one is good and will deliver good performance for a system thats always going to be on.
Click to expand...
 
There is a reason for this. Basically, the secondary partition on the primary drive is not only the landing zone for all data, it also stores all the tombstones required to access the data stored on the WHS drive store.


GLSauron said:
Yeah, I just sold the boot drive for my XP based fileserver and was considering switching to WHS, but as I asked earlier, there seems to be no way to install it on a sub 160GB drive, and I can NOT have my raid wiped. So WHS goes off the list. Maybe grab a HP WHS box and use its drives as backups. But then Id have to sell MY drives, PITA.
Click to expand...
 
It's coming in the powerpack update.

Just don't work on files directly on the server until then and you'll be ok.

I never do this anyway...



devn9ll said:
Has the file corruption bug been fixed yet?
Click to expand...
 
TechLarry said:
There is a reason for this. Basically, the secondary partition on the primary drive is not only the landing zone for all data, it also stores all the tombstones required to access the data stored on the WHS drive store.
Click to expand...

I read this and wondered how much space these tombstones would be taking up. Well, not much. About 3.0TB of data, and the first D:\ is only using about 5GB to store said tombstones.

Another interesting thing I noticed was running 8 drives, 3.0TB of space, about 500GB free; WHS leaves about 3-5% free (~20GB) on the fullest of drives. I'd like to see a little less overhead there.
 
TechLarry said:
It's coming in the powerpack update.

Just don't work on files directly on the server until then and you'll be ok.
Click to expand...

Are you sure? Over at the WHS forum, people are reporting corruption on files they aren't even editing:
http://forums.microsoft.com/WindowsHomeServer/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=2740790&SiteID=50
http://forums.microsoft.com/WindowsHomeServer/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=2639295&SiteID=50

WHS seems like a really cool product but this corruption bug really scares me. It seems to be random. I hate to lose a hard drive and then find out my backup was corrupted.
 
I've been looking at getting one of the HP home servers to replace the current setup I have for sharing files. I was wondering if it was possible to collect emails on the server. As I have cron job emails coming in by the bucket load and would like to off load them to the server?

Is it possible to setup thunderbird as a service to do this?
 
gordy_hand said:
I've been looking at getting one of the HP home servers to replace the current setup I have for sharing files. I was wondering if it was possible to collect emails on the server. As I have cron job emails coming in by the bucket load and would like to off load them to the server?

Is it possible to setup thunderbird as a service to do this?
Click to expand...

The box is a modified version of Small Business Server 2003 R2, I believe. I'm not positive but you might find that Exchange is on there, although I don't know if that would work for you.
 
vischo said:
The box is a modified version of Small Business Server 2003 R2, I believe. I'm not positive but you might find that Exchange is on there, although I don't know if that would work for you.
Click to expand...


Thanks there doesn't seem to be any mention of the email side on all the whs sites I've read. Though one enterprising person has managed to get an email server running on one.
 
Just wait for the powerpack update then.

devn9ll said:
Are you sure? Over at the WHS forum, people are reporting corruption on files they aren't even editing:
http://forums.microsoft.com/WindowsHomeServer/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=2740790&SiteID=50
http://forums.microsoft.com/WindowsHomeServer/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=2639295&SiteID=50

WHS seems like a really cool product but this corruption bug really scares me. It seems to be random. I hate to lose a hard drive and then find out my backup was corrupted.
Click to expand...
 
I had high hopes for Windows Home Server, and was very excited to try it out. At first I was impressed with the setup and easy to use features that Windows Home server offers. Unfortunately, after using Windows Home Server for a few weeks, the initial ease of use, and automation of WHS proved to be its downfall. The lack of control, corruption issues and slow network transfers destroys what could have been a fine product, and turned into a nightmare for me. Fortunately I didn’t lose data, I wrote a review of my findings here:

Continue on to the article by clicking here http://www.exoid.com/?page_id=140
 
I'm not sure you really understood WHS from the get go. A couple parts of your review are really confusing. Especially when you refer to "pseudo files". Did you attempt to access the data stored on the server directly?
 
cbutters said:
I had high hopes for Windows Home Server, and was very excited to try it out. At first I was impressed with the setup and easy to use features that Windows Home server offers. Unfortunately, after using Windows Home Server for a few weeks, the initial ease of use, and automation of WHS proved to be its downfall. The lack of control, corruption issues and slow network transfers destroys what could have been a fine product, and turned into a nightmare for me. Fortunately I didn’t lose data, I wrote a review of my findings here:

Continue on to the article by clicking here http://www.exoid.com/?page_id=140
Click to expand...

The product isn't for you. Ease of use and lack of control makes this a product for your average home user, not your power users. It's made for joe blow to be able to easily setup a server in their home. It's like complaining that your ford focus doesn't do well when you drag race.
I am a power user and don't mind the lack of control. In fact I welcome it. I just want the damn thing to work, which it does nicely. With no input from me. I don't care what data is on what drive. I don't need to know and I don't want to know. I don't know why you'd want to know. I've also added drives to the system, transfered data from it to the pool and then added the drive to the pool with no issues(I had plenty of space) so that wasent an issue.

Perhaps swapping controllers would make it so reinstalls wouldn't work but swapping a motherboard shouldn't be an issue as long as your drives get connected back in the same configuration. I am using promise cards in PCI slots and only the main drive connected to the board and I have had no issues adding, removing or replacing hardware.

I see absolutely no reason to assign drive letters or even map the root drive.

File transfer has never been an issue for me. I can get upwards of 80MB/s. Perhaps it's your specs but the server balancing has never slowed anything down for me. And perhaps it's because I have all the right patches that my transfer speeds are good. I constantly stream HD content from the server with no issues.
I don't know that encoding video over a network makes much sense. It's a very intensive process and hiccups within the encoding program itself can cause problems, especially when you are trying to force the output over the network onto a drive that is having data transfered off it and moved to it's final destination.
I do download movies directly from one system to the server with no problems.
I've even run a newsreader on the server which would in turn upon completion attempt to repair the file with pars(if necessary) and then extract. I have also installed a torrent program to automatically download my TV shows and store them in the correct shares with no problems. The server did it all, continued balancing and streaming my HD content to my HTPC.
 
TechLarry said:
It doesn't have anything to do with the server. It's the connector software for the client PC's.

Currently it is only for XP and Vista 32-bit. There is a "PowerPack" update coming early this year that is stated to include 64-bit connector software for clients.
Click to expand...
So with the PowerPack update, it will be able to see a network comprised of both 32-bit and 64-bit machines?

neomits said:
Anyone have any thoughts on the uTorrent plugin? I'd love to be able to offload my seeding to a server such as this, and get all the benefits of WHS.
Click to expand...
Actually, I'm interested in this as well. If I can just have the WHS-box run the torrenting, that'd make things easier for the other computers on the network, since nothing would need to be transferred/backed up first before it could be streamed by other users.

TechLarry said:
Also, WHS erases and takes over all available volumes during installation.

[...]

After the system is set up, reconnect your drives and boot up. They will be listed in the Storage pane, but will be listed as not part of the storage JBOD. You just add the one's you want manually and leave the rest alone.
Click to expand...
Will the manual addition to the JBOD erase the drive if there is data on it or no?
 
[UPS] Sorce;1032076018 said:
So with the PowerPack update, it will be able to see a network comprised of both 32-bit and 64-bit machines?
Click to expand...

You can "see" 32 and 64bit machines now. It just won't backup 64bit machines now. My desktop is 64bit and I can still transfer and access data fine.
[UPS] Sorce;1032076018 said:
Actually, I'm interested in this as well. If I can just have the WHS-box run the torrenting, that'd make things easier for the other computers on the network, since nothing would need to be transferred/backed up first before it could be streamed by other users.
Click to expand...

Yes, you can do that.
[UPS] Sorce;1032076018 said:
Will the manual addition to the JBOD erase the drive if there is data on it or no?
Click to expand...

Once you tell the server to it "add" the drive it will erase it.
 
zmjone2992 said:
not yet, will be out with powerpack 1, and the eta on that is apparently unknown
Click to expand...

hmm i still have my 120 day trial sitting here i want to installon my server, i guess its going to be windows xp inside vmware for now......
 
You don't need the connector software to use the server. You can store data and access it just fine via a 64bit machine. It just won't back up your 64bit machine at the moment.
However you can manually back up your computer to the server with whatever backup software you want if that's what you want to do.
 
Archer75 said:
You don't need the connector software to use the server. You can store data and access it just fine via a 64bit machine. It just won't back up your 64bit machine at the moment.
However you can manually back up your computer to the server with whatever backup software you want if that's what you want to do.
Click to expand...
This is what I'm planning to do. I can map a drive to the server, and use my favorite SyncToy app to copy my important data across.
 
I too consider myself a power user and I fix issues daily for other users at work, constantly screw around with my own client systems, and have a side business building and setting up pc's for people. But for my server I just want it to work and not have to 'deal' with it when I get home. WHS is perfect for this.
 
[LYL]Homer;1032097241 said:
I too consider myself a power user and I fix issues daily for other users at work, constantly screw around with my own client systems, and have a side business building and setting up pc's for people. But for my server I just want it to work and not have to 'deal' with it when I get home. WHS is perfect for this.
Click to expand...

We all need a little time off from micro-managing everything.
 
Its my first post since I joined the sight, might as well make it informative ;)....

This is what I just read. For those who haven't crossed over yet, I think you should wait :confused:...

"Microsoft today updated KB 946676 which is the Knowledge Base article covering the Windows Home Server data corruption bug. This bug causes data to be corrupted when you try to edit certain files directly on the home server within certain applications.

As well as fixing the original publication date of the article, worrying, Microsoft state that customers have reported data corruption occurring with a growing list of applications. I guess they have a responsibility to report the full list of issues reported - however, according to the article Microsoft have only reproduced the bug on certain applications within that list.

In summary, Microsoft have reproduced the bug successfully with the following applications:

* Windows Vista Photo Gallery
* Windows Live Photo Gallery
* Microsoft Office OneNote 2007
* Microsoft Office OneNote 2003
* Microsoft Office Outlook 2007
* Microsoft Money 2007
* SyncToy 2.0 Beta
* Intuit QuickBooks
* uTorrent

Home Server users have reported the issue occurring with the following list of applications:

* Photoshop Elements
* Zune Software
* Apple iTunes
* TagScanner
* Mozilla Thunderbird
* Adobe Lightroom
* Intuit QuickenMS Digital Image Library
* MP3BookHelper
* ACDSee
* WinAmp
* Windows Media Player 11
* Microsoft Office Excel
* Visual DataFlex

So, to put this in perspective, the list of potential applications affected is growing. That is very worrying, particularly given the prevalence of some of the applications - iTunes, Excel, WMP11 etc.. Microsoft have not yet reproduced the issue on some of these applications but also they’ve not yet been discounted, so at any point, an application may move from the reported list to the proven list.

A few things to bear in mind:

1. Microsoft are actively working on the issue - as the KB article indicates, they have reproduced the issue and are working on a fix. Clearly that fix is not yet available, but I have been told it’s being dealt with as a very high pritority. We (MVPs) are continually seeking updates from them on the issue.

2. Until the fix is issued, my advice is do not edit any file in any application directly on your home server. Copy the file to a home computer, edit it, and then copy it back again.

3. This issue occurs if a file is edited directly on the server when the server is under stress (ie. copying/moving a large amount of files). It’s difficult to replicate, but not impossible. I do not know how many have really been affected by the issue, but the potential is there. The backup, remote access etc functions of your home server are not affected, so don’t think you have to pull the plug. Just be careful.

4. The issue only affects systems with more than one hard drive. If your home server has just one drive, you won’t be affected. If you’re running multiple drives, with folder duplication switched off, there is still a potential risk if you edit files directly on the server from a home computer."
 
Archer75 said:
You don't need the connector software to use the server. You can store data and access it just fine via a 64bit machine. It just won't back up your 64bit machine at the moment.
However you can manually back up your computer to the server with whatever backup software you want if that's what you want to do.
Click to expand...

yes i know, i only have the trial i just want to see what the deal is with this home server and learn how it works
 
Per KB 946676 - the solution is to not edit data directly on the server until the patch comes out.

For example, I use Quickbooks and I put the data files on my client pc. That pc backs up to the server. No issues.

If I was to put the data files directly on the server and access them from Quickbooks there, then possible corruption.

I'll switch the way I do it after the patch is released.
 
Sub'd
Very informative thread. I've been thinking of getting WHS.
 
I recently built a new WHS system. So far it has been great having all my data in one place and accessible. I have read about some of the corruption so I just make sure that I never work off the drive directly. It would be nice if there was some indication as to how widespread the problem really is. A few vocal people can make some issues get blown out of proportion, though I would have to say that no corruption is acceptable for such a product.

The only real odd thing I have found is that for some reason WHS seems to be loading up my first data drive a lot instead of balancing everything out. I have one drive at nearly 98% capacity, then everything else seems balanced at around 45-50%, though the server reports that it completes balancing. Who knows.
 
Well, I'm just learning about WHS and thought this thread needed a bump with all the screenshots still available in it. Just know that a release candidate of the Power Pack is available that fixes the corruption bug and provides x64 support is available.
 
I have been running the release canidate since it came out a month ago. No more corruption bug, speeds have been improved and they've added a feature that lets you backup the server. So not only does duplication protect against drive failure but now I have the entire server backed up to an external drive should the entire server blow up. Now that's redundency!
 
Archer75 said:
I have been running the release canidate since it came out a month ago. No more corruption bug, speeds have been improved and they've added a feature that lets you backup the server. So not only does duplication protect against drive failure but now I have the entire server backed up to an external drive should the entire server blow up. Now that's redundency!
Click to expand...

Oh, nice. Server backup was one of the big missing features, so it's awesome that it's coming in the next patch.
 
I have an HP EX470 coming my way in the mail soon. When you place files into the media folders does it allow you to keep a file structure underneath or is it just laden with files everywhere and no folders? The reason I ask is because I have my mp3 collection neatly ordered in folders and sub-folders and would hate to lose that.
 
th3 godfather said:
I have an HP EX470 coming my way in the mail soon. When you place files into the media folders does it allow you to keep a file structure underneath or is it just laden with files everywhere and no folders? The reason I ask is because I have my mp3 collection neatly ordered in folders and sub-folders and would hate to lose that.
Click to expand...

Your folder structure will remain intact. Under the surface files are all over the place. But to you they are presented just as you have them.
 
Archer75 said:
Your folder structure will remain intact. Under the surface files are all over the place. But to you they are presented just as you have them.
Click to expand...

You're limited to 256 characters in the path in total, iirc.
 
Archer75 said:
Your folder structure will remain intact. Under the surface files are all over the place. But to you they are presented just as you have them.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the info, seems like everything will be fine (I really don't care about where it puts the files behind the scenes, just as long as when i go into a folder, it displays the files that I put in there originally).
 
Hi guys,

Just bought the HP MediaSmart and a few 1,5TB seagate drives. Should I replace the 500gb that is coming with the mediasmart with a 1,5 tb drive before installing? I see some people recommend installing one the largest harddrive..

- xuzo
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top