Windows Home Server FAQ

psxstudio said:
I've been lurking and reading re: WHS and I finally pulled the trigger. :cool: I've ordered a norco 4220 case plus few 2 TB HD's and will be using old spare parts (mobo, 1 TB HD's, etc) to build the system (AMD X2 555 and Asus mobo). I didn't order any sata controllers since I'll be using mobo sata ports (6 total). Eventually I'll fill up the norco case with 2 TB's as funds are available.

My question is:

1. After using the IDE dvd-rom to install WHS, I can unplug it (remove it from the system) and reboot?

2. Once WHS is installed and running, I can install the AOC-SASLP-MV8 controllers without any problems down the line when I'm ready to install more HD's?

Thanx in advance. JB
Click to expand...

1. actually, you can install WHS from a USB drive, and enable AHCI at that. this is what I did, slipstreamed AHCI drivers and created a USB installer.
 
Cliff Couser said:
1. actually, you can install WHS from a USB drive, and enable AHCI at that. this is what I did, slipstreamed AHCI drivers and created a USB installer.
Click to expand...

Ahh... I've been reading about that and creation of USB installer is only works on Vista!? :confused: I currently have XP running on my system.
 
psxstudio said:
Ahh... I've been reading about that and creation of USB installer is only works on Vista!? :confused: I currently have XP running on my system.
Click to expand...
While I never tried it myself, and even if WHS is still XP-based, its installer is not completely XP-era.

I've used XP (and W2K3) for many years, and have lost track of just how many installs I've gone through. So when I came across WHS, something felt "off" with the installer. At the time I had read about Vista's image-based installer (and tried it once or twice, I believe... Never cared too much about Vista), and its advantages.

Anyway, long story short, as far as my knowledge of WHS goes, its installer seems to be an XP-based setup program managing an image-based installation. Which means you end up with XP's limitation on boot-time drivers (you need to slipstream AHCI ones) but the ability to install from USB (which XP never really could do) AND apparently extra "hardware migration" capabilities, just like Vista. I moved my OS drive from a 945G-based motherboard to a G31-based one without WHS even breaking a sweat...
 
Hello Guys,

Now I found Lights-out add-in. My idea to have my WHS in Hibernate mode until I need media from it through network for my PlayonHDs. After this , for example 5 minutes w/o requierment on WHS it will go to Hibernate mode.
If any of you use this add-in , could you help me , is it worth to buy it for this target?
Thanks in advance.
 
For the record, I installed my WHS via a USB thumb drive. It was painless. My whole WHS runs off a single 1.5TB Raid 5 Array which goes through an Adaptec 5405 raid controller. During the installation of WHS I was brought to a screen to select the hard drive for installation, On this screen there was an option to load drives for my raid controller. I unpluged the thumb drive, put drivers on it, plugged it back into the server, selected the drivers and my array showed up. After that the installation continued sucessfully.

The WHS installer appears to be a hybrid vista/xp thing. I did NOT slipstream any drivers.
 
nowwhatnapster said:
On this screen there was an option to load drives for my raid controller. I unpluged the thumb drive, put drivers on it, plugged it back into the server, selected the drivers and my array showed up. After that the installation continued sucessfully.

The WHS installer appears to be a hybrid vista/xp thing. I did NOT slipstream any drivers.
Click to expand...
Again, I never tested it, and I'm running all my drives in IDE mode (ICH7 limitation), but from what remember it's just like that, a DOS/GUI hybrid from both the XP and Vista eras.

I still prefer the whole Vista-based setup routine (much easier, faster, and apart from some initial probing, most hardware can be changed while keeping the same OS installation, which was NOT possible in the old days), but WHS was a GREAT breath of fresh air when it came to Windows install routines... Now, if only someone could make an XP version that did just that... hehe
 
nowwhatnapster said:
For the record, I installed my WHS via a USB thumb drive. It was painless. My whole WHS runs off a single 1.5TB Raid 5 Array which goes through an Adaptec 5405 raid controller. During the installation of WHS I was brought to a screen to select the hard drive for installation, On this screen there was an option to load drives for my raid controller. I unpluged the thumb drive, put drivers on it, plugged it back into the server, selected the drivers and my array showed up. After that the installation continued sucessfully.

The WHS installer appears to be a hybrid vista/xp thing. I did NOT slipstream any drivers.
Click to expand...

Yeah... I ended it doing it that way too.. Since I couldn't slipstream ACHI drivers into the usb install (i'm on xp system... hehe).

JB
 
user3657 said:
will vail run on a old p4? ive read it needs a 64bit cpu. but will it not even install?
Click to expand...
Vail is based on Windows 2008 R2, which is only available for 64-bit platforms. That means, much like just about any W2K8R2 or W7 x64 install, setup WILL stop on its tracks if a 64bit capable CPU is not found.

Good thing is, depending on how old your P4 is, it might support 64bit extensions. If it's socket 478-based, forget about it, none of those was 64bit ready. If it's a socket 775 part, it might have the extensions. Just use CPU-Z: run it and read the "Instructions" field on the main page. If EMT64 appears, you're good to go.

Hope this helps
 
omega_new said:
Hello Guys,

Now I found Lights-out add-in. My idea to have my WHS in Hibernate mode until I need media from it through network for my PlayonHDs. After this , for example 5 minutes w/o requierment on WHS it will go to Hibernate mode.
If any of you use this add-in , could you help me , is it worth to buy it for this target?
Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...

For the PlayonHD to wake the WHS, the Lightsout client software would have to be installed on the PlayonHD and be able to generate a "magic packet" to wake the WHS.
 
BonOeil said:
Hi,

Is WHS supports raid cards like Perc5i ?

I mean smart, spinoff/on, array...
Click to expand...

Whs does not "officially" support any form of raid. However, all this means is if something goes wrong microsoft will not give you any assistance.

I use an adapec 5405 raid card and I have not had any problems. Many others in these forums use raid cards with WHS so I don't think you need to worry about it.
 
Does anyone know how WHS insinuates itself into W7 libraries? I'm thinking about moving away from WHS and this is one of the features that I would miss in it.
 
S-F said:
Does anyone know how WHS insinuates itself into W7 libraries? I'm thinking about moving away from WHS and this is one of the features that I would miss in it.
Click to expand...
Hmm, I just checked with my Libraries, and you can add folders to be scanned to any of the libraries at will just by going to each of its property pages and clicking on "Add location". I haven't installed the connector on this laptop yet (just got it), but I assume that's the way WHS publishes itself. That's the easiest way, anyhow... hehe

Hope this helps.
 
I believe the standard WHS shares (Videos, etc.) get automatically added to the Libraries when you install the connector.

One thing I found out about Libraries though: Normally, any folder that you want to add to the Library must be locally indexed. But the only way to index a network share is to make it offline accessible. This means that every time you access a file on the share, Win7 will cache a copy on your local machine. This cache can get big (especially for Videos), and I think it's stored on your system drive by default, which is a problem for us SSD users. But with WHS, the index is stored on the server so I don't think there's any added space needed. There might be a way to work around this, but I haven't looked into it too deeply as I don't use Libraries all that much anyway.
 
Hmm, that is interesting. I never added any folder to the Library other than the standard ones WHS Connector brings along, so that is news to me. And, though understandable in terms of library updates and correctness, it's still a bummer if WHS gets to circumvent that (what appears to be a pure software) limitation...

Now, one thing comes to my mind: though I don't use Libraries that much (7MC fits my needs there), I do believe all computers in the same Homegroup share Library information (without offline availability), so can it be you can only add network storage without the local index requirement if the target machine is part of a Homegroup with indexing active?
 
I bought an HP EX490 6 months ago and finally have some time to begin setting it up. Out of the box it comes with a 1 Tb hard drive.

Is there a good reason to upgrade the system disk to 2 Tb? If so should it be a 7200 rpm disk or is 5400 rpm fine.

Anything else I should make sure to do during the initial setup?
 
What's a good 2tb drive to buy right now for a WHS with the advanced format bullshit?

I need to buy maybe 4 this week.

Looks like the Samsungs and Hitachi's are the best bet?
 
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cycleback said:
I bought an HP EX490 6 months ago and finally have some time to begin setting it up. Out of the box it comes with a 1 Tb hard drive.

Is there a good reason to upgrade the system disk to 2 Tb? If so should it be a 7200 rpm disk or is 5400 rpm fine.
Click to expand...

The way this thing is designed to work, you should be fine with just leaving the 1tb as the primary drive. The beauty of the server is when you add the second drive so you can start duplicating folders, so add that secondary drive asap so you have some data integrity.

cycleback said:
Anything else I should make sure to do during the initial setup?
Click to expand...

During the initial setup just make sure you have the connector software installed on all the client pc's in the network. Either let the computers stay on overnight so each box can do a full backup and then start copying your files over or however you setup your network.
 
valve1138 said:
What's a good 2tb drive to buy right now for a WHS withOUT the advanced format bullshit?

I need to buy maybe 4 this week.

Looks like the Samsungs and Hitachi's are the best bet?
Click to expand...

Did you mean without advanced format? If you wanted advanced format then the WD 2tb EARS drives are only $70 on Newegg using code EMCKJJG27 and a $20 rebate if you are in to that kinda thing.

Otherwise, yes, the Samsungs have my vote as the best non-advanced format drive. I plugged an advanced format drive in a WHS using the jumper trick and it seems to work fine and I freak a little when I read stuff like this so you might want to wait till that all gets sorted out. Or just stack some of these in there for cheap.
 
I am trying to install WHS on as ASUS Motherboard with 785G / 710SB chipsets and am windering if I just use the raid drivers for AHCI - I keep getting the BSOD if I don't F6 any drivers with AHCI turned on.

Does ACHI make much of a difference in WHS if I am not hot swapping?

thanks
 
cmanser said:
Does having AHCI on help any with speed?
Click to expand...

For WHS probably not at all. The biggest speed benefit of AHCI is related to command queuing, which really only helps in applications where you have lots of independent users hitting the disk concurrently, like an enterprise database application or file service for hundreds of clients.

Being able to hot-swap in WHS is still handy, and you don't get that with native SATA, only AHCI.
 
PigLover said:
For WHS probably not at all. The biggest speed benefit of AHCI is related to command queuing, which really only helps in applications where you have lots of independent users hitting the disk concurrently, like an enterprise database application or file service for hundreds of clients.

Being able to hot-swap in WHS is still handy, and you don't get that with native SATA, only AHCI.
Click to expand...
QFT!

Also, unless you REALLY need hot-plug (I never tried it, but I believe WHS actually requires a restart to add or remove disks from the pool, so hot-plug doesn't sound that hot - pun intended), then any other thing than the years-proven plain IDE driver from Microsoft (SATA is seen as standard IDE if AHCI or RAID modes are not used) is also quite possibly a point of failure.

Now, some of you guys (those of you same age or older than me) might be preparing to pounce me with "hey, you DO know Microsoft's IDE driver is single-access only, right?" (meaning, you can only read or write to one drive at a time), but while that is mostly true, W2K3 forgoes that limitation (been there, done that. My WHS is currently 4xSATA running in IDE mode, and there are ZERO problems reading or writing to more than one drive at the same time. Except swamping the Gigabit link, of course... hehe
 
WHS definately does support hot plug. You plug a drive in and it is recognized immediately - shows up in the disk management window of WHS and you can add it to the pool. If you have a drive properly removed from the pool you can pull it from WHS no problem. Works wonderfully.
 
Having some concerns with my WHS lately. Hopefully someone here can shed some light on it.

Recently my WHS seems to freeze/pause and in general seems to be slower than it use to be. For instance when I open up windows explorer on my main PC (Win7 Pro 64bit) the folders on the left won't show up. I just get mangifying glasses. If I open another explorer right away everything will be there on the new window, but still searching on the old one.(Pic below). Also when I am going through my picutures, if I am in list view and switch to thumbnail view, I don't get any previews, like it's just sitting there thinking. If I open another explorer view and go straight to that folder and go into thumbnail view, they pop up just like I figure they should. Another thing that happens is if I am moving or copying files from one folder to another it will pause for a 30 seconds or so, and then resume the copy/move.

I can't seem to put my finger on the time when it started happening. Things were going great and I am not sure what has changed. Most recent addition has been the 1.5TB WD Green drive.

All my drives minues the boot drive are the WD Green EADS drives, so not worries on the sector size issues.

Any suggestions would be awesome. Is there anything I can do to troubleshoot this? Any maintenance I should run on the disks? Pleae help!! Because it's annoying.

Specs:
ASUS P5Q-SE Plus
Intel e5200
4gb RAM
1 x 500gb WD
4 x 1TB WD Green EADS
1 x 1.5TB WD Green EADS

Window after switching to thumbnails
Pic%20View.jpg



Explorer on the left searching, second explorer open right after
compare.jpg
 
Fritzz said:
Having some concerns with my WHS lately. Hopefully someone here can shed some light on it.

Recently my WHS seems to freeze/pause and in general seems to be slower than it use to be. For instance when I open up windows explorer on my main PC (Win7 Pro 64bit) the folders on the left won't show up. I just get mangifying glasses. If I open another explorer right away everything will be there on the new window, but still searching on the old one.(Pic below). Also when I am going through my picutures, if I am in list view and switch to thumbnail view, I don't get any previews, like it's just sitting there thinking. If I open another explorer view and go straight to that folder and go into thumbnail view, they pop up just like I figure they should. Another thing that happens is if I am moving or copying files from one folder to another it will pause for a 30 seconds or so, and then resume the copy/move.

I can't seem to put my finger on the time when it started happening. Things were going great and I am not sure what has changed.
Click to expand...

Same thing is happening to me. I haven't made any major changes. I noticed these delays starting to happen about a month ago. I'm using the newest WHS Vail Preview (not the RC). I assume you're using the first WHS.
 
Yep using the original RC copy of WHS. Thinking about dropping out my 1.5TB and see if that's what the issue is.

Anyone else got any ideas? Anything I can try? Are there any programs you can use to defrag your WHS? Or is that even something you want to do?
 
I started having issues with mine being slow. I use my whs to stream bluray in my house. I also have the wd 1.5 green drives. Come to find out the one with whs installed on it has bad sectors yay me. I can't pull the drive right now either as I broke my ankle FML lol Also the green drives go to sleep and can take time to wake up there is a way to fix that but I can't remember at the moment. Think im going to replace my green drives with wd black drives and raid 5 for Vail.
 
What's the correct process to restore drives from a lost WHS server to another one? I've got a pair of drives that were connected to a WHS virtual machine (passed through to it). The VM got lost (screwed up array migration). How do I reintegrate the pair of drives into a new WHS setup?
 
Insert the drives, DO NOT add to the DE Pool.
Copy data to the new shares.
 
Open a CMD prompt
Type "net stop PDL"
Type "net stop WHSBackup"
On your new WHS DE Pool Delete the contents of D:\folders\{00008086-058D-4C89-AB57-A7F909A47AB4}. Do not delete the folder.
Copy the contents from your old WHS hard drive E:\folders\{00008086-058D-4C89-AB57-A7F909A47AB4} to D:\folders\{00008086-058D-4C89-AB57-A7F909A47AB4}.<Replace E:\ with appropriate drive letter>
Open a CMD prompt
Type "net start PDL"
Type "net start WHSBackup"
Reboot
Enjoy!
 
As for the slowing WHS's, are you running the Tentacle software ? There was a post elsewhere saying that software was causing a slow machine.
 
hmmm interesting, i've also been having crazy slow downs on my WHS lately as well, and have tentacle software, removed it, lets see if it gets better.
 
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