Windows Home Server Team Blog

I suppose the “one household at a time” motto is going to rule out remote backups for the time being.

Speaking of growing with you... I think it was in the C9 video we learned about how you’ll be able to add/remove disks from a WHS over time as needs change... what about the day when the needs extend beyond the box itself?

I foresee a time when someone might outgrow the physical storage abilities of their existing server such as where they’ve already added as many internal HD’s as it can take and don’t want to go out and buy a new and larger disk to replace one or more of the existing ones. Instead they decide to buy a brand spanking new WHS, move their data to the new one and then give/sell the old one to a parent/friend/child/etc.

(note: the above assumes they don’t want to add any external storage)

What kind of mechanisms exist to allow a (future) owner of a WHS to move all of their storage and backup to a new unit? In the presence of more than 2 HD’s, one likely couldn’t guarantee that any single drive would contain a copy of each file and relevant deltas... so you couldn’t just yank the drive(s) out, temporarily install them to the new unit and have it import the contents... such a requirement would also be well outside of the desire (I expect) to be able to allow virtually all end users to treat it as a sealed box.

Perhaps... a higher level migration tool/wizard? (even though it would add a couple more steps to the process over what you discussed)... or are the files stored in a more readable form that would allow you to manually copy them over... such as when you move content from and old MCE to a new one?

I think an important part of "growing with you" is the need to be platform agnostic.  Like Microsoft's new SYNC initiative, Home Server should recognize that someone may own a Mac or PS3, or even *gasp* Linux in their home.

Much of this work is on the client's end, such as Mac supporting Windows networking.  But I hope that Home Server reaches out to other divisions (such as the Mac BU) to create new interoperability across Microsoft initiatives (even ones that extend beyond Microsoft products).

I'm still going to close my eyes and cross my fingers that remote backup will be involved until they specifically address it and say "No Jonathan, I'm sorry, we hate you."

<3

I know I'm reaching, but the anywhere file access leaves me with hope.  Plus allowing the I have a kid at college crowd does expand their market.....

To Brothernod - I think right now the "anywhere file access" is referring just to the remote web interface for the server (which I think is a fantastic feature, by the way.)  I'm definitely in agreement, however, that this product should tie into service-based (Live) features such as remote backup.(What happens when it's the server that gets fried or my house burns down?)

For future technology discussions... It appears that this server is not going to be using a domain environment (So non-domain capable OS's will still work with it.)  But I'd really like to be able to at least manage the Vista parental controls from the server.  Will this be able to be done with the connector software?

The potential of this project is so exciting!  My biggest concern is that the limited scope of this initial release won't impress enough people to make the initial version a huge success and therefore pave the way for a future version with more compelling features.  Much of the core functionality of this product (central file repository, backup for all PC's and remote file access) have been available for years in other ready-made packages (like the Mirra Personal Server.)

In the spirit of "Access Everything from Anywhere", will it be possible to use WHS as sort of a centralised RSS feed store? I have a laptop and desktop computer at home. I subscribed to the same feeds on both computers, but when I read an updated feed on, say, my laptop, it will obviously still be marked as 'unread' on my desktop. So next time I'm on my desktop, I'll have to open all these 'unread' feeds to see if there is actually something new, or if it's just the messages that I already read on my laptop.

Same thing goes for Windows Mail: will it be possible to let Windows Mail store my email on WHS so that I will be able to check my mail from both the laptop and the desktop?

Over on the Windows Home Server Blog there is a nice overview of the high level features of the first

"the Windows Home Server Connector software on each of your home computers running the Windows XP or Windows Vista operating systems."

You realise some of us run Windows Server editions at home? So, no backup solution there then?

I think it would be nice if it could also address the patching issue.  A baby WSUS server.  It would save bandwidth and make the home more secure and lest tediuos for the Home IT..

Just a thought