MS Windows Home Server

Popular Mechanics have posted How to Build Cheap Linux and Windows Home Media Servers in Three Easy Steps in the February (2008) issue of the mag.

The new version of PerfectDisk for WHS is now available. The 2008 version of the defragmentation toll for Windows Home Server is priced at $39.99, and also includes a copy of PerfectDisk 2008 Professional for one of your networked PCs. A home site license is also available for just $99.99, and provides a single license of PerfectDisk 8 for Windows Home Server and up to 10 licenses of PerfectDisk 2008 Professional for your network.

So what’s new:

Windows Home Server does not play nice with large files above 4GB or 5GB. Using the simple copy-and-paste in Windows Explorer or by dragging and dropping from the source to the destination causes the system to either completely lock up or results in a “Path too deep” error message. And others get this error when using SyncToy, RoboCopy or XCopy as well.

What Causes It?

It is mostly caused by having over 256 characters in the path. You have to remember that although the SHARE name is only for example \\server\RecordedTV, the actual folder on the WHS box is probably something like the following due to the way Drive Extender handles the data.:

C:\fs\4\DE\folders\{00008086-058D-4C89-AB57-A7F909A47AB4}

OR

C:\fs\D\DE\folders\{00008086-058D-4C89-AB57-A7F909A47AB4}

So as you can see, with the above path, your directory and file naming can easily go over the 256 permitted characters.

How do I check?

If you open the console and click on the  “Network Health” icon and it will display the path too deep error. If you click on the error, it will list which files are too long. Just edit the file and directory name to a shorter length.

Detailed error information can also be found in %QLOGS\qsm.log, which you can check to see for a failing path and see what the error is.

My paths are <256 Characters!

This shouldn’t be failing when the complete path and file name does NOT exceed 256 characters in length, but some people are experiencing this even when there are less than that amount and this problem is not solved even when Power Pack 1 is installed. So if this is your case, what now?

Third Party Software to the Rescue

Using the free utility TeraCopy, which we mentioned the other day causes the “Path too deep” error to totally disappear and for now seems the answer. At least temporary.

We bought to your attention the other day that the vulnerabilities detailed in the MS08-001 security bulletin also affect Windows Home Server.

The security bulletin which was first issued on January 8th was revised on January 25th when Microsoft announced that Windows Small Business Server and Windows Home Server was also at risk, neither of which had been mentioned in the original bulletin.

Windows Small Business Server and Windows Home Server both have IGMP (Internet Group Management Protocol) enabled by default and this results in a greater exposure to the same vulnerability. That’s why for these two operating systems Microsoft has given the vulnerability a severity rating of “Critical”.

An attacker could exploit the vulnerability by sending specially crafted ICMP packets to a computer over the network and could cause the computer to stop responding and automatically restart. An attacker could also take complete control of an affected system and could then install programs; view, change, or delete data; or create new accounts with full user rights.

The update will be installed as part of Windows/Microsoft Update, as long as you have it set to automatically do so, of course. Otherwise the update will be listed as KB941644 on the Update Website, which you can access on the server machine directly. Or you can install all updates requires for WHS via the Console,Settings, General tab and pressing Update Now. All Windows Home Server users should apply this update to remain secure.

Bob Muglia is the Senior Vice President of our Server and Tools division at Microsoft during the day and is an IT pro at night. Why? Well he needs to be when he runs 9 servers at home! Bob chats about Windows Server 2008 and Windows Home Server. The video can be viewed at the Microsoft TechNet Edge portal.

Many thanks to Łukasz Foks for the info.

VIA ARTiGO Pico-ITX Builder Kit provides the starter hardware for a fully functional PC that’s small enough to fit in a desktop PC’s 5.25-inch drive bay. Based on Via’s Pico-ITX motherboard form factor, the motherboard is just slightly larger than a credit card and uses Via’s VX700 chip set and UniChrome Pro II graphics chip. The Artigo kit also includes a preinstalled 1-GHz Via C7 NanoBGA2 processor and fan. Within its miniature 10cm-by-7.2cm size Via manages to cram in everything from a SODIMM socket (underneath) to an ethernet controller with an RJ45 jack (in the back) and support for four USB ports (up front). And you also get PATA and SATA connectors, as well as audio jacks for speakers and a microphone.

All you have to do is install an OS like Windows Home Server and once Via have finished the BIOS fix for the two products to work together, the Artigo would make a fantastic low-power server.

More reading material at PC World and at VIA.