MS Windows Home Server

NOTE: This add-in is designed to work exclusively with the HP MediaSmart Server EX47x models, and will not work with any other WHS systems.

MSS Fan Control allows the user to easily control the speed of the upper and lower exhaust fans of the MediaSmart Server. It also allows the user to configure the speed and temperature thresholds that determine how the fan speed should increase as the CPU temperature rises.

More information is available from the MediaSmartServer forums. Thanks to The Home Server Show for the information.

Add-in developer Brent Friedman has a new add-in for Media Center users. TV Manager copies your recordings off to your WHS for storage and management. It comes in two parts. The first part is installed on the server for management of the Recordings. And the other part is the Vista Media Center plug-in that copies new recordings over to the WHS deleting the original. It also allows you to watch the recordings like you normally would via “recorded tv” on Media Center.

Features:

• Moves  the recordings to your WHS for storage, management, and later viewing.
• Allows you to watch the recordings in Media Center as if they were on that PC’s library.
• You can delete recordings via Media Center or the Console.
• You can even watch the recordings in other media programs (that support dvr-ms)  via ‘C:\Users\Public\Windows Home Server\’
• It is and always will be Freeware.

More information is available from Brent’s Blog.

VPOP3 for Windows Home Server; the email server add-in has been updated to version 2.6.0d

More information and the evaluation/registered version are available, as are three new tutorial videos:

• Download and install VPOP3 for Windows Home Server
• Configure VPOP3 for Windows Home Server
• Configure Outlook Express to use VPOP3 for Windows Home Server

AutoExit 2008 R2 is now available as a public beta. The add-in can be used to shut down and reboot machines in your home network all from within the console.
Wake On Lan is also supported, which enables you to easily boot up your machines remotely and you can also put the machine into hibernation, sleep, log off the user or lock the machine. And also in this new version the server can also be shut down from the toolbar.

More information is available from here.

The Windows Home Server Disk Management Add-In may have compatibility issues with Power Pack 1 (PP1).  The Windows Home Server partner team  is working with the add-in author to identify and resolve the potential compatibility issue.

In the meantime it is advised that you refrain from using this add-in in conjunction with Power Pack 1.

UPDATE: For those of you enquiring what the compatibility issue is: When using the Disk Management Add-in to “remove” or “rename” a disk, the drive no longer shows up in storage. Since this can have a severe impact on a Home Server we wanted to let people know as soon as possible.

The website management add-In for Windows Home Server; Whiist has been updated. Now at version 0.82 Whiist has the following features:

• Quickly create new websites on your home server.
• Create new photo albums to share with family and friends in a few simple steps.
• Create public content, or restrict access to users of your Windows Home Server.
• Easily customize your public and private Windows Home Server Homepage links.
• Fully integrates with the Windows Home Server management console.
• Customize your Windows Home Server homepage

Developer Andrew Grant says that the latest version is compatible with the MediaSmart Server and also with PP1

More information on this great add-in is available from here.

LogPoint Performance Monitor is an add-in that creates a graphical representation of your Home Server performance data while monitoring the disk speed (read/write) and tranfers per second.

LogPoint are also in the process of finalizing the development of the Windows Home Server LogPoint Management Console. This will give you most of the LogPoint functionality on your Windows Home Server network; allowing you to monitor and manage the devices on your network.

LogPoint Performance Monitor can be downloaded for free from here. Thanks to Jerry Wade for the details.

I new add-in is being planed called WHS DupFileManager which will will be an active duplicate file manager looking for file dups that live in any shares (or user defined subset of shares/directories) on the Windows Home Server and will move the duplicates to a “Duplicate Share”.

Although there is a similar add-in entitled DupeCleaner, WHS DupFileManager will provide a better user interface for the end user.

A beta version will be available within the next week or so and developer wombat94 would like some feedback on what features you would like to see in this version.

More information is available on the Windows Home Server Forums, which is also the place to leave feedback and feature suggestions.

VPOP3 for Windows Home Server (Beta) is a Windows email server designed for Windows Home Server which will work with any Internet email account which supports POP3 or SMTP methods for incoming mail, and SMTP for outgoing mail. It will also work without an Internet email account at all, using direct SMTP email reception and sending.

The add-in includes a built in spam filter which can detect over 90% of spam and offensive email. VPOP3 also has a full Webmail server built in, enabling you to read and sent email  including viewing your address book etc all from within the same browser.

Message archiving, a mailing list server and autoresponders are other included features which are available in a 1 month free trail version after which VPOP3 for Windows Home Server (Beta) is available for a yearly price of £40 ($82).

More information including the trail are available from here.

The add-in Advanced Admin Console which allows you to access administrative tools on the server directly from the console has been updated to version 0.4.3 Beta and includes the following changes:

• New wizard for adding URL shortcuts
  This new wizard makes it easy to add URL shortcuts to the Advanced Admin Console toolbar. This way you can access the web configuration interface of other devices in your home network from within the WHS console.
• Shortcuts to folders and URL shortcuts are no longer opened in external windows. Hold the Shift key while clicking on a folder or URL shortcut  to open it in an external window.
• The tooltip of an URL shortcut displays the URL of the shortcut.
• Update availability notification
  An update notification bar is displayed in the Advanced Admin Console when an updated version is available. You can turn this feature off in the settings dialog.
• Setting for displaying the shutdown button removed from the settings dialog
  This setting was a leftover from an earlier build where the shutdown button was displayed in the toolbar. Since the shutdown button is now located in the status bar the setting became unnecessary.

More info is available here.