By Philip Churchill on July 12th, 2010
WHS Technology in Windows 8?
Paul Thurrott in his weekly Mailbag post has written the following about the forthcoming Windows 8 release:
…Windows 8 will almost certainly be the first client version of Windows to use the Drive Extender technology that debuted in Windows Home Server. Among other things, Drive Extender allows Windows to divvy up hard drive storage into a single, uninterrupted blob of storage space, removing the need for drive letters. While it’s unlikely that Windows 8 will dispense with drive letters all together, this is clearly the first step in that direction.
If this proves to eventually become true, then this is great news BUT where would this leave Windows Home Server as a stand alone product/appliance?
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This would definitely be very nice and a reason to upgrade. Without duplication I still see the Whs as a superior solution unless Windows 8 adds that also. Otherwise you lose a drive and who knows what data goes missing.
Except for some highly specialized needs, I see no consumer demand to integrate Drive Extender technology into the client version of Windows. But even if it is integrated, I still see WHS remaining relevant as a centralized, always available, high speed local access, internet connected storage pool for the whole family. And overtime I see it gaining gateway/router capabilities.
Not sure why this would affect WHS as a product – they are just adding some low-level technology to Windows. It’s not backing up to another location, it’s not adding Remote Access, it doesn’t have anything to do with accessing sharing files. I almost see it as Windows having NTFS support/RAID support/FAT32 support/etc… It’s just another technology.
But again this is Paul Thurrot and Windows 8 – I’ll believe it all when it’s actually released.