At Ignite last week Microsoft announced the launch of Windows Server 2016.
For those of you that wish to play, a 180 day trial is available from the TechNet Evaluation Centre.
Also a webcast is planned for October 13th with a walkthrough of its new features with demos and early adopter stories, whilst additional demos and documentation are available on the new Windows Server 2016 site.
Updated from version 4.6, CloudBerry Backup has been updated to version 4.7.1 with the following changes:
More information is available in the following two blog posts both here and here.
Episode 293 of the Home Server Show podcast is available:
“A whole lot of follow up on this episode. Circle, WiFi, Server to NAS, and a better look at Open Mesh with Mike Faucher. Jim Collison discusses cloud storage while Dave digs into his wiring closet. Also, some moving news.”
You can catch the audio from here, or watch the video below:
Introducing CloudBerry Backup 4.6
The latest version comes with the following new features and updates:
Support dynamic disks for Image-based backup
In previous versions of CloudBerry Backup you were not able to include dynamic disks into the image-based backup, only basic disks were backed up. Now you can back up dynamic disks – they will be included by default if you create a new Image-based backup plan. For existing plans there is a need to edit the backup plan and select those disks into backup. Check out How to Create Image-based Backup.
Note: Dynamic disks can be restored only as basic disks. You will need to convert them back to dynamic after the restore. You can use Windows Disk Management on your computer to make the conversion. Check out How to Recover System from Image-based Backup.
Creating a bootable ISO for restoring Image Based Backup
In previous versions we offered a bootable USB option only that allows you to run a system recovery from the image-based backup. Now you can create a bootable ISO file so you will be able to mount the ISO file as a disk and restore your system. This option can be helpful for environments that do not have USB or for virtual envrionment. Learn more at How to Create a Bootable ISO for Image-based Backup.
Support JSON for Keystone authentication
New versions of OpenStack Keystone API currently tend to support only JSON format for their requests, deprecating the XML format. So now CloudBerry Backup fully supports JSON format that allows you to use cloud storages based on a new Keystone API.
After our last story explaining why Anthony from Division-M made the decision to move away from his full time position at the company which produces Drive Bender. Anthony has been flooded with the community’s response. So the end result, in Anthony’s words:
“Given the level of user support, it seems I had no other choice other than allowing Drive Bender, PoolHD and Cloud Xtender to live on! As for my involvement, I’ve decided to remain involved as a hobbyist… that is I will remain active on the forum and play with the code when possible.”
The full response can be read here.
After a few weeks of absence, its time for another episode of the Home server Show podcast.
Episode 292 is all about Circle, WiFi, and Networking:
On this episode of Home Server Show I’ll unbox Circle while giving you a heads up about this new product. Listen in if you want to manage your wifi devices, internet, usage, etc. Jim, Mike Faucher, and I jump into Wifi, roaming, access points, security, routers, and more networking issues. I’ll also update you on my switch from Server 2012 to Synology and how I’m duplicating data, backing up to the cloud, and backing up my web server to the NAS.
You can listen to episode 292 here, or catch it on YouTube here.
Microsoft have updated their post on client connector availability for Windows 7, 8/8.1 and 10 joined to WHS2011 and Essentials 2012.
The updated post highlights the availability of an update (3105885) to support auto-redirection of Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials for the Windows 10 client connector.
Anthony from Division-M has made the difficult decision to move away from his full time position at the company. Using the company’s blog, Anthony stated the following:
Unfortunately slowing Drive Bender sales and sluggish Cloud Xtender numbers have meant that ongoing development at the current pace is just not financially possible. The slowing Drive Bender sales were anticipated, as Windows Storage Space’s had a big impact on this market, not to mention the cloud is also seeing users move from large local storage to much cheaper cloud solutions. Our strategy was to have Cloud Xtender pick up the slack, however this has not happened. While the initial Cloud Xtender numbers looked good, these have not been sustained.
Anthony also stated that there are no plans to scrap the products and that all valid licenses will continue to work now, and into the future. Future updates for all products will continue with bug fixes for both Drive Bender and Cloud Xtender being released over the coming weeks as well as a Windows 10 compatible version of PoolHD becoming available.
Version 1.6.1 of Lights-Out has been released. This is primarily a bug fix update which fixes some Windows 10 issues. With added official support for Windows Server 2016 Essentials Technical Preview 3 and Mac OS X 10.11 (El Capitan).
Lights-Out for Windows Home Server 2011 and Windows Server Essentials 2012 (R2)
More information on this latest release, is available from here.
Episode 291 of the Home Server Show podcast is up:
It’s a battle between the Dell Inspiron micro 3050 and the HP Stream mini. We’ll talk about Media Center and if it’s better on Windows 8.1 or Windows 7 with these boxes.
you can catch episode 291 here.
