By on July 09th, 2008

Ask the Home Server Guy

Home Server Hacks are already on part 3 of their new series of Q&A called Ask the Home Server Guy.

Ask The Home Server Guy

Fellow MVP Donavon West has the daunting tasks of answering your Windows Home Server related questions with detailed explanations and pictures too (I like that part!). From the HP EX470, iTunes and Macs to the Remote Desktop Connection having expired and lots more.

All future installments can be found on the new Ask the Home Server Guy website.

News • Windows Home Server
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By on July 09th, 2008

BitDefender Total Security 2009 Beta 3

Beta 3 of BitDefender Total Security 2009 has just become available, the security package add-in for Windows Home Server.

BitDefender_logo-color_on_black-RGB

New in Beta 3:

  • Online backup for Windows x64 systems
  • Vulnerability scanning
  • Wizard to create new antimalware scan tasks from basic view
  • History events for several modules
  • IM Antiphishing not implemented

Known issues:

  • Pppoe connections and ICS are not filtered by the BitDefender Firewall
  • Yahoo! Messenger crashes on login when script control and game mode are enabled
  • BitDefender button is not displayed in the Windows Live Messenger windows on x64b systems
  • Rarely Yahoo! Messenger and Windows Live Messenger may crash on exit.
  • BitDefender Security Center may crash during a product update.
  • On Windows Vista SP1 (x86 & x64), the local computer appears offline in the Network Map tree.
  • Sometimes the registration wizard freezes during a product update (workaround click „cancel” in the registration wizard).
  • Time Limiter does block the internet traffic in the specified time interval

You may sign up to the beta program from here. Existing beta testers can also find the download and additional information from the same link.

More details of the features included in BitDefender Total Security 2009 are available from here.

Other Software • Windows Home Server
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By on July 09th, 2008

Should WHS and Media Center be Combined?

Windows expert Ed Bott writes about special-purpose consumer devices on ZDNet:

Windows Media Center is mature and extremely well supported. It wouldn’t be that difficult to port the Media Center code to a next-generation operating system that could then form the basis for cool, quiet PCs that could form the hub of a household digital media system. In fact, a device like HP’s MediaSmart Server, which currently runs Windows Home Server, could combine Media Center and backup functions into a single box and would probably run better without the unnecessary overhead of Windows components it doesn’t use.

So, what do you reckon? Would it be a good idea to combine Windows Home Server and Media Center as one product? Leave your thoughts below.

News • Windows Home Server
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By on July 09th, 2008

WHS – Great for Home Based Businesses with Small Networks

Would you like to know how Windows Home Server compares to Microsoft Small Business Server and why Home Server is also great for home based businesses with small networks?

Then head over to smallbiztechnology.com where Joel Sider, senior product manager of the Windows Home Server team at Microsoft is interviewed.

News • Windows Home Server
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By on July 09th, 2008

Ad-In: TV Manager Beta 3

Beta 3 of the add-in TV Manager is now available. Designed for both WHS and Media Center, it copies your recordings off to your WHS for storage and management. It comes in two parts. Part one, is installed on the server for management of the Recordings. Part two, is the Media Center (Vista only) 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’.

Fixes:

  • Added support for French installations of Windows Home Server. (Used to be a problem with the spelling of Videos)
  • Fixed the Media Center Scheduler service going bonkers. (Modified how the service is changed to run under the current user instead of LocalSystem)
  • Fixed the Problem downloading Guide data bug. (Was a result of changing the account the scheduler service ran under. Fixed by changed the permissions on first run of the client)

New Features:

  • Added logging to the TV Manager client. (You’ll get a dialog box telling you to check the event log with the TV Manager category)
  • Automatically loads and refreshes the data for the TV Manager Console Tab.
  • Exit context menu shows up when right clicking the client icon in the system tray.

All the information is available from here.

add-ins • Windows Home Server
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By on July 07th, 2008

PP1 Drive Extender Balancing Algorithms used for Disk Balancing

Chris Gray, lead developer for Windows Home Server has published a brief description of the balancing algorithms used for disk balancing in Home Servers PP1 Drive Extender. For the geek’s amongst us Chris takes us through auto-migration, duplication and balancing.

All the details.

News • Windows Home Server
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By on July 07th, 2008

Getting HP Updates to Work with PP1

After installing Power Pack 1 (PP1) on the HP MediaSmart Server you may notice that you can no longer get the HP updates. Hewlett Packard are releasing a new version of their update once the final version of PP1 is released. In the meantime one way of still getting the updates is to browse the supplied CD and just reinstall the hp update which will enable the updates from HP to work again.

Tutorial • Windows Home Server
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By on July 07th, 2008

How to Duplicate WHS Backups and Remove the Caution Screen

Daves Computer Tips Newsletter has a great article on how backups work on Windows Home Server and what makes the WHS backup so special. Dave also shows us how to duplicate the computer backup files by using a registry hack on the Home Server and how to remove the caution screen when logging on to your Home Server via Remote Desktop.

WHS Caution

You can catch the details here.

Tutorial • Windows Home Server
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By on July 07th, 2008

Add-In: Windows Home Server Disk Management 1.0.8.6

Sam Wood has updated his add-in, Windows Home Server Disk Management to version 1.0.8.6 which fixes a crash if removing the last internal drive bay and external drive bays still remain. The user is now prompted to remove external drive bays first.

WHS Disk Management

This Add-In provides more detail about your server’s storage status than what the standard WHS Server Storage interface provides.

Features:

  • Detailed information for each disk in your Windows Home Server
  • Real-time temperature and activity monitoring
  • Capacity indicators for individual disks
  • Customizable disk names
  • Customizable 3D wireframe representation of your server

More details are available from here.

add-ins • Windows Home Server
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By on July 04th, 2008

Happy Forth of July

Happy Forth of July

Celebration

For those of you not in the USA. Independence Day honors the birthday of the United States of America and the signing of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776.

Have a wonderful day!

News • Windows Home Server
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