Your Windows Home Server website by default uses SSL port 443 and if changed your security certificate will need to be configured to apply to that port also. Colin Walker has the details on how to do this at his RandomElements Blog.
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 ?ukasz 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.
The Windows Home Server Disk Management add-in which we discussed here has been updated to version 1.0.3. for those of you not in the know, this add-in is an extension of the server storage interface, making it easier to identify the hard drives via a visual display. Seeing which drive is the system drive and the amount of data being used on each drive has now become easier.
So what’s new:
The add-in TiVo Publisher for WHS makes your music, photos, and videos shares on the Home Server browsable from any TiVo that supports home networking. Updated version 1.21 is available which has fixed some bugs including a uninstall problem as well as correcting a problem with pressing “Play” on an artist folder and the “Flatten Video Container” option. The following features have also been added:
What was going on this week at mswhs.com? Here’s your chance to catch-up if you missed something!
You may notice an update for your Home Server if it has not been automatically downloaded and installed by Microsoft update. It regards a Windows Kernel TCP/IP vulnerability, which could allow remote code to be executed on supported editions of Windows Small Business Server 2003 and Windows Home Server.
More details are available in Microsoft Security Bulletin MS08-001.
The severity Rating is Critical so if its not installed – install it!
There’s a lot of chat at the moment (here and here) on how Windows Media Center users and those with Windows Home Server integrate both in their home setups. Their is currently no easy way of combining the best of both products unless you have the time available to do so.
Now things have got a whole lot easier with Recorded TV Manager, an Add-in for Windows Home Server designed specifically for Home Server networks that include one or more “Media Center” machines which record television programming for later viewing/time shifting.
Available from next week as a paid add-in for $24.95, it includes the following features:
More info on Recorded TV Manager, help topics and a list of collection scenarios when using the collection Wizard are available.
NB: The Recorded TV Manager website is still being worked on and will not be LIVE until next week, but feel free to have a browse.
If one of your client computers is an XP machine then there is a newer version of the Remote Desktop Client which is used if you want to remote desktop into the Home Server machine. It has been available as an Optional Software Update at the Windows Update site but for those of you that want the link it is available from Microsoft.
