By on July 26th, 2007

Welcome "Daily Rotation" Readers

Daily Rotation has added us to its list of tech headlines. The site carries headlines from over 300 tech sites all on the one page. Each headline links to the story it refers to and you can easily configure the page so headlines from only the sites you selected will only be displayed. These configurations can then be viewed on any PC by setting up a free account at Daily Rotation.

If  one of your favorite sites is not listed then it can also be added by pasting in its feed address in the box provided. The number of headlines from each site, background colors, font size and column size can also easily be customized.

Daily Rotation has been set as my homepage for the last couple of years, give it a try yourself.

News • Site Announcements
Full Story
By on July 23rd, 2007

When I open a backup I get a dialog box asking me to restart my computer. Why do I get that?

Tom Ziegmann part of the Windows Home Server Team has just posted this over on the Microsoft WHS forums:

You will get a message saying that “Windows has installed new devices, in order for them to be fully functional you need to restart your computer.” You get this message because when a backup is opened it loads a disk driver that allows you to open the backup as a separate disk. If you restart your computer you will have to start the process of opening the backup all over again. Do not restart your computer, the backup will open and you should not have any issues.

Backup • News • Windows Home Server
Full Story
By on July 20th, 2007

4 more OEM Partners added to the list of WHS Hardware Manufactures

Well we now have four more OEM partners added to the list of Windows Home Server hardware manufactures. Iomega, Fujitsu-Siemens, Velocity Micro and Tranquil PC.

The Iomega, is an expandable consumer networking product that will include up to four hot-swappable drives and the Fujitsu Siemens unit, called the “Scaleo Home Server,” will include 500GB of storage.

Logo iomega      Fujitsu

The Velocity Micro unit can be oriented either horizontally or vertically and will use use an Intel Conroe-like processor with DDR2 RAM. It will also have have SATA II (with NCQ) hard drives, gigabit Ethernet, eSATA, and will launch at an “extremely competitive price”.

velocity      Tranquil PC

And finally the Tranquil PC T7 can again be oriented either horizontally or vertically and via an optional bracket can be mounted on the wall or in a car. Its a very small unit and is fan less.

We cant wait to see all four units in action. The WHS hardware scene is defiantly hotting up!

Hardware • News • Windows Home Server
Full Story
By on July 20th, 2007

WHS Forums to be Upgraded – More Down time!

The Windows Home Server forums are due to be upgraded on Wednesday 25 July 2007 to SP4. This patch will provide a better forum for us and resolve some long standing issues, so be prepared for a lot of down time.

Site Announcements • Windows Home Server
Full Story
By on July 20th, 2007

Add-in: Program Launcher – Launch any Program from within the WHS Console

Program Launcher from Red D Solutions enables you to launch any application directly from the Windows Home Server Console just by entering the Program Path and Program Name.
It comes with 4 applications already setup. Desktop, Event Viewer, IIS Manager and Windows Explorer. You can add any other applications you wish e.g. Task Manager.

Program Launcher

This is a very useful add-in, well done to developer Dan Forsyth who had this to say:

“While working on my first add-in I got really annoyed at having a console and a remote desktop session open to check the event log and iis admin tools. So I whipped up a quick add-in that will let you launch any app you want from the console.”

Download Program Launcher version 1.0

UPDATE: Version 1.1 has also been released that solves an icon issue where the icons shown for the application were jarred and B&W. If there are issues with this build you can still use version 1.0

add-ins • News • Windows Home Server
Full Story
By on July 18th, 2007

RTM Documentation is available

The RTM English version of the Windows Home Server Getting Started Guide has been posted to the download center on Microsoft’s web site. French, Spanish and German versions will follow in the next few weeks.

Also available for download is the Windows Home Server Reviewer’s Guide which has detailed descriptions about the features and functionality of WHS. Time to get reading!

News • Windows Home Server
Full Story
By on July 17th, 2007

RTM button-pushing ceremony Video

Tom Z. part of the Windows Home Server team has posted details that the guys from On10.net have posted a four minute video from Microsoft’s internal Sign-off party of Windows Home Server v1. The video and Larry Larsen’s write up on the event can be viewed at http://www.on10.net/Blogs/larry/watch-windows-home-server-rtm/.

News • Windows Home Server
Full Story
By on July 17th, 2007

100 New Fixes, Forums and Connect to Stay Open and Available Versions!

Now that Windows Home Server has shipped we have some details on the included fixes, info on what will be happening to the Microsoft WHS Forums and Connect web site and details on the availability of the evaluation version including info for MSDN and Technet subscribers.

There has been over 100 new fixes with the RTM version, a lot of which were text string changes for the German, French and Spanish localization builds. Other fixes include:

  • Backup Consistency Check
  • Log files growing
  • Windows Updates takes all updates (including non-critical ones)
  • Remove Drive problems
  • Activation error messages
  • Server Recovery for some of the hardware partners

This is good news. The Microsoft WHS Forums will remain open and will become a place where people can discuss their experiences with the product and find add-ins, etc. The product team will continue to monitor and participate in the forums and they ask us to keep testing and reporting on the forums so they can see if they can reproduce any of the reported problems with the RTM code. The Connect site will also remain open for beta-testing any add-ins or other new functionality that the Windows Home Server team might develop.

Those of us with a MSDN or Technet subscription will be sad to hear that the first release of Windows Home Server will not be available via these services although in a couple of months we shall be able to order disk kits of the 120 day Evaluation Editions from the Microsoft home server web site.  These Evaluation editions shall be available in English, French, Spanish and German.

News • Windows Home Server
Full Story
By on July 16th, 2007

Windows Home Server has been released to manufacturing (RTM)

Today Windows Home Server has been released to manufacturing (RTM).

The software has now been finalized and its now being handed off to the OEM partners. The evaluation version (with 120 day evaluation period) and the system builder version are also heading into the distribution channels and will be available in the next couple of months. French, German and Spanish versions will be finalized shortly, and the OEM products will hit retail shelves this fall.

Charlie Kindel at the RTM ship party had this to say:

“It started with a vision that an always available device on the home network was an essential ingredient of a Microsoft platform for the home. At first there was only one of us, then three, then five… We put together a plan for a plan and executed. The result was an ambitious, yet pragmatic product plan that would deliver real value to consumers. We formed a team of extremely passionate, diverse, and hard working people. Some will say we had great luck but we know the best luck of all is the luck you make for yourself. We had a spirit of getting it done, no matter what. We broke some rules but never any laws. A community of highly enthusiastic customers rose around us. We made them part of the development process and rewarded them and they amplified our efforts.  We made some mistakes…and corrected them. We took a few risks…and they paid off.  In April 2005 we said we’d ship V1 in the first half of 2007. It wasn’t always easy and it wasn’t always fun, but we said what we were going to do and then we did it. You know what they say…the fourth time’s a charm.†  Congratulations and thanks for helping ship the coolest version of Windows ever: Windows Home Server.”

Well that’s it boys and girls the beta period has finished and whilst the Home Server Team have a well deserved break, we can now look forward to the OEM products reaching us around October 2007. Well done all you beta testers!

News • Windows Home Server
Full Story
By on July 13th, 2007

New Security Suite for Home Server

Well we have a new Security Suite for your Home server which is a beta release. Eset Smart Security from the guys who make Nod32, so you know it will have a good viral detection rate and it’s light on resources too.

ESET Smart Security is an integrated security solution containing Antivius, Anrtispyware a Personal Firewall and Antispam functionality as well.

Antivirus & Antispyware

  • Intelligent cleaning without the need of user’s action
  • Scanning on background saves system resources
  • Smaller update size – faster updates on slow connections

Personal Firewall

  • Monitoring and scanning of executable files
  • Integrated antivirus & antispyware scanning of all network traffic
  • Intrusion detection system – detects and block various types of network attacks
  • Works completely automatically or uses user created rules

Antispam

  • Very high effectiveness thanks to multiple filtering techniques applied together – signature base filtering as well as Bayesian analysis
  • Custom rule sets – white and black listing
  • Very low false positive rate

Download ESET Smart Security BETA 1b. The official release date should be sometime in Sep/Oct 2007. More Information and a Changelog are also available.

Note:  On the firewall use interactive mode so you can open the ports which Windows Home Server needs.

Other Software • Windows Home Server
Full Story