Microsoft Home Server?

[Cienja]

Hi. I'm looking to build a home server for movies, music, pictures, etc. A place to store all the digital media of a family of four. I have the hardware, but I'm not sure what to do about the software. I want to stream movies, pictures, etc., from the server to PCs, laptops, tablets, iPhones, and TVs (through XBox). I currently stream from my PC (Win 7) using Tversity, which is fine, but it takes up my bandwidth, which is why I'm building a new box.

I am thinking of going with Microsoft Home Server, which should enable all I've listed above, plus I can probably run my own domains off of it as well (I think.) Low bandwidth sites that I use for a blog, etc.

Do you have an opinion on the software? Would Windows Home Server be able to serve up to Windows, Android, and Apple devices as well as serve up a couple of very light weight WordPress sites?

Thanks in advance!

 

[smitbret]

Hi. I'm looking to build a home server for movies, music, pictures, etc. A place to store all the digital media of a family of four. I have the hardware, but I'm not sure what to do about the software. I want to stream movies, pictures, etc., from the server to PCs, laptops, tablets, iPhones, and TVs (through XBox). I currently stream from my PC (Win 7) using Tversity, which is fine, but it takes up my bandwidth, which is why I'm building a new box.

I am thinking of going with Microsoft Home Server, which should enable all I've listed above, plus I can probably run my own domains off of it as well (I think.) Low bandwidth sites that I use for a blog, etc.

Do you have an opinion on the software? Would Windows Home Server be able to serve up to Windows, Android, and Apple devices as well as serve up a couple of very light weight WordPress sites?

Thanks in advance!

WHS 2011 $49

Mezzmo DLNA server $30 (for all of your devices)
www.conceiva.com

 

[Cienja]

WHS 2011 $49

Mezzmo DLNA server $30 (for all of your devices)
www.conceiva.com

Thanks!

 

[Binky]

WHS is a very good value, if you're used to Windows. You can do the same/similar with Linux for free, but the learning curve for many people could be prohibitive.

I've run a WHS and now a WHS2011 box. They have both performed very well. My current 10TB WHS2011 box does entire house backups, serves up all files, runs my security cam software, and runs various "essential" services (sabnzbd, utorrent, sickbeard).

I'm pretty sure you can also install it as a trial. I forget how long you can run it without activation.

 

[el-Capitan]

I was not aware of Mezzmo but have been faring well with Plex on W7, W8, OSX, iPhone, iPad, WP8, Android, webbrowser.

 

[Cienja]

WHS is a very good value, if you're used to Windows. You can do the same/similar with Linux for free, but the learning curve for many people could be prohibitive.

I've run a WHS and now a WHS2011 box. They have both performed very well. My current 10TB WHS2011 box does entire house backups, serves up all files, runs my security cam software, and runs various "essential" services (sabnzbd, utorrent, sickbeard).

I'm pretty sure you can also install it as a trial. I forget how long you can run it without activation.

Thanks. This is exactly what I'm looking to do, along with attempting to host my own domains. I own a few domains that are very light in traffic, maybe 10 visits a day or so on the most popular and with a 7mb upload speed, I assume I can host them with not much more latency than I'm getting on a hosted server at Dreamhost. Any thoughts on this? It's not a cost thing, but rather a "I've never done this before!" thing.

Thanks.

 

[Cienja]

I was not aware of Mezzmo but have been faring well with Plex on W7, W8, OSX, iPhone, iPad, WP8, Android, webbrowser.

Thanks. I've been using TVersity for about two years now and it works great through Xbox with no additional software, but my Android tablet and my iPhones require an app like GoodPlayer (iOS). Does Plex do the same as most media streaming software?

Thanks.

 

[colonelciller]

hmm.. with all the functions that youlre planning on, including serving web pages i'd really. suggest you consider a linux install with cPanel.

windows based severs for serving up websites are pretty sucktastic

 

[colonelciller]

google Linux vs Windows server / hosting