Planning For A WHSv1 Replacement?

[SunnyD]

I'm pretty much going to move over to Server 2012 from WHS2011. Reasons:

#1 - I'm not really using any of the WHS features of WHS anymore since I could never get the connector to work (because of the .Net on x64 bug with it).

#2 - I need the flexible storage options, and I don't really trust any of the 3rd party addons.

#3 - I don't really like "hacking" WHS to get it to do certain things (like AD or using a cert from a 3rd party)

#4 - System limitations - 8gb ram isn't enough for (see #5)

#5 - I potentially want to run a couple VMs on the box (Asterisk and/or pfSense), so more hardware resources is somewhat of a necessity.

Server 2012 does everything WHS does minus the pretty web front end imho. I would trust a 3rd party web package to provide that functionality over 3rd party WHS addons pretty much any day.

 

[ViRGE]

By happenstance I found the original article that I read. Perhaps it was not/no longer accurate?

http://helgeklein.com/blog/2012/03/windows-8-storage-spaces-bugs-and-design-flaws/

You're a total killjoy.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Sounds like storage spaces is basically raid, though, a crappy implementation of it. I still prefer Linux mdraid though, MS is always screwing with stuff and changing things around. They seem to have a flavor of the day then next release it's something else. I have a raid array that was built in like 2008. I could install the latest version of any Linux distro, and still be able to mount the raid array and use it.

 

[TheKub]

You're a total killjoy.

If that article is still acurate then unfortunately yes I am. I miss Drive Extender. I moved to WHS 2011 when I started to aquire 3TB drives and had to break down and do a bunch of RAID 1 drives.

 

[ViRGE]

If that article is still acurate then unfortunately yes I am. I miss Drive Extender. I moved to WHS 2011 when I started to aquire 3TB drives and had to break down and do a bunch of RAID 1 drives.

It's not strictly true, but it's not wrong either. The real limitation is that Storage Spaces doesn't do any balancing, which makes it hard to take advantage of additional hard drives in a sane manner.

 

[n0x1ous]

the plot thickens...

http://connecteddigitalworld.com/2012/09/07/how-to-skip-domain-joining-for-server-2012-essentials-clients/

 

[ViRGE]

the plot thickens...

http://connecteddigitalworld.com/2012/09/07/how-to-skip-domain-joining-for-server-2012-essentials-clients/

Interesting. That's a welcome change, even if it's not the easiest thing to do.

 

[n0x1ous]

Virge,

Just wondering what you ended up doing. I was waiting for initial reviews/feedback before getting 2012E RTM and all the negative feedback about Storage Spaces, no auto balancing, no legit way to remove pooled drive and replace with larger is causing me to take a step back.

Sounds like it really isn't turning out the way I envisioned. Contemplating WHS 2011 with stablebit drivepool again, as it seems to be fairly mature at this point. I don't know what to think anymore. All I know is I can't stay on WHS v1 much longer....

Let me know what you are doing if you don't mind.

 

[ViRGE]

I haven't rebuilt my server yet (need to take care of paying for Christmas gifts for the family first), but I intend to go ahead and jump to 2012E. I have done a bunch of testing through VMWare and it has passed all of my tests to at least an adequate degree, especially now that you can block a Windows client from joining the domain. The only real problem with it is going to be the price.

Ultimately it does some things better than WHSv1 and some things worse, so it comes down to whatever work-arounds I need to follow to make it do what I need. I really want the parity spaces, so I intend to go ahead with 2012E rather than WHS2011 with a 3rd party utility. The lack of auto balancing is annoying, but I've discovered you can just create a new storage space and move data from the old space to the new space, in effect manually balancing it. It's slow, but it gets the job done.

And there is a legitimate way to remove pooled drives. You can remove the drive using the Windows Server Console. It will put the machine in a degraded state, at which point you can add the new hard drive and it will do the rebuild.

 

[n0x1ous]

And there is a legitimate way to remove pooled drives. You can remove the drive using the Windows Server Console. It will put the machine in a degraded state, at which point you can add the new hard drive and it will do the rebuild.

Thanks for the update - I didn't see that tip anywhere before so thats good to know. I too was planning on a Parity space. I think Im still going to hold off for a little longer. Keep me posted when you get it setup.

Any chance the price falls on this or do traditional server OS's likes this stay pretty constant?

 

[ViRGE]

Thanks for the update - I didn't see that tip anywhere before so thats good to know. I too was planning on a Parity space. I think Im still going to hold off for a little longer. Keep me posted when you get it setup.

Any chance the price falls on this or do traditional server OS's likes this stay pretty constant?

Pricing will state constant. MS almost never changes it.

 

[Griffinhart]

Well, I recently changed my server set up at home. As I mentioned a while ago in this thread, I had been using a Windows 2011 SBS set up running WHS v1 in VM for backup. The solution worked pretty well for me. But....

I honestly got tired of having a large server burning 110W average, and I got the itch for a new project to do. So, I replaced everything.

I decided to opt for Office 365 as an email provider, so I no longer needed to run Exchange or actually have my server run 24/7.

Once I moved my mail off my local server I had some time to play with different options.

The first change I made was to replace the home build i7 w/ 12 GB of RAM w/ 8 1.5TB drives in RAID5 with a low power server.

I picked up the HP Proliant Microserver N40L w/ the ILO option and installed 8GB of RAM. A significantly less powerful server, but very power efficient. 40W at load so far.

My first set up was running Windows Server 2012 Essentials, which ran fine, but I had some odd issues. Mainly with the web based media streaming. For some reason, It just refused to work and none of the suggestions I could find allowed me to get it to work.

I also tried installing Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V (The free hyper-V server) and then installed Essentials as a VM. It worked fine, but the media streaming problem soon re-appeared.

At this point I decided I really didn't want to run my own DNS server or use AD. So I nuked the server one last time and installed WHS 2011. I've pretty much settled on this now, and will continue to use it.

The final configuration is the Micro Server w/ the 250GB boot HD, and 3 3TB drives. I have mirrored two of them for data protection and I have dedicated the 3rd HD for desktop backups.

I also installed Lights-Out on the server. It automatically hybernates the machine after 30 minutes of inactivity and brings itself up durring my backup window. I have also set up WoL which allows me to wake the server with my cell phone when I need to remotely connect.

I'm very happy with my new solution right now.

 

[n0x1ous]

Griffinhart

Thank you for sharing your experience with us and what you finally settled on. did you have any other problems with 2012 essentials besides the media streaming? particulary with storage spaces?

 

[joe_H]

I'd also like to hear your comparison between 2012E and WHS2011. I have an aging WHS v1 box which I will probably upgrade sometime in 2013. I use it to stream a lot of content (movies, playon, etc...) to a HTPC. If 2012E has trouble streaming content, it may make my OS decision that much easier.

 

[Snoop]

One note on Crashplan is that it is a bargain at 6 bucs a month for 10 PC's unlimited.

I have a server setup which holds backup sets of all my local pcs on a separate disk via the Crashplan client along with my online backups. It is also setup to take remote backups from my families PC's across WAN. Took about 20 minutes to completely setup and if anyone doesn't backup Crashplan will send an email. You can also receive daily reports. I would pay triple that for the convenience.

It also saves deleted files for however long you set so items which were deleted months ago are still available. Very nice!

 

[n0x1ous]

does crashplan have a WHS 2011 or 2012E addin or must it be run from the desktop?

 

[Snoop]

does crashplan have a WHS 2011 or 2012E addin or must it be run from the desktop?

Not exactly sure of your goal but it runs as a service and/or application. So you setup via a gui, but it runs as a service.

Googeling I found this: http://support.crashplan.com/doku.php/recipe/whs_installation

 

[n0x1ous]

I meant if it had an official "add-in" developed for Colorado served based SDK.
an installer that ended in .wssx not .exe which it does not.

but thank you for finding that link to confirm.