Why use server software like WHS instead of Win7 or other OS?

[RobsTV]

You can remote into WHS's desktop just like your current setup, and run whatever services/apps you want from there..

Thanks for the clarification.

So then it either comes with IE, or I can simply install IE8 like any other PC, and expect similar results as a normal PC with IE8, imageburn and other apps.. That would work for me.

Just was confused in part by add-on apps offered. Why have an add-on such as utorrent if normal utorrent for windows would work fine? See how this might look like special WHS apps were needed for normal things?

 

[BTA]

One of the biggest issues I have encountered with WHS and people not wanting to use it is MS insistance that it wipe every drive installed in the system before install. A lot of people have drives that already contain a lot of data and the idea they now need to back up several TB of data somehow so they can do the install then copy it all back just isn't worth it for many people. I can install freenas to a 4GB compact flash drive and boot from it and use all my drives just as they are.

I agree about the lack of control. I want to know exactly where my data is located on each drive not have them located in a virtual pool of drives.

WHS only formats when you add it to the storage pool. You can plug it into the server and simply copy the contents to your current storage pool, then add the drive to the pool, where it will then be formatted.

Please tell me how FreeNAS would add this drive to a current RAID array without destroying the data? (for that matter, the data on all the current drives as well).

The only situation I can see where your argument might be true is in a new installation situation...but then you'd just install WHS on a new hard drive with enough space for your data, and either copy it all over the network first, or if it's readable on the current drives as a standard drive partition, plug it in and copy as I mention above. I suppose you are talking about migrating from a current solution to another...which can be solved by an investment in a new hard drive...and lets face it, you probably aren't moving to a new solution because you don't want to spend money on expanded storage...

As for lack of control...I'm not seeing it. All data is stored in WHS on standard NTFS partitions. You can unplug a drive and plug it into another PC and pull your data off like you would anything else. How easy is it to recover data from a RAID 5 array if you have problems with the server or array itself?

 

[BTA]

Thanks for the clarification.

So then it either comes with IE, or I can simply install IE8 like any other PC, and expect similar results as a normal PC with IE8, imageburn and other apps.. That would work for me.

Just was confused in part by add-on apps offered. Why have an add-on such as utorrent if normal utorrent for windows would work fine? See how this might look like special WHS apps were needed for normal things?

Yep I have IE8 installed on mine just through normal Windows Update.

Yeah there are actual WHS Add-ins that you can get. Many of them are very good. The main advantage to those though is that they integrate with the Home Server Console (the little app that installs on your PC that lets you manage and monitor what your server is doing).

Your example of utorrent is a good one. Yes there is an Add-in version, but you could just as easily install it from the desktop. If you didn't install the Add-in version then obviously you wouldn't be able to manage it from the Home Server Console application. (you might want to research the Add-in utorrent, if I remember right it doesn't work very well or is stuck on an older version or something...I don't torrent much so I'm not really familiar though).

A good example of an Add-in version better than the stand alone would be My Movies...which I use extensively. (http://www.mymovies.dk)

I could install the standalone from the desktop, but that would only give the basic functionality, which would be fine as well. But the Add-in for WHS, lets me manage everything from the console...plus, when I rip a DVD the WHS Add-in version lets me just pop a DVD in the drive, it will rip and download all the meta data in one shot. I don't have to do it anything, it just spits it out when it's done. I can then pull up the Console and verify it worked if I wanted, or change any settings I feel I need to make from there.

Keep in mind that running services from the desktop on WHS is not technically "supported"...which just means Microsoft will only support you using WHS as they intended, which is a headless server with everything being installed/run from the Console.

http://www.wegotserved.com is a great resource for all your WHS questions.

 

[JackMDS]

http://www.homeserverland.com/downl...ult.aspx?GalleryPostSort=PostDate&PageIndex=1

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[Raduque]

I will never understand why people want to use WHS as a workstation when it is very clearly not designed for it.

 

[imagoon]

While waiting for memory to arrive, things keep popping into my head.

Keep in mind, this whole thing is in regard to switching from a PC O.S. as a server to WHS (or possibly 32bit Windows server 2008 or server 2003 R2).

Looks like running apps on the server will not be as easy as on a PC used as a server. Probably doable though.

What about a web browser and DVD burner?
For example, now if I wish to access my technet account, with my wireless laptop I simply remote access my server PC (pcanywhere), browse to technet website, find the desired ISO to download, and it then starts MS download manager and saves to the PC server.

After downloading, I run image burn to DVD burner on that PC server, and done.

Easy and painless.

If I only had a file server, I would need to access the technet website with the laptop, start MS download manager from laptop, indicating network storage location desired, then file would come from the net to Router, then wireless to laptop, then wireless back to router, then wired LAN to file server. If I shut off laptop during the download, download would stop. Of course that is not the way to go. So access to normal and easy apps like IE and imageburn on the server is mandatory.

Any problems doing things like this with WHS?
Or will pretty much everything require special apps and tweaks to make it work on WHS?
Just thinking the effort needed to be put in for the gains that come out in the end.

Another question about backups.
PC currently uses hardware raid.
Plus, using Acronis to backup important server data to another drive on a networked PC.
Has anyone used the latest Acronis that does live constant backups, plus has features like picking and choosing individual folders and or files easily from it's manager? Seems like a lot of what WHS does might be close to the same or better with Acronis and a PC as server?

WHS has it's own ability to backup. In the storage manager you can add the drive and selected the option "I want to backup to this drive." However it will only backup files on the file system not "itself." However reinstalling WHS is not that hard and restoring to it is then a matter of moving the files back on to the system.

Again WHS by default will have little to no space allocated for running stuff on itself. Your "3 Terabytes" of disk will only show up as a 20gig partition. WHS uses a lesser known (at least for home users) technique of volume mounting to NTFS. Linux people will recognize it right away but it is not common to see in the windows home world.

Yes you can log in to the console. It is not really designed for it however. I personally just log in to my home PC via logmein or the remote desktop relay and start the download there.

WHS does not have built in DVD burning support. You would need to find an app that could handle being on the WHS server without wrecking the machine.

 

[JackMDS]

WHS does not have built in DVD burning support. You would need to find an app that could handle being on the WHS server without wrecking the machine.

The portable version of this, http://infrarecorder.org/?page_id=5


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Note. I have one installation of WHS for "playing" purposes.

What ever you use make sure that you real storage server is safe.

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[Modelworks]

WHS only formats when you add it to the storage pool. You can plug it into the server and simply copy the contents to your current storage pool, then add the drive to the pool, where it will then be formatted.

Please tell me how FreeNAS would add this drive to a current RAID array without destroying the data? (for that matter, the data on all the current drives as well).

With anything but WHS including an OS even as old as win2k I can use my current drives for storage and just add files to it without formatting anything. If you only have a single 1TB drive you cannot install WHS, but I can partition that drive and install almost any other OS without losing anything.

As for lack of control...I'm not seeing it. All data is stored in WHS on standard NTFS partitions. You can unplug a drive and plug it into another PC and pull your data off like you would anything else. How easy is it to recover data from a RAID 5 array if you have problems with the server or array itself?

How easy is it to recover data from RAID ? How long does it take to swap out the drive ?
If a drive fails all I have to do is remove the bad drive, put in a good one and the data is rebuilt. There are going to be some pissed off people when they have backed up all their dvd collection to a NAS and have 2-3TB and the drive fails. Going to be fun ripping all those dvd again.

I see nothing of value with WHS except it is easy for people to install who don't want to learn anything. It is a hacked together version of windows server and I am really really surprised MS even produced it. To me it installs and works like something a group of hobby programmers would put together. For free there are a lot better alternatives out there and I'm not just talking about FreeNas. Any linux distribution can do more with less hardware and more features and the software is free. WHS is easy , other than that I see nothing special about it. I would rather use win2k than WHS for a nas.

 

[Modelworks]

For example, I think I would want to back up the NAS periodically. Maybe these two OS's can do that already, I don't know. But assuming they can't, I would know how to install backup software onto WHS and get it running, but I'd have no idea how to do that in FreeBSD -- and I'm primarily a Mac user who drops into the terminal almost every day. It sounds like home users like me are WHS's target market.

The benefit with using server based NAS is they support RAID. With RAID you do not have to worry about backing up the NAS because if a drive fails you just swap out a new one and it rebuilds the data, nothing lost. You don't have to install any backup software for a NAS to work. Plenty of Mac users do it with time machine and no special software needed. Also the *nix systems can read and write HFS so it is possible to take a drive from a Mac and install it in the NAS and read the content on the drive.

I think I also got a little turned off by FreeNAS when I read that the developer said it is too inflexible and so he's starting a new project to rewrite it in Linux. But really, doesn't it sound like a toss-up between the two, depending on what you want out of it?

The reason isn't that FreeNAS is inflexible it is that the project is almost finished. When started they set a roadmap of all the features they wanted to have and it is about to reach that point. Rather than go past version 1.0 the decision was made to move to linux because there are more linux developers than FreeBSD so things like new hardware support isn't as much work . That doesn't mean that FreeNAS will be abandoned because it has been picked up by another group who want to continue to support it.

 

[Raduque]

With anything but WHS including an OS even as old as win2k I can use my current drives for storage and just add files to it without formatting anything. If you only have a single 1TB drive you cannot install WHS, but I can partition that drive and install almost any other OS without losing anything.

Yes, but for each drive you add to the non-WHS NAS, you need to setup a new share and new mapped drive/shortcut/whatever on the client. WHS takes care of that - all storage is automatically added to the Pool and available under the same share. It formats because DE needs to control the filesystem, and the easiest way to be sure of that is to re-format the drive as NTFS regardless of what it previously was.

I don't really understand what you're getting at with the bolded part - you can install WHS on a single 1TB HD (you get a 20gb system/boot partition and a 911gb Data partition). As for partitioning and installing other OSes... why do you want to dual-boot a server that's supposed to be little/no maintenence?

The key to WHS is it's automation. It automatically balances storage, it automatically backs up client computers (and prunes the backups), it automatically updates itself, you see what I'm getting at.

 

[BTA]

With anything but WHS including an OS even as old as win2k I can use my current drives for storage and just add files to it without formatting anything. If you only have a single 1TB drive you cannot install WHS, but I can partition that drive and install almost any other OS without losing anything.








How easy is it to recover data from RAID ? How long does it take to swap out the drive ?
If a drive fails all I have to do is remove the bad drive, put in a good one and the data is rebuilt. There are going to be some pissed off people when they have backed up all their dvd collection to a NAS and have 2-3TB and the drive fails. Going to be fun ripping all those dvd again.

I see nothing of value with WHS except it is easy for people to install who don't want to learn anything. It is a hacked together version of windows server and I am really really surprised MS even produced it. To me it installs and works like something a group of hobby programmers would put together. For free there are a lot better alternatives out there and I'm not just talking about FreeNas. Any linux distribution can do more with less hardware and more features and the software is free. WHS is easy , other than that I see nothing special about it. I would rather use win2k than WHS for a nas.

You have no idea what you are talking about. If you lose a drive in WHS and you have duplication turned on for your shares that you want duplicated, it will rebuild the data when you replace the defective drive. It works differently but it functionally does the same thing you are describing. At least you have the option of only duplicating what you need, unlike RAID which you'll have to duplicate everything no matter what.

I'm glad you can install anything on a single drive and use it, but that isn't what WHS is designed for (and you seem to ignore the fact that you need multiple disks for your RAID setup as well, when it fits your "argument"). Plus how many times are you going to be installing WHS on your single drive with data on it? You're harping on an issue that MAY come up for someone one time, at installation.

I notice you have no comment to ease of storage expansion in a RAID environment? I guess that falls under your "no value" column. To some there is value there. There is also value in ease of use.

At least learn about a product before you try to bash it. This is just typical "Linux rules" dick waving on your part though.

 

[RobsTV]

How can it recover all data?
If you install WHS in a 100 gig drive, then later add a 1TB drive. All important data is saved on the 1TB drive. You have 800gig, then the drive craps out. All that is left intact is the original 100 gig drive. You are saying that is enough, and no data will be lost?

 

[Modelworks]

Yes, but for each drive you add to the non-WHS NAS, you need to setup a new share and new mapped drive/shortcut/whatever on the client. WHS takes care of that - all storage is automatically added to the Pool and available under the same share. It formats because DE needs to control the filesystem, and the easiest way to be sure of that is to re-format the drive as NTFS regardless of what it previously was.

It takes all of 5 minutes to map a new share, if even that. I don't need WHS to control my file system.

I don't really understand what you're getting at with the bolded part - you can install WHS on a single 1TB HD (you get a 20gb system/boot partition and a 911gb Data partition). As for partitioning and installing other OSes... why do you want to dual-boot a server that's supposed to be little/no maintenence?

If I want to put together a NAS using an old pc but I don't have extra money to buy all new drives and what drives I already have contain things I don't want to lose but I don't have anywhere else to put that data. I can't use WHS in that scenario and there are a lot of people that are in that situation. With another OS as the NAS I can partition that drive so the first 5GB or so is for the NAS and use the other partition already containing my data for storage and lose nothing.

The key to WHS is it's automation. It automatically balances storage, it automatically backs up client computers (and prunes the backups), it automatically updates itself, you see what I'm getting at.

It is easy for people without other OS experience. Nothing it does is special or unique and all of it can be done with other OS running on the NAS.

 

[BTA]

Not in that situation. WHS will intelligently duplicate things across multiple HD's depending on their size and the size of the data, but obviously it wont be able to duplicate data if the only other HD in the system is too small.

If you are ONLY looking at NAS functionality you could look into unRAID. It is built more for storage of media such as DVD rips or music...and as such the throughput suffers. But it is able to use any size hard drives together as a single store. I believe you need at least 3 hard drives for the parity functionality of unRAID to work though. That's another option.

 

[Modelworks]

You have no idea what you are talking about. If you lose a drive in WHS and you have duplication turned on for your shares that you want duplicated, it will rebuild the data when you replace the defective drive. It works differently but it functionally does the same thing you are describing. At least you have the option of only duplicating what you need, unlike RAID which you'll have to duplicate everything no matter what.

You need to look at RAID on *nix OS. You can specify what you want using RAID , right down to the directory or individual files because the RAID works on partition levels not drive levels. I can even use RAID across 1 hard drive and an external USB drive if I want.

I'm glad you can install anything on a single drive and use it, but that isn't what WHS is designed for (and you seem to ignore the fact that you need multiple disks for your RAID setup as well, when it fits your "argument"). Plus how many times are you going to be installing WHS on your single drive with data on it? You're harping on an issue that MAY come up for someone one time, at installation.

No you do not need multiple drives to use RAID if you want to rely on partition level backups. Many people would like to put together a NAS but don't have a lot of money . They do have drives though that they currently own with data on them and an old pc that can be used. It isn't an issue that may come up, it comes up several times a day on sites with people wanting to have a NAS.

I notice you have no comment to ease of storage expansion in a RAID environment? I guess that falls under your "no value" column. To some there is value there. There is also value in ease of use.

I can add a drive to an existing RAID system and still use that drive as a single drive without an issue. It will not be redundant , for that I would need to add two drives or I could partition the single drive in two partitions if I want that level of protection. But I can add two drives at a time and scale it up to a couple hundred drives as my needs expand if I like with no problems with the OS.

At least learn about a product before you try to bash it. This is just typical "Linux rules" dick waving on your part though.

What to say without coming off like a prepubescent teenager that results to personal attacks because they are on a forum . FYI, I have been using MS software since windows shipped on floppies. I have used server OS since NT 3.51 . I have tested WHS since when its earlier incarnations wiped data after it was running and installed as a 'bug' . I have tested the latest versions . It is a hacked together server 2003 OS. If MS was serious about the product they would use the kernel but totally write the rest of it as a home server OS.

If you like WHS that is fine with me, as I said before it doesn't matter what you use . Just don't tell me that WHS is special because all its features are unique or can't be done in other ways by anyone willing to learn . WHS is easy , but that is all it has going for it.

 

[imagoon]

How can it recover all data?
If you install WHS in a 100 gig drive, then later add a 1TB drive. All important data is saved on the 1TB drive. You have 800gig, then the drive craps out. All that is left intact is the original 100 gig drive. You are saying that is enough, and no data will be lost?

WHS will warn you and I believe give you "disk is full" messages if it is unable to duplicate any files on a share that is supposed to be duplicated.

WHS does not require you to duplicate data so you could have 100gig of duplicated data and the rest unduplicated.

Now in your case with all your critical data on the larger drive, i would assume that you a) disabled duplication, ignored all the warnings and still did it. At that point data loss is your fault. It is no different than having 2 100gig disks raided and an 800 gig one running 'solo' and the 800 gig died. You the user put it on the 'wrong disk'.

You need at least 2 disks that are large enough to have copies of all your data. if you have 800gig of critical data, you need at least 2 disks with 800 gig of space for duplication to work.

 

[smirk]

The benefit with using server based NAS is they support RAID. With RAID you do not have to worry about backing up the NAS because if a drive fails you just swap out a new one and it rebuilds the data, nothing lost. You don't have to install any backup software for a NAS to work. Plenty of Mac users do it with time machine and no special software needed. Also the *nix systems can read and write HFS so it is possible to take a drive from a Mac and install it in the NAS and read the content on the drive.

That makes sense, and if my future NAS were only going to be used as a Time Machine backup then I wouldn't feel the need to back it up, and possibly wouldn't even feel the need to RAID the NAS. In my case, though, I want to use it as a Time Machine repository but also store much of my files and data on there (and only on there). Yes, RAID will prevent data loss from a failed hard drive, but as you know it won't protect against a mistakenly deleted file. However, I'm assuming that there's a way to extend FreeNAS or a *nix equivalent to back up the storage pool (or part of it) to an external disk.

From reading posts on here, it seems that one of the disadvantages of RAID is that drives sometimes have to be added in identical pairs, and some claim that recovering from a failure is sometimes problematic (yes, this is debatable, but still it has been stated more than a few times). Do any *nix NAS systems exist that let you add single drives to the storage pool, will back themselves up to an external drive, can run bittorrent and usenet clients, have iTunes and DLNA servers, will work with Time Machine, and have a thriving add-in developer community? If so, I would be very interested in looking into it. Actually, as far as the bittorrent/usenet goes, for any NAS OS built on Linux you could simply install any Linux application on it, correct? By that I mean that you don't have to get special NAS OS-aware applications. You either run a headless app or VNC in and control it like any other desktop application?

 

[MStele]

I find all the back and forth here laughable. It's silly that people would get so emotional over products that do pretty much the same thing, and barring unforseen technical problems will both perform equally well in the task at hand. Obviously nothing is equal and that both sides have benefits and negatives, but I think if your dealing with < 4 hard disks they will both get you to the same place. > 5 discs and drive extender has the edge for versitility (raid can't use firewire/usb for expansion, at least as far as I know). Otherwise, just use whatever makes you confortable.

For myself, I prefer WHS because my backup is in the 4-5 TB range with duplication, and I still need room to grow...and also because I like my backup to be easymode. I would prefer a nice expensive hardware raid option with Risc and lovely raid certified hot swap harddrives in a nice server tower, with spare drives on standby..but hey I can dream . In my view, the linux options are just as viable, sometimes more viable, albeit and little more hands on to setup. In some ways they are superior to WHS, but like I said earlier on....choose the right tool for the job you want done.

 

[imagoon]

I find all the back and forth here laughable. It's silly that people would get so emotional over products that do pretty much the same thing, and barring unforseen technical problems will both perform equally well in the task at hand. Obviously nothing is equal and that both sides have benefits and negatives, but I think if your dealing with < 4 hard disks they will both get you to the same place. > 5 discs and drive extender has the edge for versitility (raid can't use firewire/usb for expansion, at least as far as I know). Otherwise, just use whatever makes you confortable.

For myself, I prefer WHS because my backup is in the 4-5 TB range with duplication, and I still need room to grow...and also because I like my backup to be easymode. I would prefer a nice expensive hardware raid option with Risc and lovely raid certified hot swap harddrives in a nice server tower, with spare drives on standby..but hey I can dream . In my view, the linux options are just as viable, sometimes more viable, albeit and little more hands on to setup. In some ways they are superior to WHS, but like I said earlier on....choose the right tool for the job you want done.

/agree. This why I gave up here.

There is arguably little difference between both solutions. (in what they accomplish)

Both provide a good backup solution and decent redundancy. Each is a tool. I use WHS at home because, quite frankly, I do this crap every day at work and don't want to take it home. I want a system that was pretty much turn key install so I used WHS. However I use FreeNAS to export iSCSI LUNs for my test environment at work. Right tool, Right job.

File duplication is becoming more prevalent. Those of us running real NAS and SAN units like the NetApps are already using RAID for redundant disks (amazing considering it was Redundant Array of Inexpensive (independent) disks) in the unit but are file level replicating the file systems over to redundant SAN/NAS units....

 

[smirk]

Treating it as religion instead of technology is an easy trap to fall into, and is unfortunate. However, all the information stirred up by the back-and-forth has been amazingly helpful to someone new to NAS technology who is trying to determine which type of product would be best for his environment.

 

[Modelworks]

However, I'm assuming that there's a way to extend FreeNAS or a *nix equivalent to back up the storage pool (or part of it) to an external disk.

Adding an external backup is pretty easy with just about any OS running on a NAS. What you may want to look at is another file system that is unique to the *nix world called ZFS. ZFS has only been around for about 5 years. What is unique about it is that when you delete a file it can still be recovered easily while still remaining fault tolerant and flexible.

It allows you to store data and new data somewhat like WHS does except that all files are stored this way and their is no limit to how far you can go back to previous versions of the files except disk space. It is like having an incremental copy of the file every time it was saved and being able to go back to that version at any time.

Since the data is redundant it is possible to pull out drive 2 from a 3 drive array and replace it with a larger drive and the system will rebuild that new drive with the missing data and increase the overall capacity without the user having to do anything special.

ZFS is still be actively developed but I think it will become the file system to replace all the others.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZFS

From reading posts on here, it seems that one of the disadvantages of RAID is that drives sometimes have to be added in identical pairs, and some claim that recovering from a failure is sometimes problematic (yes, this is debatable, but still it has been stated more than a few times).

The main problem with RAID comes from when the drive controller fails. If you are using a hardware based controller and it fails then sometimes you are required to replace it with the exact same model, firmware, to get the data back. *nix can use software RAID which approaches hardware RAID speeds unless you are going to buy a $4-500 RAID hardware card. With software RAID there is no hardware controller to worry about and restoring the array is not a problem.

Do any *nix NAS systems exist that let you add single drives to the storage pool, will back themselves up to an external drive, can run bittorrent and usenet clients, have iTunes and DLNA servers, will work with Time Machine, and have a thriving add-in developer community?

You can do this with FreeNas already as it is . You can backup to an external drive by just mounting it from the web interface and transferring data.

For bit torrent I use torrentflux:
http://www.torrentflux.com/

For usenet sabnzbd , it also has a windows and Mac version
http://sabnzbd.org/

Those run via web interfaces so you need no software on the pc to use them .

For itunes support there is firefly media server or mt-daapd.

If so, I would be very interested in looking into it. Actually, as far as the bittorrent/usenet goes, for any NAS OS built on Linux you could simply install any Linux application on it, correct? By that I mean that you don't have to get special NAS OS-aware applications. You either run a headless app or VNC in and control it like any other desktop application?

That is true. If you really want the most options and greatest flexibility then I would consider installing a *nix distribution instead. I realize that is not as easy to setup for most people and does require learning but the end result is better than anything out there.
*nix systems have a large amount of applications that can be installed and run from only a web interface.

I think the reason we don't see a lot of *nix based NAS projects is because most people just use a trimmed down desktop version and install whatever packages they need.

 

[Modelworks]

> 5 discs and drive extender has the edge for versitility (raid can't use firewire/usb for expansion, at least as far as I know).

As long as the box sees it as a device it doesn't matter how it is connected. You can even RAID an internal hard drive to an external USB flash drive. *nix doesn't care as long as it has the space for what you want to do and can be accessed. If you use ZFS instead of RAID then you it gets even better.

 

[Fjodor2001]

Just wondering: Does anybody know why MS decided to implement WHS using the WHS-console solution? Why not just build WHS based on a standard Windows Server 2003 release (or even better Windier Server 2008) with a couple of pre-installed extra services (e.g. the Terminal Services Gateway, a Backup solution, etc). Then they could add a standard Windows application with a GUI front-end for configuring those services (could be implemented e.g. in a control panel fashion).

To me it seems like that would be a much more customizable solution. Then you wouldn't have to rely on that every add-on functionality must be implemented as a WHS console add-in (to be guaranteed to not interfere with WHS). You could also more freely disable stuff you didn't want to use.

Could the reason that WHS is implemented the way it is be that MS intentionally wanted to 'cripple' the Windows Server OS and create a specialized solution that could not be used e.g. as a "normal" server for a company, thereby preventing companies from buying a cheap WHS license instead of an expensive Windows Server 2008 license?

 

[JackMDS]

WHS if connected like any other Windows OS to a Keyboard, Mouse, and Monitor, is just like other Windows server implementation and does not need the consul to work with.

The extra implementation gives it extra flexibility, and allow some hardwrae manufacture to reduce the price when they do not provide the interface ports that are not needed when controlled from another computer.

In other words if controlling as you mentioned is important to you, install WHS on a computer that have KBD, Video, mouse ports, and use KVM, or direct connected hardware.

You can also forgo the peripheral after the initial setup, and use UltraVNC to control the WHS from another computer as a Regular OS rather than through the consul.

Here you can see WHS on VNC while I am on AT Forum with my main Workstation.

.

 

[imagoon]

Just wondering: Does anybody know why MS decided to implement WHS using the WHS-console solution? Why not just build WHS based on a standard Windows Server 2003 release (or even better Windier Server 2008) with a couple of pre-installed extra services (e.g. the Terminal Services Gateway, a Backup solution, etc). Then they could add a standard Windows application with a GUI front-end for configuring those services (could be implemented e.g. in a control panel fashion).

To me it seems like that would be a much more customizable solution. Then you wouldn't have to rely on that every add-on functionality must be implemented as a WHS console add-in (to be guaranteed to not interfere with WHS). You could also more freely disable stuff you didn't want to use.

Could the reason that WHS is implemented the way it is be that MS intentionally wanted to 'cripple' the Windows Server OS and create a specialized solution that could not be used e.g. as a "normal" server for a company, thereby preventing companies from buying a cheap WHS license instead of an expensive Windows Server 2008 license?

To make it easy for non-computer literate people.

For the rest of the stuff you commented on, feel free to terminal service in to the box and do as you please.