Trying out Windows Home Server
So I downloaded the trial of Windows Home Server a long time ago (I was invited to the beta but really never had time to play with it). Last night I finally decided that it was about time that I did something with it, so I backed up what I wanted to keep off my old machine and started the process...
Headless Installation
The "headless" installation of Windows Home Server is pretty... headless. It doesn't take much thought or brain power to get it running. The process was smooth and very easy. I was impressed. First, you run the WHS installer disk on a computer (any computer) and it will walk you through a wizard to create your server settings which it will then copy to a USB thumb drive or floppy disk (your choice). Then you put both the settings disk/USB drive and the installation disk into the target machine and turn the power on. If your BIOS prompts you to boot from CD/DVD rather than just automatically doing it, you'll need to have it boot off the DVD the first time.
After that, installation is completely automated. It took a while because of all the updates, but I didn't have to touch it at all. It automatically partitions your drive (I only had one physical drive, not sure how it would work on multiple drives) into a system partition and a data partition for you. Note: you will lose all data on the target machine, and you are given several warnings to that effect, but here it is again so that you'll be aware of it. It then proceeds to copy all the Windows Home Server files, install them, configure the server (based on your headless configuration settings), install all updates, and then finally lets you in!
Features
Some of the features I've seen so far in Windows Home Server are:
- Easily connect computers to your home domain
- Have home computers automatically monitored for network health (virus protection, up to date software, etc.)
- Automatically backup your computers on a regular schedule
- Share music, files, pictures, videos including media streaming across your network
- Remotely connect and control your computers from anywhere.
All of these features can be turned on or off and can be configured to your liking. I'm sure there are other features that I've not yet had a chance to look into.
Conclusion
Overall, I'm very pleased with the Windows Home Server that I've got running now. I'm going to continue to play with it and see how it works for hosting web sites, Subversion and other server applications that I play with regularly.