Family Servers

Microsoft's Home Server

Microsoft's new Windows Home Server excites me.  For the past ten years, I've busily installed Microsoft's Small Business Server in homes of the rich and famous, here in the Portland area where Nike athletes often retire and members of the Hollywood set choose to live.  Expect Windows Home Server to be a simpler, more fun, and less expensive fountain spring for the digital lifestyle.   

Can Windows Home Server do what made Small Business Server so valuable?  A server becomes the natural center piece, a concierge so to speak, in a home network where photos, music, video, family web pages, a lifetime of kids homework, and endless new financial and data files are kept.  These digital heirlooms, some of the most important treasures of our lives, are served up not only in the home, but stay easily available yet protected as you travel all over the world.  I've had a blast expanding the network around a well designed server as we add Tivo, game boxes, new digital phones, and many other network appliances to the home. 

Once you catch the idea of building your world around a solid and reliable Home Server, you discover how much easier and less worrisome life becomes.  With a server, we typically spend a little more to add more reliable disk systems, cooler running and longer lasting chassis, and a backup system that actually works.  After we gather photos, music and all the data files to the server, our computers, Tivos, Mobile phones, and other network devices become simpler, less critical, more fun, and easier to replace if needed.

And you gain freedom to live.  Here with my home server, I enjoy the simple freedom of taking my breakfast out on the patio where I use my laptop to watch the News broadcast that was automatically recorded at 4:30 AM, while browsing my email, all of which is stored on the server.  Last month, travel kept me from my wife for a week.  We were able to see each other everyday and chat with ourselves and the kids, using cheap little videocams.  By building our world around a home server, we gain the freedom to focus on the relevant parts of our lives. 

In my earlier life, I was the photo hound in our family.  These days my wife takes most of the photos, and thanks to digital cameras, pictures are virtually free.  My oldest daughter is married now, but her lifetime archive of photos sits on the server where her and her husband have complete access to all the family photos.  Most of them are neatly named and organized in folders.  The next step is to create digital versions of the family photo album where everyone can add comments and create their own personal organizations of photos.  We haven't started that project yet... but we could.

Windows Home Server

With any luck, I'll receive the latest beta of Windows Home Server pretty soon.  I'll report my opinions of anything that doesn't violate non-disclosure agreements.

Windows Home Server is different from other Microsoft servers is a few basic ways.

Home Server Disk Storage

Windows Home Server aggregates all disks into a single storage area.  Additional drives are no longer addressed as E:, F:, G:, etc.  Users access their data with named folders.

Home Server Automatic Backup

Data is automatically backed up on the server and on each workstation.  A client utility is installed from CD on each workstation to automatically route backups to the server.  As long as at least two harddisks are installed on the server, all data can be made redundant. 

Home Server Data Sharing

The Windows Home Server features a control console where home user accounts are setup and permissions are granted.  Data on the server is made available throughout the network using named shares rather than mapped drives. 

Home Server Remote Access

Data can be accessed across the internet using a 'Windows Live' Internet address.  After logging into your family website, home computers can be used as if you were sitting at their keyboards.   

Wynn Smith
Computer Help
(503)650-9496
info2@oregoncity.com