I was wondering what the advantages or disadvantages of using either package in a home environment might be given the release of Windows 7. I currently have W7 64 bit Ultimate installed on my Desktop PC, Home Theatre PC, and Laptop...While my girlfriend has Vista 64 Home Premium on her Desktop PC, XP Home SP3 on her laptop and on her other desktop. I am building a box with use as a server in mind (4 gB RAM,2 TB storage) and am curious as to what would be best to run the whole setup with. A few things to consider are: 1) How much overhead does Server 2008 R2 require? Is it configurable/scalable down to home usage requirements or is it just a monster designed for server farms? 2) Windows Home Server is 32 bit and built on Server 2003 (kinda...lol) but has it's own SP3 coming out soon that is supposed to enhance its compatibility with W7 etc.,etc...Should I go for that or wait and see if MS does a rebuild of WHS based on Server 2008 R2 or something? 3) Could anyone PM me a link to an ISO of WHS to experiment with please? Any advice is greatly appreciated!
Actually, I suggest SBS 2008. Its a good midpoint between full blown Sever 2008 and WHS. SBS has the advantage of being easy to setup and includes your very own exchange server...and it only requires 4GB of RAM.
I believe that SBS is a REALLY bad choice. It has the same core as 2008 SP2. Do you need an additional headache? R2 already has an OEM:SLP key for Std edition =_= This is IMHO too =)
it depends on how smart you are when it comes it DNS/DHCP/LDAP. If you don't understand how to setup and administer a domain it will cause you more issues than it will help. If you are just looking for central storage then use WHS. If you are actually looking for a networked environment with everyone having different permissions and unique logins, and things like that then go with 2008 R2. SBS is a joke. If you need multiple servers then go with Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 or VMWare ESXi and virtualize everything. I have a fully virtualized environment with HA and failover and it works great, but I am also a MCITP: Enterprise admin, so you need to scale your environment to your needs. Simple Sharing and Streaming: WHS - x86 only so you are limited to only 3.5 gb of RAM Advanced Permissions, logins that work for all PCs in your environment, group policy, virtualization - Server 2008 R2
Sorry, but from personal experience it definitely is not. Also depends what you stream to. If you stream ie to Popcornhour then Synology is definitely way to go sebus
Tried Windows Home Server ..... its ok i found ye great easy to use but that its based on Windows Server 2003 Small Business Edtion anyone looking to use it as a full blown server turn away as once you start trying to add ur stuff u can start to break it ...... with it based of Server 2003 (means old tech so good and bad in that for me i like the uptodate so was looking at 2008 but at the end of the day ... If u have 64Bit capable hardware and its going to be a server why the hell would you want 32bit OS ..... i made my own server 1.6Ghz Pen Dual Core, 2gb ram 667, asus intel g43..... stuck Windows Server 2008 R2 on and its ace ..... used Windows 7 64bit drivers and system runs sweet as a nut, PHP5+IIS7.5, Network Sharing drives, FTP Server, MySQL, TVersity (Streaming, TESTING THIS OUT), Firefly, Apache+PHP5 and a few other things,.....want to buy a few 1TB green power disks, yes my aim was use spare gear and try for as low power as i could
I think Gunny 2k9 has convinced me to roll with Server 2008 R2...Honestly I think I'd rather be using 64 bit software any ways and since it's going to be a learning experience any way I might as well learn something...lol! Thank you all very much!
Where is everyone aquiring thier Windows Server 2008 R2 anyway? would anyone be so kind as to PM me a link if possible? Thanks!
this is a big plus for whs and those who use it primarily for storage & sharing though i'm hoping they make a R2/7 based whs
When something goes wrong, your data goes with it, there is no recovery (as opposed to ie RAID) Convienient, but I would simply not use it for anything that that is vital (nor would I recommend using it - but I would recommend a proper NAS unit) sebus
when something goes wrong? one of the main purposes of DE is to replicate data (which you choose) to multiple disks. I actually use it for very important data.
It is your choice... I still prefer proper hardware RAID, sure one needs to understand more, but "you get what you pay for" (like with everything) sebus
I do understand, but you are not any more protected with raid than you are with DE. how would "you get what you pay for" apply in this case anyway?