You will be able to store music, photos, and other files on a central hub-like hard drive, accessible from every PC in your house. You will also be able to protect your files and your PCs with automatic backup and a simple restore process—even gain access to files on your PCs from anywhere with an Internet connection through secure Web access.
At the CES Expo in Las Vegas I was shown a working version of the Windows Home Server software which is design to be used as the nerve centre to control all home automation. The server is a sort of beefed up NAS based on Windows Server 2003 SP2.
Windows Home Server allows you to turn an 'old' computer into a central server for use in the home. This server can then be used to store data, to make backups of all your machines, to share printers, and control devices while also allowing you to remotely access the server, as well as the machines that connect to it, via the internet, from anywhere in the world. WHS will be sold as an OEM release for developers, but most people will buy Home Server as a complete hardware/software package.
Thom Holwerda writing for OS News fully tested the new software. He said that the software requires, at least, a 1 GHz processor and 512MB of RAM. The rest of your hardware requirements are fairly irrelevant, since the WHS machine is designed to run as a headless server (so no keyboard, mouse, and monitor); for instance, even though my machine has a GeForce 6200 with 128MB of RAM, I use the standard VGA driver. Only during the installation process do you need a keyboard/mouse/monitor. If you plan on using external hard drives, Microsoft advises against using USB 1.1, because "the older USB standard is significantly slower and less reliable for storage, and it is not supported on Windows Home Server."
Holwerda said that the installation process was fairly straightforward, and has a Vista-esque feel to it; after a few short questions regarding serial number and hard drives, the installer will tell you that it will complete the installation by itself, without user input. The installer will erase all your hard drives, and warns multiple times before doing so (in fact, you need to acknowledge this fact before WHS will install). This is the case because WHS will use all the available storage on your machine for its storage pool. It will create a SYS (C:) partition for the operating system (10-20GB), while using the remainder for storage.
When using Windows Home Server, it is best to discard of the idea of 'separate hard drives'. WHS will create a storage pool, disregarding hard drive size boundaries. For instance, in my box, I have a brand new 160GB drive, as well as an older 40GB drive. WHS will automatically combine this into a 180GB storage pool (20GB for the OS partition), and any future storage options added to the machine can be easily added to the storage pool. Microsoft says "Windows Home Server grows with you to meet your needs, today and into the future."
After the installation, you will be greeted by a wizard which will guide you through the initial setup. This wizard configures things like automatic updates (which will be performed in the background), your password and password hints, and similar things. Interestingly, Microsoft seems to have taken a few cues regarding security, since the required complexity of a password changes with how you configure the server. For instance, if you enable remote access, WHS demands a strong password.
