Ok, I have an EX490 on order right now, but it's been delayed. So my "old" gripes with the EX490 popped up again. I have alot of data and it grows larger every day, and when we move to our new appartment next month the need for storage grows even larger as the server will have to deal with 3 more computers.

Only 4 drive bays seems a wee bit on the low side, for even with 4 2TB drives I would be looking at only 4TB of storage if I want to use the security of folder duplication (or what it's called), and I do want to use that function.

Sure, I can add a few USB-drives but that means more cables to deal with (and the dust-bunny invasion that will follow) and I havent found any real nice looking drive casings other than the HP external drive, which matches the EX490 pretty well in design. But the cabling... UGH! (I have found an e-SATA enclosure for 4 disks available from play.com which is something like 182 euro and free shipping within the EU, so that is definately a nice candidate, but still, 182 euro + what the harddrives cost is more then just buying more drives and plugging them into the server I mention further down in the post)

So what I now am wondering is this: What will I miss out on software-wise if I decide to build my own Home Server with a 10x SATA port motherboard and a Fractal R2 case with atleast 8 3.5" bays and 7 fan spots of which 4 are 140mm fans...? *drools all over keyboard*

Does WHS have any add-in that functions like the HP Media Collector? Though I'm not sure I absolutely need this function, since WHS can be told to check specific folders for new data, right?

Does anyone have a link to a list of HP specific add-ins perhaps? Or could some nice person please list them here? And perhaps let me know what they do?

I'd appreciate any help, guys!

First, welcome to the world of WHS/MSS, Wanuvas! Good to have you aboard!

WHS does not have anything else (everything WHS has is in the MSS anyway) but there are plenty of Add-Ins and applications that will provide equivalent functionality to the HP MSS.

While I am a believer in the MSS it is not necessarily the solution for all of us -- and it sounds like you may be at that higher threshold where you need additional storage. In that case a DIY may be the best approach.

Look around in the DIY section for some others doing this: http://www.mediasmartserver.net/forums/viewforum.php?f=22

EDIT: I have taken the liberty of moving this to that DIY section for you. You may get more responses there.

_________________
....JBick

EX475, 2 GB, LE-1640
PC1: Vista-->W7 Ultimate/32, (D-Drive RAID-5 Array)
PC2: Lenovo Laptop, Win XP Home SP3
2xLinksys WRT54G v1.1 and 2xNetGear GS105 Gbit switch

Thanks for the welcome and the post-movage, JohnBick.

From the reviews on the EX49x that I've read they say that it is easier to use then a regular Windows Home Server, the software that is. So to those of you who have a DIY, for someone who has been using Windows for close to 15 years and has no problem reading long guides, will there be any trouble for me?

As it stands now, I have two 1TB drives that are at 90%-95% full on my HTPC. These are planned to be used in the EX490 together with the 1TB that it ships with. But, I am looking at using 4x 2TB internal drives in the end together with as many 2TB USB drives as needed... I *love* the design and size of the EX490, but it *sucks* that it only can hold 4 internal drives... Sure, somewhere down the road I guess there will come out even bigger drives, but I have not seen any rumours or nothing about that happening anytime soon.

So I'm looking at using the following:

Mobo: Gigabyte GA-MA790FXT-UD5P (10 S-ATA ports *drools*)
PSU: Corsair HX550W
RAM: Corsair XMS3 DDR3 PC12800/1600MHz CL9 2x2GB
Case: Fractal Design Define R2 (8 internal 3.5" bays, atleast 7 120mm fan spots and bargain price)
CPU: AMD Phenom II X3 705e 2,5GHz Socket AM3 Box (or similar AMD "e" processor)
Cooling: Scythe Ninja Mini Rev. B
Harddrives: WD Green's, lots of them. And either a WD Black or an SSD for the system drive. (That is if the WD Green is a good drive, I've read things about head parking and such, anything to worry about?)

And WHS of course.

Oh, does anyone know if I can start by using the WHS 180 days trial and then just buy a license and type that serial into the trial to get it to work. Or do I have to re-install?

Another "oh", can I pull out one of my drives from the HTPC and just plug it into the WHS and have it work without formatting it or something? Or do I need to have a fresh harddrive in the server and have WHS copy all the data that I want to save over the network?

I'll let one of the DIY experts chime in on your hardware, but the reality is that WHS can get by with relatively low end hardware, it's really up to making sure you've got enough expansion ability to meet your storage needs for awhile.

The Demo version of WHS used to allow 180 days but you couldn't upgrade to a full version without a reinstall. Now there's a 30 day demo that is upgradeable with a real license. The software is only $100.

WHS will want to format your drives, you'll need to copy your content over to the server.

_________________
Alex Kuretz
Remote Notification: Monitoring and alerting for your Home Server via email, Twitter, text message, RSS, push notifications, and on your Mac desktop
Have you tried our Add-Ins?

Ok, if WHS wants to format the drives when I add them to the pool, what will happen if the system drive dies and I have like 8TB of data on the drives in the pool? (Not likely I know, but it could happen) How would that particular scenario be handled?

yakuza, JohnBick, which harddrives would you recommend? I have two 1TB WD Green's now, they have served me well this last year and a half or so, but reading about the head parking scared me a bit.

Any input on the system I described above would be appreciated, especially the motherboard and the choice of AMD over Intel.

Read up on Server Recovery, that's the mechanism to replace a failed System Drive or corrupted OS.



Everybody has a favorite brand, I run 2 of the WD Green drives and like them. I just ordered a Samsung for diversity, and also have numerous Seagate drives.

_________________
Alex Kuretz
Remote Notification: Monitoring and alerting for your Home Server via email, Twitter, text message, RSS, push notifications, and on your Mac desktop
Have you tried our Add-Ins?

If the server frame dies the Shared Folders can be read in any other PC that can read NTFS-formatted disks. If you duplicate your data (and you should) then the failure of ANY one drive will not cause the loss on any Shared Folder or file. (The client backup database --really an archive-- may be damaged though.) If the System Drive fails the recovery is a little bit more difficult but your duplicated Shared Folders should still be intact.


I have been using WD Greens and continue to recommend them. When selecting a drive the only one that MIGHT make a difference is the System Drive. Folks who have used SSD drives, 10,000 rpm drives, etc. report slight performance improvements. (When the HP V3 software comes out I plan to upgrade the 500GB drive that came with my EX475 with a 150GB Raptor. Don't really know it I'll gain much!) Unless you are doing other heavy computational tasks on the server the network is going to be your limiting factor, not the disks.


I have a DIY server for testing. It is a very old DIY desktop, hot by 2002 standards but low-end unit by today's standards. And it was AMD. I chose Intel for my current desktop and probably would for a server. But I am not convinced it makes a lot of difference for a BASIC server. But if you want to put a lot of other functionality in there a pair of Core-Duos (or QuadCore) Intels would speed things up. Again, it is a question of what you intend to use the unit for, how much you are willing to pay and what sway emotion has on your decision.

Like Alex, I will leave it to others to comment on your proposed configuration.

_________________
....JBick

EX475, 2 GB, LE-1640
PC1: Vista-->W7 Ultimate/32, (D-Drive RAID-5 Array)
PC2: Lenovo Laptop, Win XP Home SP3
2xLinksys WRT54G v1.1 and 2xNetGear GS105 Gbit switch

Wanuvas - welcome to the DIY WHS world. I recently built my second DIY WHS machine. The first was based on an old Dell Dimension 8100 P4 to which I added a PCI SATA controller and 4 WD Green drives totalling about 3TB of storage. It performed OK, but with ripping movies, and wanting folder duplication, I quickly outstripped my available storage, and could't really add any more to that old machine. I just recently completed a build that sounds somewhat like what you have planned, here's the thread:

viewtopic.php?f=22&t=6517

I used a Gigabyte mobo with 8 SATA ports on board, an Intell E5200 processor, 6 WD Green pool drives, and a WD Black system drive, totalling about 7.25TB storage. All of this is in a full tower Chieftec case with 8 internal 3.5" bays, 2 external 3.5" bays, and 6 external 5.25" bays (whcih I eventually plan to fill with 3x5 SATA enclosures.

This should suit my needs for quite a while to come. John, Alex, and Damian (all very active on this forum) were all extremely helpful in getting me up and running and getting my previous server's data migrated over to the new machine. Follow their advice - they know what they're doing.

_________________
MGannon
DIY WHS "NorthStar" - viewtopic.php?f=22&t=6517
Intel E5200 Pentium Dual Core
2 GB RAM
19.25 TB Storage

Wow, thanks for the quick replies, guys!

How much interaction does WHS demand of a user that only wants to stream movies over the network and have his/hers backups done safe and securely? I'm thinking of the 3 not-so-tech-savvy females that will use the server for just that? (My wife and I are moving to an apartment that is in the same house as my mother's and my sister's and we will all chip in for the server. It's awesome, really. ) I will of course be the admin, so I will be the one who deals with the "control" software...

Gonna post another thread in the add-in part of the forum later today, need to know exactly which ones I need for my particular usage of the server.

Thanks again, guys!

Aside from yourself, there really is no reason anyone else should be doing any admin interaction with the server. In fact, once set up, you really don't need to mess with it...unless you want to...or are addicted to messing with it. Obviously, any users seeking to look at a file or photo or other item stored on the server will "interact" with it but that interaction is on an access level via the Shares and not an admin level. In terms of streaming movies, just figure out what means and products you want to use to do that, i.e. SageTV add-in and Sage HD200 extender, HTPC and associated software such as My Movies, Play On, etc.

_________________
HP MSS EX490 with Intel E6300
4 GB RAM
7 TB Drive Storage

MediaSmartServer.net Wiki, it's loaded with helpful information about WHS and the HP MediaSmart Server.

For example....

I only got into streaming video about a month ago (via Sage HD200 Extender, SageMC, PlayOn...). Nothing used is unique to HP. I set everything up and, except for checking a few items to assist others on this board, I have not touched the server since.

Once you install and configure the server and the software you are going to use with it, it really is "set & forget".

_________________
....JBick

EX475, 2 GB, LE-1640
PC1: Vista-->W7 Ultimate/32, (D-Drive RAID-5 Array)
PC2: Lenovo Laptop, Win XP Home SP3
2xLinksys WRT54G v1.1 and 2xNetGear GS105 Gbit switch

Wanuvas,

Once you have your server setup and running it basically runs itself and should it have an issue it will complain in the console icon will change from green to red or this brownish/beig color on your client computer. If you have an HP MSS the health light will turn from BLUE to RED to provide you notification something is wrong. What I find is if you keep your setup simple your WHS will run quite well and require little attention on your part. Its when you start adding tons of addins just because they look cool or seem cool that can get you in trouble. When considering an addin let others try it out first and see if they have problems unless you know it comes from a good source like the addins that appear on this site. There are some very good addins that are useful and many others that well just cause issue.

This site is full of very useful information and there are many here with a wealth of knowledge and experience. You have chosen a good site to obtain information. I encourage you to read the forums, contribute and always feel free to ask lots of questions which you have already started doing. As for streaming movies I have recently started doing that myself and there is alot I still have to learn. The challenge for me like you is to make it as simple as possible for my future wife. Already I am able to stream music and movies in the house and on the internet using SubSonic and ORB. Last week I was actually streaming movies from my server to my SmartPhone via ORB which was pretty cool. I am doing all this with an EX470 with the stock single core processor and the newer EX49x MSS units are more hearty and if you go the DIY route then you get to chose the hardware which means you get to chose how much power you are willing to pay for and have more control and flexibility over the hardware.

Whatever route you chose it will be well worth it in the end. Good luck and hope to see you here often.

_________________
Exploring the possibilities!

Migrated from WHS2011 to WS2012E: HIGHLANDER

~ Norco 4220 Enclosure
~ Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD5
~ AMD Phenom II X4 995 3.2 GHz
~ 8 GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
~ 3 Supermicro AOC-SASLP-MV8