Home Server - is it worth it?

I have had a server for years now on and off, just depended on what I was doing and if there was a need. Running a full server in a home enviroment does have some major draw backs. But we are not here to talk about that. We are here to talk about the alternative, a Home Server. The one I chose is the one you find in the link, a Lenovo D400.

There are many manufacturers of Home Server hardware out there Acer, HP, and others prices vary as well as the configurations, be sure to get what you need. The reason I chose the D400 is simple, Price. I was able to get it on sale for $239.00 off Amazon so i snapped 1 up for myself and a couple of more for clients, the silly things are now over $400.00 again on Amazon, and I don't know why.

The D400 has the Atom chipset as well as 4 hot swappable had drive trays. My unit shipped with one 1 TB hard drive, I filled the other 3 bays with SATA drives I already had on hand. Two 1.5TB drive and One 500GB drive for a total 4.5TB storage on the system. We'll get more into that later.

The D400 is a solid unit but it is the OS that made me want to purchase a home server. The OS is Microsoft Home Server, which is built upon Windows Server 2003, which is a very solid OS and is still in production in businesses around the world.

Windows Home Server (WHS) is a stripped down version of Server 2003, but don't let that keep you from this system... Yes there are a lot of higher functions which are stripped out of the OS, such as it cannot be a DC (domain controller) and it cannot be a member of a domain, however you can still use it as a DNS server, DHCP server, as well as a print server. These are advanced features and you will need advanced server knowledge to configure and take advantage of these services.

WHS is designed for the average home user, hence it is designed to be accessed via a desktop applet. This applet gives you access to all the basic features of the home server as well as backups. Did I say backups? Backups are where this product really shine. WHS will make full image backups of up to 10 workstations, and this includes Apple products as well. That alone makes this product a great value, and that is why I have business clients which have this product in there businesses, simply for the workstation backup.

I would like to briefly go over the storage, as I mentioned i have 4.5TB of storage on my home server, well I have that much in drive space, but not in storage??? Let me explain... WHS does NOT, let me repeat does NOT support raid 5 or any raid for that matter. The system use a process called "folder replication" to duplicate your data across the drives this is what gives your redundancy in your data. This also lets you use whatever drives you have laying around for your home server, it will even accept usb drives into the system.

I enjoy having my home server, it is economical to say the least, and I don't have the heat issues that I had with my full server. I currently have my DVD collection on my server as well as all my business documents. I keep finding more for it to do, and it simply does it.... Not to mention it is so quite, you cannot hear it run.

If you have any questions let me know.

:)

Merry Christmas - Happy New Year

I cannot believe that 2010 is just about over. It has been a very interesting year to say the least, and in a lot of ways, I'm really glad to see it go away. As mentioned in a earlier, I have truly been blessed this and life has been good for me personally, however I'm afraid that the state of affairs as it relates to our country as a whole have not fared so well.

We have seen the beginnings of Socialized Medical Care in this country, however I truly believe that it will be repealed in the upcoming year. We have seen the end of the worst Congress in the history of our great country, and we have seen a change in the political tides that have not been seen in over 100 years. Shall we talk about radical islam???? Should we??? You never know who may be looking. You know it is wrong to say anything that may offend a muslim, however it seems to be considered a good deep to offend a Christian??? I find that odd, truly not to mention scary.

I mentioned earlier that I have been purchasing silver as much as possible, and I have continued to do so, and I am happy to say that it has done very well. When I started purchasing silver it was under $20.00 / ounce , now it is a literal hair under $30.00, and that my friend isn't bad at all over 6 months of time. I personally believe that it will top out around $85.00 per ounce. Why shouldn't it? The government in their wisdom has devalued the dollar by at least 20% and demand for this metal is at a all time high, and will continue to remain that way.

I'm sure someone is wanting to know what my hopes are for the next year, and since you asked I will tell you. I hope that obomacare will be repealed in total. I hope that there are true tax cuts put in place to stimulate the economy, and lastly I hope that the people which were just elected to congress will simply do what they were sent there to do. I also pray that there will be return to common sense in this country. I know those are very big things to ask for in this day and age, but it is what it is.

New for the upcoming year will be a huge amount of PADs on the market... iPads, aPads, gPad etc. I do see some utility in these devices, but not the amount that people think. It will not replace a laptop or netbook for that matter, it does however serve to be a good reader and entertainment device. I cannot tell you how many of these devices I have configured for end users simply to be put on the shelf or passed down to a child. It really is funny that that people buy these and then pay someone like me to give them remote access to their pc, and then after a month get me again to roll out a new laptop for them....

That is enough rambling for the moment, and someday I will put some more on here, hopefully sooner than 3 months.