[BLOG] Windows Home Server: great backup solution
Here goes....
Last year I was searching for a more robust way of keeping track of my backups. I have always backed up the important financial data, but pictures, videos, saved games, and music always seemed to slide off to the side when it came to doing it. I had this computer backing up to that one, secondary hard drives, mapped drives, and a lot of confusion. I kept saying there has got to be an easier way of doing this, so I started looking into NAS setups and pre-made boxes. I figured I would just “ghost†everything to the NAS, but the Ghost version I had would not run on a network drive, only local drives ARRGGH! Then started to look at running a Linux backup solution which at first I thought that would be reasonable, but I also knew I would not have the time nor the patience to “learn†Linux. So I dropped that idea after a while too.
Then I stumbled across a possible solution to my problem. “Could it really be that simple?†I said. I am here to tell you that YES it is that simple with Microsoft Windows Home Server! My friends, I am not an IT professional, nor have I ever taken network class one. I freely admit I do not know squat about how to setup a server. I am no dummy; I have had a “networked house†for years now and I have lots of practical knowledge from screwing up my PC’s for the past 15 years. I am lazy and like it when it all just works; WHS works.
I signed up for the free, yes FREE, 4 month trial of this OS. My official trial will end in May and it started in November. Yea, that’s 6 months, but I’m not complaining. After receiving two copies (you can sign up for three) I installed it on an older system of mine to try it, and was immediately hooked. I have since done a little shuffling, begging, and even spent some stock money on it for some nice large drives. I now have a solid backup solution that not only works well, but has some rather cool features to it! Like the ability to remote log in to the server from anywhere, remote log in to my other PC’s, and even host a simple website of my pictures for family as I want. There are lots of plug-ins both commercial and community. I also have no doubt that I will purchase it when the time comes.
The system automatically backs up every local drive from every PC running the connection software every night, period. It is an incremental back up, so if nothing changes nothing backs up. If 10 files are added and 3 are changed, then it does its thing so the initial back up is long and big but after that it is quite reasonable. It also allows for each user to store their files on the server in their own directory, or in the shared directories for Pictures, Music, and Videos of which I have full control of permissions by the click of the mouse. This might be easy as pie stuff for IT guys, but not for the rest of us. It does insist on strong password protection from all users and the remote interface, so I can be assured that 1234 or crap is not going to be a password. More later….
Last year I was searching for a more robust way of keeping track of my backups. I have always backed up the important financial data, but pictures, videos, saved games, and music always seemed to slide off to the side when it came to doing it. I had this computer backing up to that one, secondary hard drives, mapped drives, and a lot of confusion. I kept saying there has got to be an easier way of doing this, so I started looking into NAS setups and pre-made boxes. I figured I would just “ghost†everything to the NAS, but the Ghost version I had would not run on a network drive, only local drives ARRGGH! Then started to look at running a Linux backup solution which at first I thought that would be reasonable, but I also knew I would not have the time nor the patience to “learn†Linux. So I dropped that idea after a while too.
Then I stumbled across a possible solution to my problem. “Could it really be that simple?†I said. I am here to tell you that YES it is that simple with Microsoft Windows Home Server! My friends, I am not an IT professional, nor have I ever taken network class one. I freely admit I do not know squat about how to setup a server. I am no dummy; I have had a “networked house†for years now and I have lots of practical knowledge from screwing up my PC’s for the past 15 years. I am lazy and like it when it all just works; WHS works.
I signed up for the free, yes FREE, 4 month trial of this OS. My official trial will end in May and it started in November. Yea, that’s 6 months, but I’m not complaining. After receiving two copies (you can sign up for three) I installed it on an older system of mine to try it, and was immediately hooked. I have since done a little shuffling, begging, and even spent some stock money on it for some nice large drives. I now have a solid backup solution that not only works well, but has some rather cool features to it! Like the ability to remote log in to the server from anywhere, remote log in to my other PC’s, and even host a simple website of my pictures for family as I want. There are lots of plug-ins both commercial and community. I also have no doubt that I will purchase it when the time comes.
The system automatically backs up every local drive from every PC running the connection software every night, period. It is an incremental back up, so if nothing changes nothing backs up. If 10 files are added and 3 are changed, then it does its thing so the initial back up is long and big but after that it is quite reasonable. It also allows for each user to store their files on the server in their own directory, or in the shared directories for Pictures, Music, and Videos of which I have full control of permissions by the click of the mouse. This might be easy as pie stuff for IT guys, but not for the rest of us. It does insist on strong password protection from all users and the remote interface, so I can be assured that 1234 or crap is not going to be a password. More later….
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