Upon my daily reading of CrunchGear.com, I came across this post which caught my eye as just looking too damn cool for its own good.
What you’re looking at is a Windows Home Server. In short, it basically stores all of your music, video’s, photos and documents on it, then gives access to up to 10 users simultaneously via wireless connections. It offers whopping storage spaces, between 500GB and 1TB, and apparently will be priced around the $500 mark. Damn, storage space is getting cheap and large!
Not only that, it also offers three more hard drive bays for additional storage. Additional storage? Surely 1000GB’s is enough, no? And of course, all data is also optionally accessible via an online personalized domain name. That’s neat.
Its cool, don’t get me wrong, but I just don’t know how much use it would be in the average house-hold, do you?
Update: After reading this post about it over at on10.net, it apparently also backs-up everything automatically and silently overnight. Now that’s handy. There’s a load more sites which cover this thing in more detail too, with videos and cool stuff like that.
portfolio
9 Jan 2007 at 8:06 pm
Personally, I think it is great but really not something I would buy, you could build something to do the same for less than that.
9 Jan 2007 at 8:17 pm
True. It’s also not something that I’d personally use either. Looks very neat with the green glow though.
I think, all in all, this is just another stepping-stone to Microsoft/Windows move to the home-theatre media centre revolution. And I hope they do well, it should be great.
9 Jan 2007 at 8:30 pm
Yeh, One thing that I like about the windows operating system is the media center edition, but I have found a free alternative that is just as good, Ubuntu with MythTV - https://help.ubuntu.com/commun...
9 Jan 2007 at 8:31 pm
Truncating needs to be done on links, another bug found
9 Jan 2007 at 10:34 pm
Ubuntu eh? I’ve heard many things about this. I believe Collin runs a quite successful blog about Ubuntu.
Thanks for the bug thing. I had it installed already but it was set to 170 characters! A tad pointless
9 Jan 2007 at 10:37 pm
Cool stuff, yeah I think I’ve come across his Ubuntu blog before.
10 Jan 2007 at 9:06 pm
Did run the Ubuntu blog. Stopped when I uninstalled Ubuntu. The information’s still there but not updated any more.
BTW Ad - you couldn’t build it for $500. Convert that to Sterling and it’s around £263. That’s with half a terabyte of storage, network connectivity and an automatic backup solution. All that in a posh box with minimal configuration and 10 user option. It’s not just the cost though. Think about the time it would take to build it, install the software, configure it, test it etc. Not to mention that although Ubuntu is great, if you’re Windows bred it’s a hell of a change.
11 Jan 2007 at 8:26 am
Agreed with above. I can’t believe its coming in at about $500 though, that’s damn cheap to be honest! With auto-backup too. I love that.
11 Jan 2007 at 12:06 pm
That machine most likeley uses Mini-ITX which usually can clock in at about 500 - 600 mhz. This is because they use embedded chips, most of them are by VIA.
If you were to put a machine together with two 750gb harddives and a second hand machine, OK it wouldn’t look as nice but it would do the job. OK maybe there isn’t the software on it, but i’m sure there is an open source hack that someone will come up with at some point to allow you to use a home made system with the Xbox and other home theatre stuff.
Hard drives are coming down in price very fast and you can easily put a machine together with 1tb for less than £250
11 Jan 2007 at 12:16 pm
I don’t know a great deal about computer hardware anymore, but a quick search on Froogle found me the cheapest 500gb Hard drive was about £130. That’s £260 for 1TB already, not including motherboard, cpu, cooling, case, psu, or any software.
Seems this tiny Windows box has a lot more to offer than you first might think? However, I’m pretty sure that $500 won’t be the final price.
11 Jan 2007 at 2:40 pm
I’m talking about the 750gb external drive that PC world was selling for about £60 or something, just crack the case open and you got your self an internal.
I am probably wrong. I haven’t really done any computer building for some time but it could work.
11 Jan 2007 at 2:46 pm
The only 750gb external drive on pcworld.co.uk is the Seagate drive priced at £329.99 as per this page. Don’t get me wrong, I know what you’re saying. I have a theory though, that as technology and time advances, pre-built machines will be the cheapest way, rather than the other way around like it is now - or used to be.
11 Jan 2007 at 2:52 pm
And what about the software? Did you guys watch the channel 9 video that Daze linked above?
25 minutes long but a fascinating (if you a re a geek) watch. Apparently it’s using 2000 Server style software which is very rugged. They’ve then built functionality on top of that to allo everything from the basic use right up to using Terminal Services to allow the nerd in to play with the system. You can get it to control external devices with scripts written in .net or similar.
External devices = lighting, curtains (with electronic modules etc).
11 Jan 2007 at 2:54 pm
Please show me where I can get 1tb in a working machine with software (any windows software, not ripped off!) for £250.
I am genuinely interested as I need network storage. At the moment the WHS seems like a damned good deal to me!
11 Jan 2007 at 2:55 pm
Over-my-head, but great
Controlling curtains. Just superb!
11 Jan 2007 at 3:31 pm
Some of it was over my head too, doesn’t stop me wanting one though!
11 Jan 2007 at 4:38 pm
The deal must be over on that external drive then, but it was on a sale a few weeks back - £60 or £70 for a 750gb hard drive.
I was talking about open source software.
11 Jan 2007 at 4:45 pm
Sorry, but I just cannot believe that. Even from eBay Hong Kong, they’re still going for £200-odd. It also seems its only Seagate who currently make such a drive of that capacity.
11 Jan 2007 at 4:48 pm
I am wrong then. Never mind.
I rest my case.
11 Jan 2007 at 4:55 pm
OK after further research, I was wrong, it is in fact the 160gb model that they were selling for that price.
Sorry.
11 Jan 2007 at 4:56 pm
amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/...
Even cheaper online.
11 Jan 2007 at 5:16 pm
Ah right, that’s £383 for 1TB. MS must be getting hard drives for near to nothing! Incredible.
11 Jan 2007 at 5:17 pm
I am waiting for someone to crack it open and put pics up..
11 Jan 2007 at 5:27 pm
If you find a photo, put a link to it up on here please. I’d also like to see that!
14 Jan 2007 at 9:00 am
For me style is very important and the Windows Home Server has that, it looks well cool and if it had just basic specs and looks that good I am happy.