[dba-Tech] Windows Home Server update

I have ordered pieces to build my own.  I have pieces and parts (including
the X2 processor I was going to give away) that I can use to build one of
these things.  I did a spreadsheet to discover how much it would cost me to
build what HP is selling for $600 and it turns out that the HP box is a
pretty reasonable price.  It would cost me about $500 to build what they are
selling for $600.  Of course my build has a dual core and 2 gigs of ram
instead of a "celeron" level single core and 512M memory.  Other than that
the specs are pretty similar, and those changes cost about $50.

That is the point though is that if you build your own you can do what you
want with the thing.  This is a Server 2003 core OS and according to what I
saw yesterday, with RDT you can actually get in and see the OS as a true
Windows 2003 machine instead of using the "simplified" interface that they
provide.  This server will have "plug-ins" that can do other things like
serve AV feeds or anything else that a server can do, so having a more
powerful CPU and more memory might be useful.  For example you could also
have the server do virtual machines, run SQL Server in that virtual machine
etc.  IOW get more use out of it than just a windows home server.

So anyway, I should get delivery of the OS and parts required to build one
of these and with luck will have it done and working by the Monday.  the one
thing I am really looking forward to is the complete and automatic backup of
all my machines, on a "raid like" system (duplicated storage).  They claim
to have a complete system restore form a boot CD.

I'll let you know how it goes.

John W. Colby
Colby Consulting
www.ColbyConsulting.com