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    What does WHS do when you try using an external hard drive as a backup device? What is it formatted as? Is it safe to put other things on the drive or must you use it for WHS backups only?
    Wednesday, May 20, 2009 7:21 PM

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    The backups are copies of the files in whatever share(s) you've chosen to back up. While Windows Home Server uses some special NTFS objects (hard links) to allow you to store multiple backups which in total would need more space than the drive provides, as far as the end user is concerned they're just files, and can be treated as such.
    I'm not on the WHS team, I just post a lot. :)
    Wednesday, May 20, 2009 8:16 PM
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    I'm guessing you haven't tried to find out for yourself...

    The drive will be formatted using NTFS. And yes, it's safe to store other files on the drive, outside of the backup folders that Windows Home Server creates. Doing so will reduce the total space available for backups of your shares however.
    I'm not on the WHS team, I just post a lot. :)
    Wednesday, May 20, 2009 7:44 PM
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    I'm guessing you haven't tried to find out for yourself...

    The drive will be formatted using NTFS. And yes, it's safe to store other files on the drive, outside of the backup folders that Windows Home Server creates. Doing so will reduce the total space available for backups of your shares however.
    I'm not on the WHS team, I just post a lot. :)
    I have not tried it as I do not no what it would have done. I assume your talking logically and saying any other files I place on the External drive will reduce space....? WHat are these backup files stored as? A certain type of file, a mirrored copy etc? Thanks
    Wednesday, May 20, 2009 7:49 PM
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    The backups are copies of the files in whatever share(s) you've chosen to back up. While Windows Home Server uses some special NTFS objects (hard links) to allow you to store multiple backups which in total would need more space than the drive provides, as far as the end user is concerned they're just files, and can be treated as such.
    I'm not on the WHS team, I just post a lot. :)
    Wednesday, May 20, 2009 8:16 PM
    Moderator