Sign in
Microsoft.com
 
Microsoft
 
 
 

locked
Best HDD to start WHS RRS feed

 > 

  • Question

  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    We are putting together a desktop fileserver and will run WHS. From what I can understand, I think the Primary partition will only be used if there arae no other hard drives available. Does that mean if the server had 2 physical hard drives, then the OS partition will never be used to store duplicated data (since the first hard drive is partitioned with a primary partition and a secondary partition.

    More importantly, if we wanted duplication to run on all shared folders, wouldn't it make sense to start with 3 hard drives? Then WHS will be smart enough to put data outside of the first hard drive? Is that how WHS would work?

    We are considering 1x640 Gig Primary drive and 2x1TB hard drives to start. Is this a good way to start out our WHS server? Any tips?
    Friday, April 3, 2009 3:10 PM

Answers

  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    You're looking for "best practices", but unfortunately there's no "best practices" guide for Windows Home Server. For the most part, the "best practices" will either be obvious (install at least two hard drives, and turn duplication on for all shares) or unimportant for most users. In your environment I would say that three drives, if this represents a reasonable cost to you, would be your best bet, yes
    I'm not on the WHS team, I just post a lot. :)
    Friday, April 3, 2009 7:37 PM
    Moderator

All replies

  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    You're looking for "best practices", but unfortunately there's no "best practices" guide for Windows Home Server. For the most part, the "best practices" will either be obvious (install at least two hard drives, and turn duplication on for all shares) or unimportant for most users. In your environment I would say that three drives, if this represents a reasonable cost to you, would be your best bet, yes
    I'm not on the WHS team, I just post a lot. :)
    Friday, April 3, 2009 7:37 PM
    Moderator
  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    Thanks for the feedback Ken. We are looking to run WHS on a Dell PowerEdge T300. Will there be any issues with this that you can see? I am assuming we can turn off Dell's RAID once we get teh server. Any more tips?
    Friday, April 3, 2009 7:59 PM
  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    I won't make specific hardware recommendations, sorry, beyond saying that IMO it's very easy to over-buy hardware for Windows Home Server. As for installing on a specific hardware configuration, it will depend on how complex the hardware is (Dell's small tower servers aren't the most complex environments out there, but they do have on-board or add-on RAID controllers which can complicate an installation), and how technically skilled you are.

    Have you considered a hardware/software solution like the HP mediaSmart Server? Or a small server running Windows Server 2008 Foundation? Either one may be a better choice, since they will take the installation and compatibility questions out of the picture.
    I'm not on the WHS team, I just post a lot. :)
    Friday, April 3, 2009 9:25 PM
    Moderator
  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    We are putting together a desktop fileserver and will run WHS. From what I can understand, I think the Primary partition will only be used if there arae no other hard drives available.

    To clarify:  the primary drive will only be used if there is no free space on any of the other drives in the server.

    Does that mean if the server had 2 physical hard drives, then the OS partition will never be used to store duplicated data (since the first hard drive is partitioned with a primary partition and a secondary partition.

    The OS partition will never be used to store data (duplicated or otherwise).  The DATA partition (the second partition on the primary drive) is the one that doesn't get used unless there is no free space on any other hard drive.

    More importantly, if we wanted duplication to run on all shared folders, wouldn't it make sense to start with 3 hard drives? Then WHS will be smart enough to put data outside of the first hard drive? Is that how WHS would work?

    We are considering 1x640 Gig Primary drive and 2x1TB hard drives to start. Is this a good way to start out our WHS server? Any tips?

    Friday, April 3, 2009 11:33 PM
    Moderator
  • Question
    Sign in to vote
    0
    Sign in to vote
    Hey everyone, thanks for the replies. We are definitely going with the T300 to start (without RAID). If and when we outgrow WHS, we will add RAID and then upgrade to SBS 2008. Can't wait to start testing! Thanks again!
    Wednesday, April 8, 2009 12:57 AM