Yearly Archives: 2011


Add-in: Grid Junction 2.0 for WHS 2011 and SBS Essentials 2011 Public Beta

A few months ago we announced that our Windows Home Server add-in, Grid Junction, designed to manage an Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) via the Windows Home Server Dashboard, was being revamped for WHS 2011 and SBS Essentials 2011. After months of private beta testing Grid Junction v2 is now released for public testing.

In case you are not familiar with Grid Junction, which means you're not jumping for joy just yet, the original add-in was designed for Windows Home Server to manage an Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) via the Windows Home Server Dashboard. Grid Junction integrates seamlessly to issue power alerts and help protect Windows Home Server from power problems such as brownouts, or blackouts by safely powering down the Windows Home Server when battery levels reach a set threshold.

Protect your Server!

Whenever your Windows Home Server 2011 or Windows Small Business Server Essentials 2011 suddenly looses power or otherwise halts or restarts without warning there's a possibility that the file system may have been in an inconsistent state at that time due to data writing or disk balancing activities. If you are unlucky, this can not only corrupt your file system requiring a reinstallation of the Operating System but possibly destroy important data.

Which Battery Backup (UPS) Devices are Supported?

Generally speaking, the most commonly used industry leading uninterruptable power supply manufacturers such as APC, Belkin and Tripp Lite (among others) are known to be supported. But given the vast number of models and variations please check the supported UPS devices list.

Do I need Special Drivers or Software?

In most cases the vendor supplied battery driver or the generic windows battery driver should be sufficient. Unless the manufacturer included specialized software for explicit use on Windows Home Server(s) we do NOT recommend any manufacturer supplied software to be installed besides the driver (if required). In addition we recommend that any users who already installed any of such software to uninstall it before installing the GridJunction Windows Home Server Add-in.

 

Beta Version

We welcome everyone to make full use of it but do issue a warning of caution as how it is still NOT the final version please try not to use it on your production/live servers.

Please visit the following link: Grid Junction v2.0 BETA  to download your free trial version, put it to through the ringer and let us know what you find.  This beta trial will run until January 31, 2012.

More: kentdome.com | home-server-addins.com


HP MediaVault Generation 1: Getting New Life from an Old Friend

Do you have a HP Generation 1 MediaVault (2010-2050) with a bad motherboard or maybe you just want more power or want to change its functionality? Read on, this article is for you! History: Back around 2006 HP released the Generation 1 MediaVault NAS (models 2010-2050). All were hardware identical except for the drive size provided. This product offered features like file sharing, media sharing (such as streaming music, videos, movies) and digital pictures. It also provided a secure source for local PC backups and internet access. One important feature was the ability to mirror it's 2 internal SATA drives. The Gen. 1 platform was later redesigned and updated to become the HP MediaVault 2100 and 5100/5200 series. These look like mini HP Mediasmart servers with only 2 drives and feature a different processor and file system. HP offered a Raid 1 "like" mirror system based on the Reiser file system which in theory was a good idea but actually created a number of complications for the user. If a secondary drive failed it was somewhat easy to replace and restore but when the system encountered a primary drive failure special procedures were required to insure the data on the...

More Performance and a New OS, Removing the Smoke and Mirrors Part 2

You have seen the announcements from HP saying their MediaSmart Server is going the way of the DoDo. No doubt you share my feelings of sorrow and abandonment once again by a major corporation; my guess would be because of the fiasco with Vail and the Drive Extender issue. In it's place, HP wants you to buy a new Drobo. Oh well, life goes on in the world of computing. No more digressing, time to focus on the subject at hand. Part 2: More Performance and a New Operating System So, you performed the Celeron to the Pentium Dual core upgrade to squeeze a little more life out of your MSS and you want to know what else can be done extend the life of that neat little black box. Maybe you are considering a software upgrade to Windows Home Server 2011 or something else more powerful. Are you asking: Can I squeeze out a little more performance out of my 485 /7 dual core platform? Is it possible to efficiently run a new operating system on my MSS.? Can I expand the memory for said new operating system? All of the above questions can be answered with a yes...