Windows 7 - Windows Home Server 2011 is Ready for Release

Airbot · 03-29-2011

Quote:

Today, the Home Server engineering team signed off the release version of WHS 2011. An exciting milestone which now starts the process to make it available for purchase.
Affordable and easy-to-use, Windows Home Server 2011 is the ideal solution to help families keep their important digital files and data automatically backed up, organized, and accessible from virtually anywhere.
To help with questions we hear during this time of the product release cycle, I have provided further guidance below. If you have a specific question, please feel free to post in comments, on our WHS forum.

When will OEM’s offer WHS 2011? Many OEM’s and System Builders have already started building specific form factors and solutions based on WHS 2011. We expect to start seeing them in the market starting May.
What languages is WHS 2011 available in? WHS 2011 will be released in 19 languages including Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional, Taiwan), Chinese (Hong Kong), Czech, Dutch, English, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Portuguese (Brazil), Portuguese (Portugal), Russian, Spanish, Swedish, and Turkish.
When will the Evaluation for WHS 2011 be made available? The evaluation experience for WHS 2011 will be released in early April.
When will I be able to download WHS 2011 via my TechNet or MSDN subscription? WHS 2011 will be made available on MSDN and TechNet also in early April.
What is the difference between V1 of WHS and WHS 2011? You can learn more about differences in our comparison datasheet.

more..

z3r010 · 03-29-2011

Great news, I cant wait to get it up and running.

pparks1 · 03-29-2011

It will be interesting to see if this barely used product grows with this release or dies with this release. Overall, I'm unsure about it's potential success without drive extender and with HP getting out the Media Smart hardware game.

Drive extended was the #1 thing that I would have used this product for. I already do image based backups, so no real gains there.

Crispy · 03-30-2011

Quote:

Microsoft has released Windows Home Server 2011, formerly codenamed Vail, to manufacturing. This means that original equipment manufacturers around the world will now receive the RTM bits and start bundling the OS with consumer-oriented server offerings.

According to the software giant, a variety of OEMs as well as System Builders have already been hard at work putting together Windows Home Server 2011 solutions and form factors.

Specific availability deadlines weren’t provided, but the company expects the first WHS 2011 servers to hit store shelves as early as May 2011.

“Affordable and easy-to-use, Windows Home Server 2011 is the ideal solution to help families keep their important digital files and data automatically backed up, organized, and accessible from virtually anywhere,” revealed a member of the Windows Home Server team.

Unlike the first version of WHS, Microsoft aligned its development efforts for Windows Home Server 2011 with those for such server platforms as Windows Small Business Server 2011 Essentials and Windows Storage Server 2008 R2 Essentials.

Since business customers and consumers don’t exactly share the same necessities in terms of their server operating system, the company decided to favor the first in the detriment of the later.

Windows Home Server 2011 no longer sports Drive Extender, a feature which allowed multiple hard drives to be pooled together in a simple volume seamlessly.

Source: Windows Home Server 2011 Reaches RTM - Softpedia

jimbo45 · 03-30-2011

Hi there
OK trying to teach marketing to one of the world largest companies probably isn't a likely winner -- but putting a DATE in a products name tends to make the product seem obsolete YEARS before it becomes so --unless that's also part of the "Forced Upgrade" path.

I'm still using Windows 2003 server --still a FIRST CLASS product even though it looks by the name a real Dinosaur sounding title.

Haven't yet found ANY Windows server successor product that even begins to compare with W2K3 server and some versions DO allow more than 4GB -- even on x-86 you can actually use up to 64 GB on W2K3 server R2 Enterprise edition,

Cheers
jimbo

DeaconFrost · 03-30-2011

I have been very happy with the RC version, so I'll be using this as soon as it is released. I built a server with a RAID card in it, so the loss of Drive Extender won't bother me that much. There are also several 3rd party plug-ins that are restoring DE's functionality, so I honestly am a long way from calling this a failed product.

Gbsnplr · 03-30-2011

Quote: Originally Posted by DeaconFrost

I have been very happy with the RC version, so I'll be using this as soon as it is released. I built a server with a RAID card in it, so the loss of Drive Extender won't bother me that much. There are also several 3rd party plug-ins that are restoring DE's functionality, so I honestly am a long way from calling this a failed product.

Can you list some of the 3rd party plug ins? Drive extender is a very useful feature for me.

DeaconFrost · 03-30-2011

Quote: Originally Posted by Gbsnplr

Can you list some of the 3rd party plug ins? Drive extender is a very useful feature for me.

A quick Google search will tell you everything you need to know, but here's a link to get you started. These have been announced quite some time ago, soon after DE's removal was announced.

Windows Home Server 2011 – Third Party Drive Extender Replacements « PricklyTech

Gbsnplr · 03-31-2011

Thanks

DeaconFrost · 03-31-2011

What I forgot to add above is, that even though they've been announced and in beta for a while, I haven't seen anything listing them as final. I'm thinking the developers are waiting to see the final code of Vail before declaring their add-in ready. I also haven't seen any final info on cost...if the add-ins will be free, or up to $20 for a lifetime license.