OK, this is what I'm planning:

I really, really, really want to have my home network set up in a domain, so that I can log on to my account from any computer. Furthermore, I really, really, really want to be able to use Exchange to get to my emails and calendar from any computer at home or remotely, and being able to push Outlook information to my HTC TyTN. I also really like the possibilities of having a pre-built customisable Intranet with the basic functionality you would need to access your home network remotely, such as accessing files, posting information, accessing desktops remotely, VPN functionality, etc. Hence SBS 2003 seems to be a logical choice for me. I can even buy a license from a friend with a private company that's moving to Windows server 2008. Great!

But (!!!) I also really, really, really like the functionality that WHS offers. It would be a great interface to offer to friends and family in terms of accessing my media, primarily pictures. There are a bunch of useful add-ins that I'm drooling over, such as the WebGuide functionality which I already use to stream live TV and music to my HTC. So what do I do?

Perhaps I should set up an SBS server with a virtual server on it running WHS. Is this at all possible? I can forsee a number of issues with this. One obvious one would be that I need to assure that the system (OS) drive of the server would not be included in the drive pool of the WHS. I do not have enough understanding to of WHS to determine if it is possible to choose, or if WHS will automatically include all drives on the computer. Then there is the issue of data corruption, but I am counting on the fix to be available soon. Even if that is not the case, I could always set up things so that any file operations would go through the SBS access, i.e. any files I open would be openened and edited through "\\SBS_SERVER\whateverpath" rather than "\\WHS_SERVER\somepath". That could be true for WMP on client machines. Still, I would be able to utilise the neat interface of WHS when remotely accessing my network. On the other hand, perhaps the actual need for WHS is greatly reduced when using SBS, apart from the interface. Hmm, would it be possible to extract the web site functionality on a WHS setup and build it as part of a SBS sharepoint website?

The hardware I'm thinking on using is the following:

Thermaltake LanBox Lite
Thermaltake 7'' Bay LCD
MK Gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2H
CPU Pent. Dual Core E2160
HD250GB WD SATA-300(system disk)
HD1TB WD GP SATA-300
HD500GB Western Digital
2xDDR2 2GB PC5300 Orig.
SuperSilent Freezer 7PRO
DVD±RW Optiarc7200 Svart
Nexus NX8040 400W
Keysonic Wireless mini keyboard ACK-540 RF

Comments? Ideas? Suggestions?

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/Angel

Just to spice things up a bit more: why not move my two DVB-T tuners to this box, and run a Virtual PC session with VMC on it in parallel? That way I could have all my recordings on the WHS accessible to other PCs, and use existing PCs (with VMC) as extenders. Just a thought...

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/Angel

I dont think you can virtualise pci/pcie tuners, though VMware can virtualise USB which might be worth investigating.

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http://www.spore.com/view/profile/Vengence_IRL

If you are going to setup a Virtual Machine for WHS and leave it running full time I'd highly recommend getting 4GB of RAM so you can have at least 2GB for the SBS (Exchange is memory whore).

On one of my machines I'm running Windows 2008 w/ Hyper-V and have WHS setup as a Virtual Machine.  I have 1GB of RAM dedicated to the WHS.  I'm also running a VM of Vista-64 Ultimate and another of Gentoo.  But like you mentioned the benefits of WHS if you have a server already setup is slim.  I have mine setup for a mixture of development\testing and for a couple computers I need to keep seperate from my  domain.

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.:: Vista Ultimate x64 :: Antec Fusion :: Corsair HX520w :: ASUS P5E-VM :: Core2 Duo E8400 3.0Ghz :: 4GB RAM :: 128GB SSD System\Apps :: 1TB\5TB Data :: LG GGC-H20L BD/HD DVD :: HDHomeRun x2 ::.

mikinho:

If you are going to setup a Virtual Machine for WHS and leave it running full time I'd highly recommend getting 4GB of RAM so you can have at least 2GB for the SBS (Exchange is memory whore).

That's exactly why I'm going for 4GB: 2xDDR2 2GB PC5300

I'd be interested in hearing if there were any issues in setting WHS up as a virtual machine. I dedicate the memory in the settings of the VM thingy, right? I only have some minor experience from setting up Ubuntu as a Virtual PC on one of my machines, and I seem to remember that you specify memory size there, even though it did not show in the task manager. As far as I could see, the memory utilisation of the process was not in parity with the memory size set in VPC. I may be wrong, though.

Haven't tried Virtual Server, but I guess it's pretty much the same. Would wmware server be a better solution. I think there is a free version, but is that sufficient? I need to learn more about this!

Any recommendation on this setup would be very welcome!

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/Angel

Sorry I missed the 2x

Yes, you allocate dedicate memory for the VM.  Hyper-V is the 2008 (much improved) version of Virtual Server.  It has some really cool features that let you create a dynamic server environment similarly to VMare's ESX Server.  Personally I already prefer Hyper-V but I haven't seen any real performance numbers yet.

VMWare Server is their free edition and would suite your needs thought I think you'll need to use v2 (in beta).

I'm late for work but I'll add more later if you'd like or have any questions.  My only pain was getting the Gentoo kernel config right.  I believe I had to set the network card to Legacy Network card.

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.:: Vista Ultimate x64 :: Antec Fusion :: Corsair HX520w :: ASUS P5E-VM :: Core2 Duo E8400 3.0Ghz :: 4GB RAM :: 128GB SSD System\Apps :: 1TB\5TB Data :: LG GGC-H20L BD/HD DVD :: HDHomeRun x2 ::.

A few points...

1) What are your client PCs running? To join a PC to the domain, it has to be running a business version of Windows; i.e XP Pro or Vista Business or Ultimate. If you are running XP MCE or Vista Home Premium on your clients, they won't be able to join the domain. They will still be able to access resources on the server (E.g. Outlook will be able to reach you Exchange account) but you won't be able to do domain stuff like roaming profiles, folder redirection, single sign on, group policy etc.

2) Hyper-V is a great virtualisation solution but is probably out for you as you'd need to run Windows 2008 on the physical machine (Hyper-V being a component of Win 2008), and virtualise both SBS2003 and WHS. So there's an extra license and resources to worry about, although 4GB should be enough. There's supposed to be a $28 seperate version of Hyper-V but this would be running on slimmed down Windows 2008 Server Core version so might be difficult for you to manage. So to save money I would suggest you use SBS2003 on your hardware and run Virtual Server 2005 R2 or Vmware Server (both free) to virtualise WHS. VMware server is slightly easier to use, and can support dual processor VMs, but personally I prefer Virtual Server as you can set CPU% that each VM is allowed to use. Actually this may have changed in the beta of vmware server 2; I've not checked.

3) Not sure if WHS can backup your client PCs if they are joined to a domain. It would be great if SBS2008 got a WHS style backup facility. If you use roaming profiles and folder redirection though, most of your stuff will be on the server though, so this may not be so important.

cheers,

Aitor

 

Thanks for all the great input! I will be using a mix of Vista Ultimate, Vista Business and XPMCE (which can be tweaked to join a domain).

I think that Aitor will be very happy to hear that SBS 2008 (check the link) seems to be very similar to WHS, including a backup facility (pic). Oh, darn, now I want that. Looks so neat!

Once again thanks! I will order the stuff tomorrow, but the Thermaltake 7" bay LCD is out of the picture (no pun intended). It's too expensive for the little use I would have of it. But I gotta admit that it would be like totally übercool to have one of those on the server. It wouldn't fit that particular case anyway, I discovered.

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/Angel

Hmm, I keep replying to myself.

What about turning the whole thing on it's head? I mean running WHS with a Virtual Machine running SBS (given that there will be a fix for the data corruption thing)? Is there any server virtualisation that will install on WHS? That way you could buy the HP box and still get server capabilities. If the specs for that box are sufficient. I would still go for my custom build, though.

Another thing I'm thinking of is actually running Vista Ultimate on the box and virutalise SBS from there. Perhaps even SBS and WHS in parallel. There are reasons for why this would be beneficial, among those that the box could serve to give quick access to a browser, without having to go upstairs or dig out the laptop and wait for that to start. The box would be always on and equipped with a screen and keyboard/mouse I would have a qick way of getting on the Internet or check my emails downstairs (near the kitchen where I spend a lot of time cooking, my great interest besides computers). Although I can use the destop of the server session for that, somehow I feel uncomfortable letting the whole family having access to the server session. Another way to do that would be to virtualise Vista through Virtual Server, but then I would not be able to emulate sound (no YouTube watching on that box).

One other thing: If I understand things correctly, WHS can only see computers in a workgroup. Any computers on a domain would not be visible. Is that correct? If so the backup function in WHS does not work, I guess, as was hinted in a previous post.

I think I need advice here. I keep going in circles. What should be my strategy. Don't really have the time to play around with different setups. Need to get it fairly right from the start.

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/Angel

I have been planning on running a virtual instance of another server on top of WHS for some time. I have read about this and it seems to work fine. I am not sure you will be able to run SBS like this however. I currently run SBS and the way it likes to be configured, it runs as the center of your network. It likes to be the default gateway etc. There is a whole setup process to run through if you are running a seperate firewall/router box, in which you need to point some functionality at SBS. I think this might cause issues because the WHS installation hosting your SBS instance would not be able to find the SBS at bootup.

Maybe it could work. I think it would be a headache. I am about ready to ditch SBS. I find myself using less and less of the features. Now I mostly use it as a domain controller and nothing more. I don't use exchange much anymore and I don't think the intranet site is all that useful. IMHO WHS has tons of functionality that SBS should have in it. Maybe they will plan a new version of SBS that incorporates the backup functionality, ease of storage etc. If I find that I miss my domain too much I may just run a virtual instance of a domain controller.

Good luck and keep us posted if you decide to try this!

Angel of Death:

I really, really, really want to have my home network set up in a domain, so that I can log on to my account from any computer.

You can still use Roaming Profiles without a domain, you just need to manage the user accounts/passwords/path to profile on each PC and the server (really not that big a deal for a couple of users/PCs). I have done this now with W2K3 server in a workgroup environment, it should work just as well under WHS (it just requires a shared folder).

Of course this won't help your desire to run Exchange - have you considered using Gmail/GoogleApps w/ Thunderbird accessing your mail via IMAP and Sunbird/Lightning to sync Google Calendar (via GooSync or some other method)?

Much cheaper than buying SBS! Plus your email won't start bouncing / get lost if your home server / internet connection goes offline.

So, now I've gone and done it! Happy? Yes! Smooth ride? Yes!

I have had the SBS2003 running for some time now, with Exchange server working fine with both OWA and OTA mobile sync. Have set up user folders so we always have access to our personal files regardless of what computer in the domain we use. Got VPN to work and everything. Nice!

So I thought it was about time to set up Virtual Server 2005 SP1 on the machine. Created a VM with 1 IDE (80GB) and 1 SCSI VDH (350 GB). Installed the evaluation copy of WHS and it was all good to go. Had to fiddle a little with port settings to get remote access. Had to set port forwarding on the router and change the IIS website ports on the VM to assure that there were no conflict with access to Companyweb, OWA and remote server administration. But it works. There is no issue with having the WHS outside the domain. Even works with computer backups (it's actually backing up the computer I'm using right now as I write).

If anyone's interested: I actually set up Virtual Server on this client machine first and did the installation and tweaking. Took me something like two hours all-in-all. Then I connected to remotely to the server and set up Virtual Server on the SBS. Following that I copied the VHDs over to the server and ran the Virtual Server console from the client machine. All those connections! But as I said, it works and it's quite amazing. I can even sit here and remotely run a server session with a virtual server session within. Mind boggling! :)

I'm happy anyway. Now I need to evaluate whether there is any benefit, apart from the smooth client backup functionality. I already share all media from the SBS and it works great. Having an easy way to share media with friends and familiy is OK I guess, but right now I have duplicate media (only pictures so far), both on the actual server HD and on the VHD (residing on the server HD). Think I have to make up my mind there.

Happy to get any feedback and answer any questions.

Cheers!

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/Angel

Sounds like you want server 2003 instead of WHS.

Angel of death, what you are doing is exactly what I've been thinking in my head and what I was planning on doing for my setup. I was hoping you could give me some feedback how this setup is running thus far and if there was anything you would have done differently if you could do it again.

I don't plan on running SBS though. I was trying to build a true media center server. I was going to install Windows XP MCE with a tuner farm as a dedicated closet server. Then I was planning on installing a virtual machine running WHS on that. That way I have one central location for recording multiple tv channels for my entire house...without having every client media center pc in the bedrooms having to be running 24/7 just to record tv. Infact, I'd like these client media center pc's to not even have a tuner card installed in them.

Then I get the tv recording ability of MCE and the drive extender and backup features of WHS. I plan to also have a NAS attached to backup the WHS critical data to.

With your experience setting up a WHS on a virtual machine. What are your thoughts on my setup?