Random Technology Musings
Seriously, you have to ask yourself why Microsoft didn’t think of this:
[via Scott Hanselman]
I think its a testament to the legions of Windows developers the world over who wont take Redmond lack of design inspiration for an answer (compared to an unnamed Computer Company).
Get it here. I am so downloading it.
It also shows how much Microsoft left out of Vista (presumably under pressure to RTM it before it was ready).
Earth to WinFS. Where are you?????????
Well. I was about to go on buy the WHS OEM and lo and behold Novatech had sold out. 43 are expected in on 25 September.
I’m not in the mood to wait that long so I headed over to amazon.co.uk ( everyone’s favorite online retailer) and still nothing there. Annoying. Very, very Annoying. I figure amazon has more clout than Novatech and could get its hands on a nice pile of packs. There is not even a place holder page. So Amazon had better gets its act together.
I headed over to ebuyer.com. As of this writing 18 are on hand. For £40 more. I wont relate the invective now streaming through my mind. Well…
Anyone know where else I can get this without giving an arm and a leg?
Update: Blue Solutions have 16 coming in this week. I’ve already ordered. Thanks Philip for the tip.
Update 2 (27/09/07): Blue Solutions have already sold all their stock. I’m told they’ll be shipping at the beginning of next week. Which means I’ll finally have my hands on the WHS RTM next week.
Copying more than one gigabyte in one operation is tedious, frustrating and agonizingly slow. Not that there is all that much you can do.
Scott Allen was having a little bit of difficulty so I’ thought I’d help a little.
Scott Hansellman has a post on 3 utilities you can use to copy files without using the windows explorer.
First, Robocopy. If you have XP or Windows Server you can easily get this in the Resource Kits. If you have Vista, it’s already in your path. That’s always nice. It’s Robust, indeed (hence, Robocopy) but it’s legendarily unforgiving
…
Second, for repeatable jobs, I love SyncBackSE. It’s $30, but there is a free version with less features available. SyncBack is option-ful and literally moves nearly every important piece of data in my house around weekly.
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Last, but certainly not least, XXCOPY. It’s huge. Epic even. It’s even got a nice windows progress bar that pops out of the DOS Box. The Technical Reference is comprehensive to say the least. Here’s a summary of the features. It’ll sync directories, maintain short names, qualify by date/time, copy security info.
I’ve used Robocopy. The GUI frontend is next to useless (either that, or I’m doing something wrong).
I’ve yet to try the other two.
Hope this helps someone.
( You’ll catch the previous installment here)
Well, after carefully looking at the problem that I originally thought had to do with SageTv, I’ve come to the conclusion that it most defiantly isn’t. It seems to be a problem inherent to WHS (to do with opening backup images). So you can rest easy. this should be fixed in the RTM release, but I can’t be sure.
The next thing is finding a backup time so that SageTv will play nicely with WHS and find my PC’s switched on to backup. Still working on that. Its most probably going to be early in the morning.
I created a network share in the console and told SageTv to dump store all its recordings there.
Overall, it’s great. Having the ability to have TV on my PC is great. I have BBC News 24 running in a window above the system tray – its way better than a news ticker.
Recording is great. I really dig the intelligent recording functionality – no more missed ER episodes. I tested it with my second favorite US Comedy after friends – Scrubs. You might want to fiddle around with the Video Codec under Detailed setup. The default SageTv codec was,well, dogs vomit. Since I have Intervideo WinDVD installed locally, I chose their codec and it was perfect playback. I’ll have to look around the forums to see if there is another fix.
Funnily enough watching the video files was impossible with Windows Media Player or Real player before switching codec, but perfect afterwards. I’m not superstitious so I’ll write that off to chance 🙂 .
The Youtube thing failed to play the files for some reason. And the weather, though it got the info, was displayed horribly.
And if you do buy a license, you’ll need a Media Centre license.
Knew it would come to this…
The server has been running at 90% CPU for a few days.
Investigation using Process Explorer tells me that the culprit is the Interrupt process that is chewing up 50% to 70% of the CPU ( DEMigrator.exe was the other suspected culprit) . As you can imagine, this has a wonderful effect on Server response times and watching SageTV 🙂 .
I figured that the Hauppanuge Nova 500-T board that I use for sageTV (over the network using thier add-in) was throwing all the interrupts ( since its not officially supported on WHS, right?).
I update the driver off the Hauppanuge’s website. And Reboot. No change.
I physically remove the PCI-board from the the server. Still no change.
Nothing else has changed on the server(save for the fact its now in danger of blowing up from overheating).
So help please!!!!!!!
PS I cross-posted this over at the WHS Forums
Got my shiny new Hauppauge WinTV-NOVA-T 500 – Dual Digital Freeview TV tuner and hooked it up to the server.
Driver installation was painless. the server picked it up with no problem.
I installed the SageTV V2.2 Add In via the console. At this point, I have to say that it offers zero settings to configure either on the tab or under settings. On one had it does wonders to the confusion factor. On the other, being unable to do something as pedestrian as changing the storage location is frustrating . Since this is for WHS, you should know that the system partition is 20GB and it makes no sense to store video files there. Try a Share.
As long as you remember to download the SageTv client off the site, it works fine.
Channel set-up was a breeze. My only beef is the EPG via tvtv.co.uk. 90% of the channels don’t show up in the EPG yet for some reason. I’ll give it time to load all the channels up before emailing tech support.
To test it I had to do some acrobatics with the cable coming down from the antenna. I’ve not tested it with both tuners in action. I’m going to get the TV guys down here tomorrow to turn it into a permanent set-up with both tuners working.
The quality is amazing on the client. The user interface is well designed and unobtrusive.
Some points from a first impression.
Talking of the user interface:
The whole EPG thing could be improved. Surely you could pick this information up from the Tv signals themselves? How come my set-top box does it quite easily? I’ll have a play around and see if there is that option.
I’m a wee bit confused about the license structure. In 15 days, what do I do? Do I buy a SageTV license for both Client and Server?
And finally, when can we expect a release?
Looking ahead. I plan to get the Extenders for the Tv’s at some point. And I plan to grab another dual tuner to make sure everyone can watch what they want.
I love it when a gamble pays off big. 🙂
I’ve just ordered the Hauppauge WinTV-NOVA-T 500 – Dual Digital Freeview TV tuner from amazon.co.uk and it should be here tomorrow.
I’m dying to tryout the SageTV Add-in and Placeshifter ( they are both Release Candidates, but then again, what on the server isn’t?) and will play around tomorrow (assuming Amazon’s delivery estimate is correct 🙂 ).
We Got Served says:
SageTV is designed to be your “always on” digital entertainment hub that’s accessible at home or over a broadband connection. Put any Video, Music or Photos onto your SageTV Media Server and enjoy them on any TV, PC or Mac screen.
Enjoy all your TV, Video, Music or Photos anytime, anywhere using SageTV Placeshifter to connect to your Windows Home Server from any broadband connection Connect your TVs at home to SageTV on Windows Home Server with SageTV Media Extender Handles nearly every Video, Music and Photo format Works with Cable, Satellite and Broadcast TV around the world including NTSC, ATSC, PAL and DVB
As long as it works in the UK, I’m happy.
Now I’ve tried getting the built in DHCP server that is part of the underlying Windows Server 2003 working and it didn’t turn out very well.
Now, however a new Windows Home Server Add In takes the pain out of DHCP. DHCP4WHS is great. I just spent ten minutes getting it working.
This thing handles anything you care to throw at it: Remote Access, Remote desktop, VPN connections.
Basically I ticked the box on the Router setup page ( I have a Linksys W54WAG gateway/Router) for DHCP Server Relay, typed in the the static IP address I’d just set up for the server (be sure to do this first), get the nameservers from the DSL status page and finally, amend the port forwarding on my router to get Remote Access working. The nameservers are the most important bit as you need them to get online.
In the DCHP4WHS config page, if you do change settings, be sure to restart the service for the new settings to take effect.
I’ll grant you that a DHCP Server isn’t very sexy… but it does have something very unique that I think is worth bragging about… as far as I can tell DHCP4WHS is the first and only DHCP server written in C# and/or for the .NET Framework.
It is quite an achievement. I’d love to see the source.
In the finest tradition of Windows Home Server, DHCP4WHS “just works”.
It gets my Code2Fame vote.
(Thanks to MS Homeserver blog and We got served for the info)
If you’ve been reading my blog lately you’ll know I’m installing SageTV for WHS. The idea is to eventually have Freeview (for those outside Britain its free-to-air Digital TV) on all PC’s and Tv in the house come through WHS.
Now the Website isn’t entirely clear on exactly how SageTv 6 integrates with WHS.
Does it use the console? Does it run as a service (a big thing for WHS software since no-one is logged in most of the time)? How does it deal with the WHS folder structure? Does PlaceShifter integrate with the Remote Website?And a million and one other questions.
Now I was just browsing through the feature list for SageTv and it is impressive.
Here are my favorites:
Multiple Tuner Support
Record two or more shows at the same time! No limits to the number of tuners allowed. I can’t seem to find a card with more than two tuners so expandability is great.
SageTV Studio Development Kit (learn more)
Let’s you customize or develop new applications for SageTV . Need I say more?
Support for multiple formats across multiple tuners (can mix MPEG-2 and MPEG-4/DivX hardware encoders). Better and better.
Favorites ManagerTM
Never miss your favorite shows whether it’s first runs, re-runs, or all episodes. This is good since I currently have Google Calendar remind me of shows 🙂 .
Sounds too good to be true. I’ll let you know how it plays out when I get it. It might be soon, it might not. Stay tuned.
Well, here’s another update.
The extra 1GB RAM is in and is working its magic on server performance (2Gb in total) .
Next, I’ve got to choose a TV tuner card (details here). And then there is SageTv to install and configure.
I also hear that Diskeeper 2007 has a WHS edition.
Diskeeper automatically keeps all of the hard disks (both internal and external) on your home server defragmented to optimise the speed and performance of the server. Unlike the standard Disk Defragmenter application included in Windows Home Server (and other Windows SKUs), Diskeeper runs as a service in WHS, and continually works on defragmenting your disks whilst the server is idle. Access the server, Diskeeper stops. Server idle? Diskeeper gets back to work so there’s no noticable performance hit whilst it’s running. They call it Invisitaksing.
Sweet. I checked the disks yesterday and most had more than 30% file fragmentation.
I wrote a quick Vb console app to defrag all the drives automatically (using defrag.exe and the task scheduler), but I’m still testing it and I’ll post the code when I’m done. (its a stop gap, I know 🙂 ). So I’m desperate for Diskeeper 2007 to be RTM’d ( that’s Released To Manufacturing).
The homeserver.com domains are being registered. I just checked and swapped my domain over ( thanks to this reminder ).
And we have estimate retail pricing for WHS. Its a rumor that has yet to be confirmed.
I’m not sure weather to belive the £150 price tag. On the one had its rather cheap given the fact that Vista Home Premium is going for £135 from amazon.co.uk ( Home Basic: £79). On the other hand, it makes perfect sense since this is a product targeted at home users and should be in the same price range. On second thoughts, it also makes sense since people who buy WHS off the shelf most likely have spend money already building their server and won’t baulk at the price tag.
Update to the Update: Philip Churchill of the Ms Home Server blog suggests that it’ll go for £88.74 here in the UK.
Cheeky question time: if you’ve built a home server either for yourself or someone else, does that make you eligible for OEM prices? 🙂
Random Musings 
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