Last year Microsoft released a new product called Windows Home Server. We saw the potential immediately for this really cool new mini-server and offered it to solve some immediate problems for a few our smaller clients.
Here’s what Windows Home Server can do for businesses:
- Provide a place to store files
- Provide remote access to your work PC
- Centralize your data for backup
- Backup all of the PC’s and MACs
- Help keep everything up to date
That’s a lot of benefit for $600-$800. It has a hard limit of 10 users, no e-mail server, no fax server, no super secure firewall, no detailed security for files, no intranet, no webmail, no active directory, no group policies, no logon scripts…but if you are a company with fewer than 10 users in a business without any software that requires a server to run on, then this is the server you’ve been waiting for. What it does, it does really well and that’s all some folks need.
Hewlett Packard is making the best ones right now. This is a departure from our usual Dell recommendation, but we always go with the best, so HP it is. Home Server arrives pre-installed and there’s little customization that can be done. It’s an appliance type installation, like your xbox, playstation or cable box. It comes ready to roll. All we have to do is connect your PC’s to it, setup the backup, move the data and you’ve got a server.
This product really fills a gap that has existed for a long time. Previously the only solution we had to offer was Small Business Server, but even that was over kill for many 3 person firms. Now we have a better solution. A server that provides the services a small company needs.
p.s. we’ve begged Microsoft to change the name: first server, micro server, really small business server…anything but home server.
