January 2011 – Tom on Tech

WHS Vail Expiry Workaround

Yes, I realize that this is a little bit late as the August Preview build expires today, and may have already expired for some of you, but hopefully you can gain access to your server long enough to perform the following steps to extend the timebomb to mid-March.

1.    Install WS08 R2 SP1 RC on the server by clicking here
2.    Logon on https://connect.microsoft.com/WindowsHomeServer with your connect credentials
3.    Click on Product keys (in the left hand side column)
4.    Click on Request a new product key
5.    Click on Get Key
6.    In Windows Home Server, open a command prompt
7.    Type “slmgr.vbs -ipk ABCDE-FGHIJ-KLMNO-PQRST-UVWXY” (where ABCDE.. is your new key as requested above)
8.    Type “slmgr.vbs –ato”
9.   Reboot the server, and your beta timeframe has been extended. You can check this by opening up a command prompt and typing winver.

Proof that Windows Home Server “Vail” is Windows Home Server 2011

Over the last few days there has been speculation, possible confirmation, possible denial, and even silence on the matter of what the official name of Windows Home Server Code Name “Vail” will be when it is released later this year.

There was some speculation this past week that it would be called Windows 7 Home Server. That’s not correct. Here’s what I’m offering as proof that Vail will indeed be marketed as Windows Home Server 2011.

This past week at the Consumer Electronics Show, the Windows Home Server team showed off integration between Vail and Windows Phone 7, and then took to their blog to tell us all about it. In that blog post, there is a screenshot showing a remote access domain name (win7phone.homeserver.com). I decided to see if after the show that server was still up and publicly accessible. At the time these screenshots were taken, Microsoft’s demo server was still available. Upon arriving at the login screen, I was presented with Exhibit A.

If you look at the logo as well as the title bar it says Windows Home Server 2011.

To be completely clear, this is not a screenshot taken from a server of mine, it is not taken running a build of Vail that I have access to, nor is the image photoshopped in any way. This comes directly from a server hosted by Microsoft, using a build of their choosing, and it appears conclusive that Vail is in fact Windows Home Server 2011.

Windows Home Server Dynamic DNS Update

Microsoft just passed along some information that next week on January 11th, there will be an outage of the service that powers *.homeserver.com and *.remotewebaccess.com domain names. If you are a Windows Home Server or Windows Small Business Server user and are using a remote access domain name in one of those two categories, there is a chance that you will be affected.

This outage is taking place to migrate the service from the Windows Live Custom Domains platform to the Azure platform. By moving to Azure, stability and performance will be improved, and will lay the groundwork to support the new Windows Server Solutions products (Vail, Aurora, and SBS2011) being released later this year.

The outage will last approximately 24 hours and during this outage no updates will be able to be performed. What this means is that if your IP address changes during the downtime, your server will be unavailable until the outage is cleared. What this also means is that if you want to change your domain name or release your domain name, you will be unable to do so.

Also, you may see alerts stating that your server was unable to update your domain name, and any 3rd-party add-ins that rely on the remote access services may fail.

Not to worry however, when service is restored your server will automatically update the remote access configuration, alerts will disappear, and remote clients will be able to connect once more.

If after the update, in the rare case that your domain name is not working, follow these steps to correct your configuration.

1. Open the Windows Home Server Console

2. Click on Settings

3. Select the Remote Access item in the Settings page

4. Click Repair and follow the instructions on the screen

Windows Home Server Vail Public Preview Update

If you are using the Vail Public Preview that was released in August of 2010, please be aware that this build will be expiring on January 10th, 2011.

There is no workaround to prevent the build from expiring. If you have any data that you don’t wish to lose (which you shouldn’t as this is pre-production code), please back that data up before the 10th.

Microsoft announced in a forums post today that they are committed to providing an updated public preview build within the next 4-6 weeks.

Once a new build is released, you’ll find out about it here, the Microsoft forums, and the Windows Home Server team blog.

2011 Microsoft MVP for Windows Home Server

2011 sure has gotten off to a great start! I woke up yesterday to an e-mail in my inbox congratulating me on becoming an MVP for Windows Home Server.

Congratulations! We are pleased to present you with the 2011 Microsoft® MVP Award! This award is given to exceptional technical community leaders who actively share their high quality, real world expertise with others. We appreciate your outstanding contributions in Windows Home Server technical communities during the past year.

It is an incredible honor to join the ranks alongside the other Windows Home Server MVPs, and I look forward to helping the community in the year ahead.