Windows Home Server On Its Way To Manufacturing

Microsoft is releasing its Windows Home Server software to manufacturers Monday paving the way for home server devices based on Microsoft's software to be available this fall. Iomega today also announces it becomes the latest to offer hardware that will run Windows Home Server software. Other hardware partners previously announced to offer Windows Home Server devices are Fujitsu Siemens Computers, Gateway, Hewlett-Packard, LaCie, and Medion.

Iomega this fall says it will sell a user expandable home server for consumers with the ability to add up to four hard drives based on Windows Home Server software. No official word on pricing or exact dates for availability.

Windows Home Server is Microsoft's solution to bringing order to cluttered digital lives. Microsoft is targeting households that want to share storage among multiple PCs. Various models of home server products will provide automatic backup of connected PCs, sharing of digital content between network-attached devices (PCs, Zune media player, or Xbox game console), remote access to data, and storage expansion.



HP's home server is called HP MediaSmart Server, which will offer centralized storage for up to 10 PCs, automated backups of multiple PCs on a network, and file sharing both from within and outside a home's network. HP will also offer its own software applications such as Photo Webshare for photo sharing.



Fujitsu Siemens Computers says its SCALEO Home Server will feature two 500GB SATA RAID array disks, gigabit Ethernet, with up to four hot-swappable drives. Pricing ranges between $690 and $965, according to a German-language Fijitsu Web page.