Your help with Windows Home Server please

[Spriter]

Maybe the info coud be found somewhere... I search and did not find it.

I am moving from XP to Windows Home Server. I don't want to loose the precious information gathered with the shows I have recorded in the past few months and would like to preserve the link.

Could you be kind enough to refer me to the appropriate post OR tell me in how to proceed.

My guess is:

A) install Sage on WHS
B) configure it (including the video recording directories)
C) stop the services
D) move files (which one) from XP (location?) to WHS (location?)
E) restart de service and check everything

Or is it more than that?

Thanks a million and happy viewing!

[oaamaas]

You'll find the answers within the FAQs, but you've probably read them already since you've made that action list. There are a couple of details to get right - maybe you understand the FAQs a little better after reading this:

A) install Sage on WHS
B) configure it (including the video recording directories)
Note: Make sure to add directories on WHS install as network shares (\\your-server\...) - never ever as "d:\data\shares\..." - and keep it like that.
You might want to consider HOW to organize your WHS disks. I have recordings stored on "unmanaged" disks (had some stutterings initially - no problems after I moved recordings to unmanaged disks).
C) stop the services.
WHS:
Yes, you are done there for now.
XP:
(1) Add the same WHS network share(s) as video recording directory (in addition to the present directories).
(2) Then stop the SageTV service.
(3) Make a backup of your Wiz.bin!
(4) I didn't, but you probably should read and follow the steps detailed in the FAQ under the headline "Special note before moving recordings (v6.2 and later)" before you move on from here.
D) move files (which one) from XP (location?) to WHS (location?)
XP:
(1) With the service stopped - copy all your recordings from XP recordings directory into the WHS recordings share that you configured for the WHS install in B) and added as XP recording directory in C).
(2) When complete, rename the original XP recordings directory name (add a letter or something)
(3) Add an new (empty) directory with the same name as your original XP recordings directory (you've already renamed the original)
(4) Start SageTV again. Use the SageTV GUI and make sure that your recordings are in place and that you're able to play at least one (or look at the recording details and check the filename and path). Sage on XP will then have recognized that the recordings are moved between it's directories (from the now empty XP directory to the WHS share(s) where you copied the files).
If you've failed to succeed you still have your old wiz.bin, and all your recordings are still in the renamed directory - just revert and adjust the failed steps
(5) Stop SageTV once more (hopefully for good).
WHS:
(1) Copy your XP wiz.bin and save it into your WHS install. To really stay safe make a backup of the WHS wiz.bin first.
E) restart the service and check everything
WHS:
(1) Start SageTV and check your recordings. Guide content, recordings and recordings details should now be identical to your XP install.
(2) It might be an idea to keep things running for a little while to make sure everything was successful
XP:
(3) Finally - delete the recordings on the XP machine.

OK - the action items grew. It's really not that difficult, just stay focused.

One thing since you do not mention this - how do you plan to watch SageTV after this transition? Some folks also use the WHS machine as a client, but this is not straight forward and probably never an intended ability for SageTV on WHS... Anyway, I've kept my XP machine - I bought a SageTV client license and installed SageTV client on my XP machine, then configured it to use the WHS machine server. It will soon be replaced by a HD extender.

[Spriter]

Thanks for additionnal advice. Transfer is completed. I was worried a bit in the process. Since I transfered a lot of files to reach maximum capacity before moving additionnal HDs to the systems, WHS became very slow while distributing the data to the newly attached storage.

After a few hours, it became more responsive and I was able to navigate with the HD Media Extender with the same response time I was used to.

I will do additionnal test with HD materials before committing to this new setup and I will keep everybody posted.

WHS server, E1200, 2TB, GBlan, ATI 550, 1GB
HD Media Extender
Sage TV PC (client mode) E2200 XP 2GB

[taylormadearmy]

Originally Posted by oaamaas

Note: Make sure to add directories on WHS install as network shares (\\your-server\...) - never ever as "d:\data\shares\..." - and keep it like that.
You might want to consider HOW to organize your WHS disks. I have recordings stored on "unmanaged" disks (had some stutterings initially - no problems after I moved recordings to unmanaged disks).

From my personal experience I would strongly recommend using an "unmanaged" disk for recordings. Using a WHS managed disk made my sytem pretty much unusable with stuttering etc.

T

[jm987]

Watch out in WHS when you start low on space in the storage pool. I had 2.5 TB or storage and 500 Gigs free and the system was grinding to a halt because a couple of discs were full. It was only used as the File Storage area for movies and music. Sage was installed on a XP client with the recordings recoding directly to that box.

I hope you have better luck then I did because I'm in the process or removing WHS completely from my environment and going to a RAID 5 setup on my XP machine.

JM

[rlvogel322]

Originally Posted by jm987

Watch out in WHS when you start low on space in the storage pool. I had 2.5 TB or storage and 500 Gigs free and the system was grinding to a halt because a couple of discs were full. It was only used as the File Storage area for movies and music. Sage was installed on a XP client with the recordings recoding directly to that box.

I hope you have better luck then I did because I'm in the process or removing WHS completely from my environment and going to a RAID 5 setup on my XP machine.

JM

I've seen this also.

What I did was reinstall WHS onto the largest drive I had (1TB) and then add storage as needed. The system response has increased immensly and it's been working great. It used to take 12 minutes to copy a DVD (5Gb) over a Gigabit network. Now it's back to around 3 minutes. I only have around 500G left (1.6T total) with folder duplication on for Pictures and Music.

The box is also doing comskip and video compression (TY EP!) and I haven't had any issues running out of resources.