WHS Vail

[wayner]

The public Beta of the next version of WHS, called Vail, is now available. The biggest improvement that I have seen is that WHS can now back itself up. IT'S ABOUT FREAKIN' TIME!

However I can't tell if it is a 32 bit or 64 bit OS. What drivers will you need to install on WHS Vail given that it is based on Windows Server 2008? Does this mean that the good old firewire drivers for channel change written by Tim M Moore will not work?

Anyone else have any opinions on this?

Given that I am having weird problems on my Sage/WHS system I may try out the beta if/when I get some time.

Anyone else going to do the same?

[wayner]

Apparently Vail is 64 bit only - are there 64 bit firewire drivers for changing channels?

[medwynd]

I may try it out depending on what advantages it has. I just got a WHS server running last week so don't know if I can justify upgraded since I just started using it.

[panteragstk]

Check this review out.

[medwynd]

Great link, thanks.

[gplasky]

Add-ins have a brand new add-in file format ( .wssx files from here on in) and the ability to install add-ins on the server directly from one of your home computers. So I don't think existing add-ins will work with Vail.

Gerry

[TechJunkie]

Existing add-in will not work with the new verison. Vail is 64 bit only since it is based on Server 2008 R2 which is 64 bit only.

[TechJunkie]

If you want to try out Vail you could try to run SageTV in a virtural 32bit PC. I know VMware allows you to pass USB device to the virtural machine. Just a thought.

[wayner]

What issues will 64 bit only cause for SageTV? Older tuners cards that may not have 64 bit drivers? What about the firewire drivers for cable STBs? How stable are the 64 bit drivers of the HD-PVR?

[logsvp]

I have just setup Vail in a VMWare Virtual Machine (base configuration X64 2008R2) and installed SageTV Media Center (V6.6 for Windows). I have then added in a USB DVB-T tuner (a Blackgold BGT3550 which uses 32bit drivers).

I am now watching BBC1 on my client PC

So it looks like the basics work - obviously we will need a WHS (V2) Add-In at some point but I think this is very encouraging as a starter for 10

[panteragstk]

This article makes me worry about moving an existing drive pool to WHS v2. Drive Extender V2. The new version ov WHS coming out may be one of the many reasons SageTV v7 has yet to come out...Maybe.

[BrianDC]

So got a secondary box up and running with Vail, no issues with Sage (besides not having a simple add-in feature) or HD-HomeRun.
The concerns regarding the FileSystem and Drive extender are valid and I also want to see if MS will provide a utility to access Vail drives from an XP or Win7 machine.

The real showstopper for me at the moment is the lack of 64 drivers for firewireSTP. I'm really hoping that the release of Vail there may be renewed interest in 64bit drivers that will allow us to change channels via firewire.

[wayner]

Originally Posted by BrianDC

The real showstopper for me at the moment is the lack of 64 drivers for firewireSTP. I'm really hoping that the release of Vail there may be renewed interest in 64bit drivers that will allow us to change channels via firewire.

Darn - I was worried about that. I want to try this out but I want to stay with firewire channel change - it looks like that won't be possible.

[TallMomof2]

Since there isn't an easy migration path from 32 bit WHS to 64 bit Vail, I'll be waiting until I move on to WHS v2. My drive pool is up to 12TB now and it would take a long time to copy all that over to the new 64 bit system.

[sic0048]

Well, since the release is the 1st public beta, I wouldn't suggest moving important data to V2 anyway. It is great to be able to download it, play with it, and kick the tires, but clearly it is not ready to be used in a normal environment.

[BrianDC]

@TallMomof2
You do realize that Vail IS WHS v2. Who knows, maybe MS will have a utility to do a kind of "in-place" upgrade, however I somehow doubt it.

@sic0048
Totally agree, now is the time to play with it, kick the tires, however don't make it your production system since the FileSystem in the Beta may not even be compatible with the final version. This is a BRAND NEW DriveExtender version that is completely different than the current WHS.

I'm not as concerned about the 64-bit driver issue for most encoders, tv-tuners, etc as most companies are creating 64 and 32 bit drivers since more and more people are adopting 64-big (heck, windows 8 may ONLY be available in 64-bit just like server 2008 R2)

The issue is the weird stuff, like the firewire STB that was ripped from something else. It's not comercial and it's not being maintained. I'm really hoping that between now and Jan of 2011 there is a 64-bit STB driver created so I can migrate sage system to the new OS.

[TallMomof2]

I realize that Vail is WHS v2, just don't see any reason to be in a rush to try the beta. From what I've read on the WHS boards there won't be an easy migration route because you're going from a 32 bit to a 64 bit OS. Also, the data pool is going to be handled somewhat differently. For me that means spending a *lot* of time transferring data.

I'm thinking about separating SageTV from WHS and setting up a Win7 box as a SageTV server but not any time soon. Too much stuff to do.

[WarlordBB]

I'm not quite sure I follow. I've never used WHS but I think I get the gist. I've got a fresh install of Windows Server 2008 R2 w/Hyper-V going with SageTV running on it (the Host that is) as my server. I have no VM's at this point. I'm considering installing Vail on a Hyper-V VM like this guy has:

http://www.servethehome.com/windows-...-release-clue/

For a "kick the tires" run and I'm confused about the "no add-in" part y'all are talking about in the posts above. It sounds like those who are running Vail are installing SageTV as if their WHS was a normal OS (i.e. "no add-in"). Is this what y'all are talking about? If so, does that mean there's no benefit in running SageTV on a Vail VM if I'm already running SageTV on the Host just fine (I'd be running one or the other of course)?

[mmanville]

I have a general question about SageTV for WHS (any version). I am a prospective new user so forgive me if it turns out I am confused. On a thread in the hardware forum, someone is telling me that if you install your SageTV Media Server software on WHS, you can't actually watch TV or recordings on that box unless you do it by getting a placeshifter license and using that.

Is that true?

[sic0048]

Originally Posted by mmanville

I have a general question about SageTV for WHS (any version). I am a prospective new user so forgive me if it turns out I am confused. On a thread in the hardware forum, someone is telling me that if you install your SageTV Media Server software on WHS, you can't actually watch TV or recordings on that box unless you do it by getting a placeshifter license and using that.

Is that true?

I replied in the other thread, but I'll give a quick answer here too. WHS was never intended to allow users direct access to the desktop and OS like any other OS. It is also a stripped down version of Server 2003. It had many parts of the OS removed that dealt with media playback, etc since the user should never need it on the WHS machine.

Therefore SageTV for WHS does not officially support media playback on WHS. It isn't so much a limitation of SageTV, but rather WHS. So I doubt SageTV has removed any important sections of code in the WHS version, but it probably will not playback media without adding missing OS parts.

I do have WHS and I can RDP into my WHS machine and pull up the normal SageTV GUI (not the WHS console, but the real SageTV GUI). I'm not sure if it will playback media or not because it wouldn't really work over a RDP session anyway so I haven't tried it. But I can go in and do general maintenance, change settings, add tuners, etc all through the regular SageTV GUI.