Minimizing Performance Hit when Running Home Server Backup

I’ve always been annoyed by my home server backup. It always starts when I start the PC and then it eats a lot of resources. I often either postpone the backup or change its priority to low which more importantly reduces the IO priority to low as well.

But why not automate the latter?

And that is easy:

• Start Event Viewer
• Find HomeBackup event 768 in the Application log
• Right-click specifying attach task to event
• Follow the wizard, specify powershell.exe as program and ‘-noprofile c:\IdleBackupEngine.ps1’ as argument.
• At the end of the wizard, select to open properties afterwards and change the task to use SYSTEM with highest privileges enabled
• Finally, create c:\IdleBackupEngine.ps1. It only contains a single line: (gps backupengine).priorityclass="idle"

Have fun – working *during* the backup

DFS, IPv6 and – sort of – disabling it

Ask the Directory Services Team has a good article on troubleshooting DFS links (DFS Referrals and IPv6: Outta site!) as well as a discussion of how not to  disable IPv6 (unbinding it from an adapter) and how to do it correctly (KB929852).

In case you really need to disable IPv6, consider using a Group Policy Preference or automate it with PowerShell -

Set-ItemProperty HKLM:\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip6\Parameters DisabledComponents 0xffffffff -type dword

Useful information.

Master List of Windows 7 Keyboard Shortcut

A useful list of how to manage Windows 7 from the keyword. Win+number and Win+Shift+Left/Right are very cool.

Master List of Windows 7 Keyboard Shortcut | Windows 7 News

Windows Home Server Evaluation Kit

Before getting a real kit, I would like to test it first. But so far I have not been able to find it for download anywhere. The officiel free trial page only allows you to order the kit on a DVD - not download.

Today, I found the evaluation download on connect and even better an evaluation version of Windows Home Server Power Pack 1. Power Pack seems to be Home Server'ish for  Service Pack and some new features. You can get a prerelease version of the release notes from connect.

As soon as the download finishes, I will load it up in Hyper-V :)

Windows Home Server Transport Service problem

Suddenly I started receiving the following error message from my WHS "Windows Home Server Transport Service encountered a problem" when logging in to the machine and I get the option to Send an error report. This would happen 5-6 times before stopping.

Google didn't find any solutions (Neither did connect - I was also beta tester of WHS) so I thought that I very quickly would summarize it here. Looking in eventvwr revealed several problems but this one quickly got my attention -

Event Source: DCOM
Event ID: 10016
User: NT AUTHORITY\NETWORK SERVICE
Description: The application-specific permission settings do not grant Local Activation permission for the COM Server application with CLSID {BA126AD1-2166-11D1-B1D0-00805FC1270E} to the user NT AUTHORITY\NETWORK SERVICE SID (S-1-5-20). This security permission can be modified using the Component Services administrative tool.

Follow the help link for detailed explanations on how to change DCOM security.

Finding the CLSID in registry revealed it was the "Network Connection Manager Class" but I couldn't find it in DCOMCNFG. I then Googled again and found that it is listed as "netman" and I gave the Network Service Local Activation rights and rebooted. Problem fixed ;-)

It looks like this is also a known SBS 2003 problem and if you didn't know WHS is partly based on SBS 2003 (Which you can see in the Help and Support Center as it states it is running "Microsoft Small Business Server 2003"

Enable Power Management on WHS (and thereby also Windows Server 2003)

I am playing with my newest toy, Windows Home Server (WHS), and I must say that this is by far the niftiest "little" piece of home software I have had my hands on (I may review it later - but if you don't know it then download the trial version and install, find your add-ins here and especially look at the Webguide for Windows Home Server and the Avast Professional Family Pack, which includes a WHS add-in).

To save power and space I have setup a portable computer with an external harddrive and now I was surfing around to find out how power management works with WHS.

There where different more or less clever solutions from shutting down at midnight and then using a timer device to turn it on again to more advanced solutions, but by far the best solution I found is using the built-in features of Windows Server 2003 together with a portable computer (In my Case a Dell D830 with 3 GB RAM, Core 2 Duo and 160 GB 7200 RPM disks). 

These built-in features are explained and detailed in the whitepaper How to Enable Processor Power Management in Windows Server 2003 and applies of course to all server versions (I have used it before on my Shuttle that I use for Virtual Server labs with standard Windows Server 2003).

Another add-in I used was Marcel Nouwens free AutoExit 2008 for Windows Home Server that can do Wake-On-Lan (Perfect for my Shuttle) and handle remote shutdown, reboots, send messages or even open a Remote Desktop session) - so now I almost have my perfect home network / WHS solution running (I'm still awaiting a few add-ins so I can remotely stream MCE recorded TV (Should release in late January) and a add-in for total Desktop Management, I need my 802.11n to run better and the list continues endlessly ;-)