I was looking for an affordable server solution that would be easy to setup and use, would centralize all the media files scattered across our home network, and would have massive amounts of storage to centrally backup all our PCs, which constantly outgrow local external backup drives attached to them. With the rave reviews in this thread, the EX485 seemed like a safe bet.
Unfortunately, on one essential count, the server did not deliver: It failed to restore an image of my desktop PC to that machine after I had upgraded its hard drives (i. e., reinstall the PC 1:1 as it had been). I started the desktop from the recovery CD provided with the MediaSmart server and picked the backup to be restored. The software went through the restore for several hours, until at the very end, it broke off and delivered an error message: “Unable to refresh RestoreWizard from your server, your server may be an older version of Windows Home Server than this CD or your server may be damaged, we will attempt a restore with an older version.”
This second run and several attempts after with different settings failed as well. Calls to HP’s support (impeccably friendly, patient and helpful) failed to come up with a solution as well. So did (so far) inquiries on Microsoft’s home media server board, in HP’s forums and on “We got served”. A quick Web search showed that this error seems to be very rare.
Still, it has happened to me, so the bottom line is, I have a backup server that does not restore. I now have to restore the PC manually, which of course will take the better part of a day.
Other than that, the product is easily the best there is out there. It is not as easy to set up and use as you might think, but it is a whole lot better than, e.g., Netgear’s ReadyNAS Duo, which is what I had used previously. Nevertheless, this is not a consumer product, and you will need a modicum of PC and network literacy to use it.
When I set up the server — which must be done from a PC, it doesn’t work from a Mac — it seemed to get stuck at 16%. Turned out the server downloaded updates from the Internet, but since it does not tell you that, and since it does not show you any indication of progress, it may easily seem that the installation hung itself up. Eventually, it continued.
Setting up media collecting from the network PCs was very easy, but after I was done, I noticed the server did not copy and media files from the existing PCs in the network. I had to call HP support to find out that both the server software and the client on the desktop need to be the same version, which was not the case for me. The software does not check automatically whether the versions are the same. After I had updated the desktop client, everything went fine.
The initial media collection, i.e., copying music, pictures and videos from the network PCs onto the server took a long time (almost a day). I assume this was because I kept working on the desktop from which most of the media files had to be copied, and the server software throttled the download speed to not slow down the apps I worked with. (This is actually a good thing, I had other background solutions for backups e.g. that slowed down the desktop so severely I had to uninstall them.) The copy was only partly completed when I went to bed, but the next morning it was done.
Once you are done with that initial copy, you also need to manually activate media sharing, which is in a different part of the console. There is no automatic prompt to do so.
Setting up backups was even simpler than the media sharing. Add the PC from a menu, “OK” the default settings, and you are good to go. Activating remote access was also straightforward.
One con is that the server comes with a trial version for McAffee anti-virus, and every client that runs the the server client software comes up with a reminder prompt to activate McAffee every time you startup that PC. Annoying bloatware. There is a note on how to get rid of it in one of the other reviews.
Adding more hard drive storage (I added 3 Terabyte) was as easy as opening the server door, opening the drive bay, sliding in the drive, closing bay and door, and adding the storage to the server’s storage space in the server console.
All in all, media sharing works great, but on my desktop, restores work only for single files, but not for images (= 1:1 copies) of the desktop.
Bottom line: If the backup works for you, which it most likely will, this is a great product. It looks really, really cool, too, and is so quiet you can put it into your living room if you want to. Purchase the EX485 instead of the EX487, which is $100 more expensive but only adds storage that you can easily add yourself, and cheaper.
I was just talking with my friend about this the other day at dinner . Don’t know how we got on the subject really, they brought it up. I do remember eating a amazing steak salad with cranberries on it. I digress…