I have finished building the second version of my Windows Home Server. The first generation did suffer from a hard disk failure because, I'm guessing, the case does not provide enough airflow. Also, WHS seems to always have a good reason to spin the drives, so they where quite hot all the time.

I've changed the motherboard to an Intel one. The main reason was to have 4 SATA ports. I've build a 2 TB storage array by recycling an old Medea case. I've mounted a 12 cm fan in front of the case to ensure a good airflow around the disks. The arrays is built using 2x500GB Western Digital disks and 2x500GB Samsung disks. The Western Digital disks are running 5°C hoter than the Samsung's.

I've been part of the WHS SP1 Beta testers and I'm now able to backup my main desktop running Vista 64 bits, thanks to the new WHS console.

I've also changed the default Power Options of the WHS box to "Server Balanced Processor Power and Performance." This allows the disks to spin down when not in use.

I must say I'm quite pleased with the end result.

Here are some pictures: