Sharing Made Easy

Windows Home Server comes with a pre-defined set of shared folders:  Photos, Music, Videos, Software and Public to enable families to share and access their favorite stuff from any PC in the house.  And after installing the Windows Home Server Connector software on each PC, a shortcut named "Shared Folders on Server" is added to the desktop of each of your PCs.

After installing my home server, I copied all of my photos and music from my PCs up to my home server.  It was a manual operation (i.e. "drag and drop"), but it gave me time to organize and clean up all of my media files.  Now I can access my photo collection from any PC in the house.  I gave myself "Read/Write" access to all of the shared folders, and everybody else in the house has "Read/Only" access.  I also changed the default location on Windows Media Player so as I rip a new music CD - it gets stored in the "Music" shared folder on my home server. 

Also, as I download new photos from my digital camera, they are now stored in the "Photos" folder on my home server.  I also took the time to peruse through my photo collection, and created a folder called "Favorites" and stored a copy of some of my favorite photos in this folder. I set the default screensaver to "Photos" on my wife's PC and changed the Settings ... to "Use pictures and videos from :"  \\SERVER\Photos\Favorites  So when her PC is not in use, it is shuffling through some of our favorite photos.

I have created a few of my own Shared Folders on my home server.  I have a folder called "Finance" that I use to store important financial documents and data and I created another folder called "Documents" that currently contains a random mish-mash of stuff that that I need to clean-up and organize.  I have Folder Duplication  enabled on my Shared folders so that there are 2 copies of my music, photos and other important stuff automatically stored on separate hard drives.

Comments

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  Great information, thanks again for sharing this with us! I'd definitely like to read more in the future on how WHS integrates with Vista's Media Centre and Extenders to help shuffle music and video around the home...

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  What about storing vista's public folders?  They are identical to your list.  Is an end user with a home server going to be faced with three "official" places to put a picture?  Pictures, Public Pictures (vista), and Public Pictures (WHS)? (I put this as a suggestion on connect somewhere)

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  Finally. I've been wondering for years why a product like Home Server wasn't available. It makes perfect sense! Can't wait to hook-up my 6+ PC homenetwork and start sharing things with the rest of my family in an easy way. Last year I visited the home of the future on the Redmond Campus. Looks like we're making a small step in that direction with Home Server. I wonder however how Home Server handles sharing and integration with Media Center en Media Center Extensions like XBOX 360. I'm anxious to find out!

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  How does MEDIA CENTER integrate into all this?

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003

1. it is possible with WPN. Just install Hamachi (VPN software) on every remote computer & in the WHS and you will be able to connect to your home server as if it was on the same local area network. I'm using it right now and it work nicely. The only problem is bandwidth and the fact that is the link is broken during the initial backup you have to start from scratch (it does not save the backup state). 3 & 4) been answered in the WHS forum : https://forums.microsoft.com/WindowsHomeServer/

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  Your Folder Duplication link above takes you to the edit post control panel, not to the post itself.

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  atomusk, please re-read my original post where I said: "I've been submitting bugs and feedback (using Connect) about how to make the product better" Everything I mentioned above has been submitted to Connect in one form or another, except perhaps part of #2. I'm simply using this blog as another way to have my voice heard. :-)