Home networks tend to start out small, with most of us content to use the connectivity a Lan provides to share internet access and perhaps the odd file or two between PCs. However, there can come a time when that’s not enough, at which point you’ll probably have to think about adding a file server. But is that a wise move? What exactly has a file server got to offer; what’s involved in setting one up; how much will it cost; and is it worth the hassle?

In this introductory feature, we’ll explain how moving to a server-based system can bring great benefits to your home computing environment. We’ll look at the various options available in terms of both hardware and software, and offer some real examples that can put everything in context.

If you‘re new to networking, you might find some of our previous Hands On features of use. You might also like to refer to our 2007 feature on the basics of home networking.

What a server does
A server is a general-purpose computer that can be used for a variety of tasks, but on a home network one of the most common is file sharing. “That’s no big deal,” we hear you cry. “I can do that already using the peer-to-peer sharing built into Windows.” True enough, and in essence it’s the same technology, but there are differences when a server is involved.

To start with, a server is a single common resource, so you don’t have to remember which PC holds which files - they’re all located in one place. A server will also usually be available all the time and not switched off like a desktop or, worse still, carried around like a notebook.

Backup becomes easier to handle, again because all your data is located in one place, as does security with far less management involved when it comes to controlling who can see and do what, screening for viruses and spam and so on.

File sharing isn’t the only thing you can do with a server; it also provides a convenient platform for a variety of useful shared applications able to take advantage of its always-on status. One example is using web server to host a family website or an SQL database, now a common prerequisite for a variety of applications - from home accounting to contact management.

You might also use your server to run media-streaming software to deliver music and videos out to network players around the house, or host an email server to pick up your family’s mail.

But don’t get carried away. File sharing is all that most home users look for, possibly with facilities to back up client PCs to the shared storage. Some may find it useful to add a local web server later on and perhaps try out media streaming, but don’t assume you’ll need to buy more servers - one system should be enough to handle all these and other tasks, assuming, of course, it’s configured properly.

Desktop or server?
So, you’re still interested in getting a server, in which case the next question you’re likely to ask is, “Can I use an old PC?” The answer is, “Yes you can”, although there may be reasons that’s not a good idea. We’ll discuss this in greater detail later in this feature.

In many respects, a server isn’t very different from a desktop PC. It has much the same kind of processor, supported by similar memory and disk storage. A server also runs an operating system, often a variant of Windows which, in turn, can host applications. As such, it’s entirely feasible to re-purpose an old desktop PC, or even a notebook, for use as a server on a home network.

You can even get away with using whatever version of Windows is installed on that PC. You may need to tweak it somewhat, but it is possible although, again, there are reasons for choosing something more meaty, about which more shortly.

Server tweaks
For now, let’s assume you’re on a tight budget and want to use an old Windows XP desktop as a server. Anything earlier than that, such as Windows 98, and you may as well forget it, as it won’t be up to the job, but XP can be used. After all, it has file and printer sharing built in as standard, along with tools to authenticate users and control who has access to what.

You can even install a copy of IIS (Internet Information Services) and use an XP system to host a web server, as well as run a variety of applications, such as email and database servers.

There are, however, a number of limitations to bear in mind. As it stands, XP can’t be used to host a Windows domain, which means sticking with workgroup networking. This is not a major concern for most home networks with just a handful of users to worry about. But the way in which XP shares files is, and here you may have to make a few changes, starting with the way shared disks are formatted.

NTFS needs to be used here rather than relying on a Fat file system, otherwise you’ll find that you can’t limit access to particular files and folders on the server. Similarly, it’s important to disable the simple file-sharing (SFS) technology provided in XP, as this causes Windows to authenticate remote users as guests rather than individually, making it difficult to manage access.

Unfortunately, simple file sharing is all you get with Windows XP Home, so you’re better off avoiding the Home edition altogether. It can be turned off on the Professional edition (you’ll find it under My Computer/Folder Options - see screen left, after which XP will authenticate remote users using their login name and password, and enforce the access rights associated with those credentials.

You just have to make sure there’s an account on the XP server to match every name and password used to log on at the client PC.

Why not?
Among the reasons you shouldn’t use a desktop PC as a server is the strict limit on the number of network sessions that can be supported. With Windows XP it’s fixed at 10, with a miserly five available if you’re using XP Home - another good reason for avoiding the Home software.

On a small network this may not be an issue, but it’s surprising how quickly you run into this kind of restriction. Desktop versions of Windows are tuned to support a single user sitting in front of the screen at all times and, as such, don’t perform well when sharing files and printers or running shared applications for remote users.

If you’re really serious about your server, you’ll need something better suited to the task. Assuming you’ve decided against Windows XP, the most obvious alternative would be Windows Server as it is a capable and familiar product, but it’s not cheap.

A copy of the Standard Edition of Windows Server 2003 R2 licensed for just five users, for example, is likely to set you back £350 or more, depending on where you buy it. That’s a lot of money for a home server, especially when you realise that all you really get is file and print sharing and a web server.

Anything extra, such as an email or database server, will have to be sourced and installed separately, and may add significantly to the overall cost.

You could go for the Small Business Server package, which includes Exchange Server, but at around £400 that’s not cheap either and still isn’t a complete solution. Windows Server in all its guises is really aimed at business rather than home users, takes a lot of management and is best avoided. Having said that, there is a version of Windows that is suitable for home use - Microsoft’s Windows Home Server (WHS).

As you like it
Based on Windows Server 2003 R2, WHS is heavily customised to make it both easier to manage and provide the kind of features that home rather than business users want. For example, it makes it easy to share files and access them whether on the home network or connecting remotely over the internet.

Adding extra disks is also easy, whether using internal drives or external USB disks. Plus it lets you make backups of client PCs to shared storage, with a built-in scheduler to help automate the process. That may not sound like a whole lot, but it covers most of the home use bases.

Extra functionality can be added by way of add-ins. For example, you can enhance the media-streaming capabilities of WHS, run your own email server, protect your network against viruses and spam and so on. There’s a growing collection of add-ins available from commercial developers and as freeware or shareware.

WHS itself can be purchased in two ways, the easiest being as part of a ready-made hardware solution from companies including Fujitsu-Siemens and HP, both of which sell home server products starting at around £400. Alternatively, you can buy the software by itself for just £90 for a 10-user licence and install it on hardware of your own (see box on Windows Home Server).

And so to Linux
Windows, of course, isn’t the only operating system, and it’s not at all uncommon for home servers to run Linux instead. The advantages are pretty obvious, with price being one of the key drivers, although you do need to be careful.

Licences for business-oriented distros from Red Hat and Novell (Suse Enterprise), for example, require you to pay for support, which means you could end up paying almost as much as you would for Windows. However, most of the others can be downloaded and installed for free, and on as many servers as you want.

All you have to pay for is the download time and the cost of any media you put the software onto. If you’ve bought the DVD edition of PCW, you won’t even need this, as you’ll find our monthly selection of the latest releases included on the 8GB disc.

Popular distros to consider for home use include Ubuntu, Mandriva Linux, Fedora Core and Opensuse. All are freely available and, unlike Windows, come with a host of bundled applications to enable you to put together a complete server capable of doing a lot more than just share files and printers.

A virtual finish
Finally, if you’ve investigated the world of server-based networks, you might wonder how the much talked about idea of server virtualisation fits into the home server equation. The answer is that, for most users, it doesn’t.

There are several virtualisation technologies available but, in essence, all do much the same job, which is to let you run several virtual servers on one physical machine.

Benefits include being able to consolidate several servers onto one platform, which is great if you’re a large corporate, but it is something very few home users ever need to do. Virtualisation also makes better use of the processor and other hardware resources but, again, that’s not something home users are likely to lose sleep over.

It could be of use, for example, where you’d like to run a particular server application that’s only available for an operating system other than the one you’re using. Install one of the free server virtualisation tools, such as VMWare Server, or Windows Virtual Server 2005 R2 and that’s fairly easy to do.

But there are costs involved as you still need to install and license the guest operating systems. Despite being relatively straightforward, server virtualisation is an extra level of complexity that anyone thinking of deploying a home server could well do without.

Windows Home Server
A ready-made Windows Home Server is easy to deploy, but the DIY approach is also worth considering as the PC involved doesn’t have to be highly specified and you can easily re-purpose an old PC.

We opted for a Dell Dimension 5000 with 3.2GHz Pentium 4, but equivalent AMD-based hardware can also be used. You’ll need at least 512MB of memory (ours had 1GB) and a 70GB hard disk or bigger (serial ATA is best here, but parallel ATA is fine), with other advantages if you provide two or more disks. USB2 support is needed if you want to connect external disk drives. A DVD drive is another prerequisite plus, of course, a network interface.

A keyboard, mouse, graphics card and monitor are needed for installation, but these can be discarded later and the home server managed remotely.

We installed the software in about 20 minutes. It’s not difficult and is well within the scope of anyone used to installing desktop versions of Windows. The only thing to watch out for, especially on an older PC, is the need to find and install compatible drivers for any network, storage and other interfaces that aren’t configured automatically during the setup process.

Once the server has been installed you also need to install the Home Server Connector onto the client PC (XP and Vista 32-bit and 64-bit versions are both supported in the latest Powerpack service pack for Windows Home Server (WHS), either from the CD provided or from a network share on the newly installed server.

Either way you can access the server and take client backups of any PC with the Connector installed, as well as run the management console and further configure how the software behaves.

Shared storage is what Home Server is all about and a key feature is the ability to treat that storage as one big resource using a technology called Drive Extender, which makes it easy to add extra disks.

For example, we plugged an 80GB external USB disk into our server, then, using the wizard provided, added it to the available storage pool, making it immediately available to network users.

With more than one disk we were also able to replicate folders across disks to protect against individual drive failures. The copies take up space, but tha t seems a small price to pay, and replication is all handled in the background, so there is no real impact on server activity.

Managing a Linux server
The fact that it’s not Windows doesn’t mean you can’t use Linux on a home server as most distros include a variety of open-source tools, such as Samba, that let you share files and printers using the same SMB (Server Message Block) protocol as used by the Microsoft operating system.

Hardware requirements are modest, too, and we had no problems putting our ageing Dell Dimension 5000 desktop with its Pentium 4 processor to work hosting a number of Linux implementations. We were able to configure useful add-on applications, including an Apache Web server and MySQL database, which come bundled with virtually all of the Linux distros as standard.

It’s not all plain sailing, however, with a number of caveats to bear in mind when going down the Linux server path, such as looking for dedicated server distros rather than trying to use a desktop version (not all distros have this option). It’s also a good idea to opt for any extra applications you want when installing the operating system as adding them later can be a lot more difficult.

Understand too that, although they have the same aims, Linux and Windows are quite different and it can take a while to get to grips with the way things are managed. Graphical interfaces are now commonplace, but there will still be times when the only option is to manually edit a configuration file. That’s not a difficult task in itself, but there’s no single repository for such files, and file names and locations can vary depending on the distro involved.

For example, in Mandriva Linux there’s a graphical tool and a wizard to configure Samba file sharing. In Ubuntu Linux, however, you have to edit the underlying smb.conf file to change most of the settings and manage the file-sharing setup. Similarly, some distros have custom tools to manage add-on applications such as Apache and MySQL, while others rely on configuration files.

If you’re having problems working out how to get something to work, check the support forums for the distro involved as you’ll often find answers there. Also, check if there are any add-on tools to help. A good example is Webmin, which can be used to manage a variety of Linux applications, including Samba, from a browser console, providing a single graphical tool that can simplify things.

Find the best home server hardware
The majority of ‘proper’ servers will be designed for business use, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be used on a home network. If you do bring that old server home from work it’s likely to be much more highly configured than is really necessary, not to mention big, noisy and expensive to run. Here are our recommendations for the perfect home server hardware.

Look for a computer with a small tower case - small enough to tuck away out of sight, but big enough to accommodate extra hard disks should the need arise. A quiet fan is another must-have, especially if you’re going to keep the server in a habitable room, as is low-power consumption as it’s likely to be on all the time.

There’s no need for a Xeon or other server processor, especially if you’re only going to share files, as this task requires very little processing power. A fast desktop-class processor is fine, although if you intend running applications on the server a dual- or quad-core chip may be advisable.

Likewise, you won’t need much memory for file and print sharing - 512MB ought to be enough - but extra Ram doesn’t cost much and you’ll definitely need more to host applications. Don’t bother with ECC (Error Checking and Correction) or any other fancy server memory options - you won’t need them.

In terms of storage, serial ATA (Sata) disks are your best bet, capable of delivering enough capacity and speed to handle the needs of the home user at an affordable price. The latest 1TB disks are very attractive, but try to avoid relying on just one. A Raid setup might sound tempting, but it can be expensive and overkill as far as a home server is concerned.

Indeed, if you’re going to run Windows Home Server, Raid is positively frowned upon, the Microsoft software taking care of data redundancy and backup in other ways.
USB2 or eSata (external Sata) ports will let you add external disks, both to expand storage and take backups, and if installing software yourself you will need a CD/DVD drive.

A Gigabit Ethernet network interface or two will be needed (wired, not wireless), but go for a modest monitor and you’ll only need a screen, keyboard and mouse to start with as most servers can be run ‘headless’ and managed remotely.

Alternatives for sharing files
If you only want to share files, a traditional server may not be your cheapest or best option. Indeed, if starting from scratch you can save both money and aggro by opting instead for a Nas (network-attached storage) appliance.

In effect a ready-made server, most Nas appliances will run a variant of Linux configured expressly to share files over a Lan. All you have to do is plug the box provided into a network port and switch it on.

As far as your Windows desktop and notebook clients are concerned, the appliance looks and behaves like an ordinary server, advertising network shares that can be browsed, accessed and mapped to local drive letters as normal. Most can also be used by Apple Mac and Linux PCs, with bundled software to back up your client PCs another common option.

Very little setup or day-to-day management is needed, with everything done via a browser and little or no technical knowledge required. The hardest part is deciding what to buy, as storage appliances come in vast array of shapes and sizes.

The cheapest are single-disk devices such as the Buffalo Link Station Pro (starting at around £117 for 250GB). These are ideal for home users looking to share photos, music files and so on, with larger capacity models, up to 1TB or more, available for those wanting to share movie downloads and other large files.

However, as you move up the scale you might want to consider a dual-drive appliance, such as Netgear’s Readynas Duo (from £220 for 500GB), as these can be configured to continually back up your data to a second disk to protect against hardware failure.

If it’s the ultimate in capacity and availability you’re after, you might want to consider a multi-disk appliance, such as the Synology DS-508 (starting at around £600, not including disks) capable of delivering several terabytes of Raid-protected storage.

If you want to build your own Nas enclosures, such as the Lindy Dual HDD Nas, it will cost you less than £100 and can house two disks to give up to 1TB of storage.

Many of these appliances also offer additional functionality beyond simple file sharing, such as built-in UPnP media servers to stream music, photos and movies to network media players, for example, and a web server to host an intranet website for even simpler file sharing.

There are even some with built-in Bittorrent P2P (peer-to-peer) clients. No matter what the specification, everything will be built in, ready to use with no licensing issues to worry about.

Of course there are drawbacks. One ‘gotcha’ is that network shares don’t have a Windows recycle bin, and so you can’t recover a deleted file unless the Nas firmware provides its own undelete utility, or you have a backup to restore it from. And adding space may not be easy and you probably won’t be able to run your own applications, but for most of us those aren’t major issues and a Nas appliance will do quite nicely.