Windows Home Server let me down

[Panama Red]

I did something stupid and corrupted the boot record on my Win7 64bit hdd. This is my main machine and has all my business spreadsheets and customer data stored on it. After several attempts to restore the MBR using MS info and others' experiences I found online, I decided to throw in the towel and just restore the image from my WHS. The last date of backup was the day before the corruption so I used that image to restore the hdd. However, the computer still wouldn't boot and it seems many others have experienced the same issue when restoring Win7 from WHS. Finally, I gave up on that path too. Saved all the files then on the hdd (the ones from the restore) and did a fresh install of Win7 64bit. Then loaded the saved docs and files. Turns out, none of the docs have been updated since the first WHS image was created in Oct of last year! I tried a different hdd and a different image date and came up with the same file dates. Now I have to rebuild all the files from my paper records. Major time consumption. Biggest headache will be the inventory records. I'll have to physcically count everything I have in stock and check my purchase records to get any accuracy.

I have a theory as to the cause of this debacle. Back in Oct 09, this machine was running on Vista. I pulled the Vista drive, added a new drive and loaded a fresh install of Win7 32 bit. Once the drive was complete as I wanted, I connected to the server and did a backup. I then reconnected the Vista drive as it had files I wanted to access. In Oct 10, I redid the Win7 drive as noted above and switched to 64bit. Again, the Vista drive was disconnected and once the new install was completed, I connected to WHS. The Vista drive was reconnected and backups have continued since that time without any reported issues. Now, I suspect one of two things. Either WHS saw the Vista os as the main os (both drives used the same computer name) and only backed up those changed files, ignoring the Win7 hdd, or WHS has an issue updating 64 bit systems.

If anyone else is running WHS and backing up a Win7 64bit system, I'd suggest you use a new hdd of the same size as your current one and do a restore with your current drive disconnected. I'm betting you won't be able to boot the restored drive but you will be able to access the files when connected to another pc. Take a look at files you know have been created or changed recently, like Word and Excel files, and see if they were updated correctly. Obviously, I'd be curious as to your results. More importantly, I hope your systems are being backed up correctly on WHS.

[EzyStvy]

Which operating systems are supported by Windows Home Server?
Windows 7 operating system (all editions)

Windows Vista operating system with Service Pack 2 (SP2) (including all 32-bit and 64-bit editions)

Windows XP operating system with Service Pack 3 (SP3) (including Tablet PC and Media Center editions)

In addition, home computers running earlier versions of Microsoft Windows, and computers running Apple MacOS 10.4 and higher, can easily connect to a home server over your home network to access files and media stored in the shared folders on the home server.



Is Windows Home Server compatible with Windows 7?
The current version of Windows Home Server is compatible with Windows 7, and the experience will be enhanced with Power Pack 3, which is now available through Windows Update.