AOXOMOXOA Posted June 14, 2017 Share Posted June 14, 2017 I am rebuilding my home server that crashed, My father has a subscription to MS Technet so I have access to any of the OS installs i want, My old server has been running for 12 years with Server 2003 SBS installed on it. with the new server i also want to upgrade the OS, what do you think would be better to use, Server 2012 or Server 2016 ? and should i even bother with server essentials? seems kind of hokey to me, and I am not going to be backing up each machine to the server. Thank you in advance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kvuivbribumok Posted June 14, 2017 Share Posted June 14, 2017 Kinda depends, what are you using your 'home server' for ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AOXOMOXOA Posted June 14, 2017 Author Share Posted June 14, 2017 Basically it will just be a file server, there will be 6 users. I wont be running active directory or any DC. just storing pictures, music, videos, and software. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jim K Global Moderator Posted June 14, 2017 Global Moderator Share Posted June 14, 2017 Just a suggestion ... what about FreeNAS? Much cheaper (as in free) and would meet your relatively low requirements. farmeunit and Xenon 2 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
farmeunit Posted June 14, 2017 Share Posted June 14, 2017 As Jim K said, or any other OS, really. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Circaflex Posted June 14, 2017 Share Posted June 14, 2017 Essentials would probably be the easiest method, I use that paired with stablebits drive pool to store my files. I dont do any auto backups or things like that either. Just a fair warning, Freenas has somewhat of a learning curve for the initial setup and unless things have changed, adding new drives into the pool is not doable (this might have changed recently, but when I ran freenas a few years ago it was still an "issue" imo). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AOXOMOXOA Posted June 14, 2017 Author Share Posted June 14, 2017 Thanks for the suggestion for FreeNas, I have also looked at that. as I stated cost isn't the issue because i already have both versions of server, And I am moving the box over from server 2003. basically already have the data drives as raid. SO I'm just upgrading the OS with the new hardware. Is there any real benefit in going to server 2016 from 2012 r2? also I have just read about the "Windows Storage Server 2012 R2 Essentials" another complete OS? I dont know what the point is when your just basically setting up shared drives, public and personal folders with rights. why would you want Windows Storage Server 2012 R2 Essentials over just the standard Windows Server 2012 R2? sorry for all the questions, and thank you for all of the reply's. My last server 2003 ran solid for 11 years, When i re do it I plan on the same kind of lifespan. I don't want to have to re do it because of some feature that I wish I had. If that makes any sense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Circaflex Posted June 14, 2017 Share Posted June 14, 2017 9 minutes ago, AOXOMOXOA said: why would you want Windows Storage Server 2012 R2 Essentials over just the standard Windows Server 2012 R2? The initial setup was a little easier IMO, but both will do the same thing. You can think of essentials more like the old Home Server where there would be prompts to setup users, what folders to share, etc. Im not sure what storage server offers, I run the plain 2012r2 essential server on my box. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AOXOMOXOA Posted June 14, 2017 Author Share Posted June 14, 2017 i think i'm leaning to Windows Server 2012 R2 I don't need nor want all the essentials stuff, I had windows home server running for a while and i never used it over my 2003 server already in place so i disconnected it. thank you all for your input. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kvuivbribumok Posted June 16, 2017 Share Posted June 16, 2017 Do you plan on using RAID or are you using external backups ? I know RAID isn't really a backup mechanism but at least it saves you in case of single drive failure. Personally I use an Ubuntu server for my files and use a RAID 5 config using a flashed Dell H200 to run in IT/HBA mode. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+BudMan MVC Posted June 16, 2017 MVC Share Posted June 16, 2017 "My last server 2003 ran solid for 11 years" Wow, you know you should of updated NO Later than back in Jul of 2015, before that really that was EOL date.. Also I don't really care but technet is not for "production" use - using something for multiple years and users for your file storage is sure not "testing" or development of it Freenas should be fine for you.. Do what you want with raid, freenas support ZFS file system as well - which is all the rage and all the kiddies jumping on it https://freenas.org/zfs/ Circaflex 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AOXOMOXOA Posted June 16, 2017 Author Share Posted June 16, 2017 2 hours ago, BudMan said: "My last server 2003 ran solid for 11 years" Wow, you know you should of updated NO Later than back in Jul of 2015, before that really that was EOL date.. Also I don't really care but technet is not for "production" use - using something for multiple years and users for your file storage is sure not "testing" or development of it Freenas should be fine for you.. Do what you want with raid, freenas support ZFS file system as well - which is all the rage and all the kiddies jumping on it https://freenas.org/zfs/ I just like using server and i'm familiar with raid as I'm an old school tech for over 24 years. And if my father isn't going to install the software. I will. I don't really like the FreeNAS as I'm not that familiar with it and I just want to get this machine back up and running so i can get on with my life. I'm not the kind of person that gets excited about this crap. I just want to get it up and working and not look back. I don't want to have to learn something new and get all involved. But thank you for your advice, its always rock solid Budman. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AOXOMOXOA Posted June 16, 2017 Author Share Posted June 16, 2017 That ZFS filesystem does sound interesting though, maybe i will play with it. I have to do something while im waiting for the new hardware. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AOXOMOXOA Posted June 17, 2017 Author Share Posted June 17, 2017 Well compared to windows server FreeNAS is like reading Chinese. it might have some cool features but I cant for the life of me firgure it out. and the instructions on Youtube are for an older version Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Circaflex Posted June 17, 2017 Share Posted June 17, 2017 (edited) 18 minutes ago, AOXOMOXOA said: Well compared to windows server FreeNAS is like reading Chinese. it might have some cool features but I cant for the life of me firgure it out. and the instructions on Youtube are for an older version I mentioned in your other thread, FreeNAS is great but there is a slight learning curve with the initial setup. It really sounds like a plain old windows box should get the job done. edit actually it was this thread. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AOXOMOXOA Posted June 17, 2017 Author Share Posted June 17, 2017 (edited) yes you did, and you were right. I managed to get it installed and got two drives in a raid 1 ZFS array, but making windows shares, and all this other stuff is nuts, the videos on line are for a completely different version and assume that you already know all of their buzz words. I will be going with windows server, but i didn't to completely ignore this option and i wanted to play around with it. it is pretty confusing to me. I am sort of figuring it out. made a share and a user to connect. I think its more complicated than it needs to be. may use it for another redundant backup something. I don't know, time will tell. Edited June 17, 2017 by AOXOMOXOA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AOXOMOXOA Posted June 23, 2017 Author Share Posted June 23, 2017 I got the new MSI board set up raid 1 and now have my MS 2012 server running perfectly. it all went together perfectly once i got a capable board that did what I needed. all is good in my world again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
conna Posted October 27, 2017 Share Posted October 27, 2017 I would have gone with server 2016. Also, the essentials vs standard server is a license issue. You will need CAL's with standard server. Essentials comes with 25 users / 50 devices with no need of CAL's. Essentials is mostly wizard driven and super easy to admin. Like, non IT easy. That being said you can still load the essentials components with the standard server. Storage Spaces is great feature to explore. goretsky 1 Share Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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