The Microsoft Windows Home Server is an easy to use, set and forget appliance for homes or small businesses of ten or less people.

Unbox it and plug it into your home or office network.  This is designed to sit in a corner and operate silently without a keyboard, mouse, or monitor.  A keyboard, mouse, and monitor will be needed only in the initial configuration, so you can borrow these off of another PC.  Afterwards configure each PC (or notebook) that you would like to backup and/or have remote access to.  Then each night it will automatically wake up your computers and back them up over the network onto the home server.

When you're away and you want to access documents, photos, music, videos, or recorded TV, you can log in over the Internet from another PC or potentially a smartphone to access those files.  If you need direct access to a computer, you can go right in and access your actual PC's Windows Desktop with all of your e-mail, doc's, and programs – provided that the PC is using a Business or Professional or Ultimate version of Windows XP, Vista, or Windows 7.  If you need that with a PC with a Home Edition of Windows then that PC can be upgraded to gain this capability with the server.

Now with Windows 7 with a Media Center PC you can consolidate all of your recorded TV onto your home server to save space on your Media Center PC.  Then you watch shows over your network, which you can also do from any other capable PC in your home (recorded shows, not live TV).  A Windows 7 HomeGroup in a Windows 7 household along with the new Libraries technology makes file sharing and management easier than ever.  The Windows Home Server ties it together with one place to backup everything that needs backing up, and easy no-fee remote access to the PCs on your network.  There's no need to write down IP addresses or pay for a static IP address with your ISP.  All you'll need to know is YourAccountName dot HomeServer dot com.  You can even create guest accounts to share media with friends and family through the Internet.

The Microsoft backup technology is advanced.  You can create a CD-R to boot from and recover a crashed hard drive onto a brand new one.  This makes this device an excellent insurance policy for aging machines – a great investment for that small office.

• Microsoft Windows Home Server 2011 - secure, reliable, time-tested technology based on Windows Server 2008 R2 64-bit
• The server automatically keeps up to date with Windows Update
• Intel Celeron Dual Core processor
• 2 GigaBytes of DDR3 RAM operates better than other systems with only 1GB
• Gigabit Networking for fast throughput on a wired network
• Includes Two 2 TeraByte Hard Drives for Storage
• Approximately 4 TeraBytes of space for storing all of your media and backing up several PC's, or approximately 2 TeraBytes with a secondary backup.