Whilst over the past few days, we’ve seen a lot of new NAS hardware announced here at CES, the good news for Windows Home Server enthusiasts is that three new hardware partners will be releasing hardware for the platform in the first half of 2009. Let’s take a look at what’s coming:
Acer Aspire easyStore Home Server
The Acer Aspire easyStore Home Server will run on an Intel Atom 230 processor, with 1Gb of RAM on board and by the looks of things has 4 hot-swappable internal drive bays. 640Gb of storage is included along Anti-virus protection from McAfee Total Protection Service (free for first 6 months) is confirmed for the product and Acer also plan to include add-ins to enable easily copying data from external USB hard drives, a Power Saver Scheduler and a DLNA compliant media streaming server (likely to be TwonkyMedia Server, I guess).
Shuttle SH-4500 & SH-K4800 Home Server
Two models will be released – a basic, single drive 500Gb model (SH-4500)and an alternative 500Gb with hot swap capability. Both units have space for a second internal hard drive and can be expanded externally thanks to 4 USB 2.0 ports.
VIA NSD7800 Home Server
VIA Technologies will be releasing a mammoth 8 drive home server, making it the largest available on the market, providing up to 12Tb of storage for your home.
I’ll be working on getting a lot more information on these new home servers tomorrow here at CES, so keep an eye on the site. But it’s great to see new manufacturers supporting Windows Home Server which, along with the release of the new HP MediaSmart Server and upgrades planned for the Fujitsu-Siemens SCALEO Home Server mean that there’s going to be a very strong WHS line-up for 2009.
