WHS backup reconfiguration wizard

While doing a a recent replacement of one of my data drives (swapping out a 1TB Seagate drive with a much cooler running Samsung 1.5TB) I came across a bit of a quirk with the Windows Home Server connector. It wasn’t hard to get around in my case, but for some people reading this post might save some time.

After booting, the connector informed me that the computer had a new hard drive, and I should update the backups. Fair enough. However it complained bitterly that it couldn’t locate the old drive:

The computer is not online or Windows Home Server cannot access the computer's hard drive. Please make sure the computer is powered on and connected to your home network.

Windows Home Server cannot access the hard drive as it’s sitting on my desk unplugged. You wouldn’t have thought this would be a deal breaker for reconfiguration of backups, but it is. The backup reconfiguration wizard ends. If you don’t have access to the drive (i.e. it’s dead) then it seems like your options involve uninstalling the connector software and thereby losing your past backups.

If you have the drive (as I did in my case – yay for my quick swappable external SATA enclosure) you simply need to reattach it and run the backup reconfiguration process. What I found a little bit strange, is that in this case WHS is aware that you’re choosing to no longer backup a drive which was previously being backed up, and asks if you’d like to discard or save the previous backups.

Sounds like this bug has been around for a while (since CTP judging by a couple of posts I found). So if you’re about to perform a planned replacement or removal of a drive, and want to keep your backups, then remember to run the reconfiguration wizard beforehand.

Tags: Windows Home Server

 Print | Posted on Saturday, September 05, 2009 2:25 PM |