Microsoft have released a publically downloadable RC of PowerPack 1 for Windows Home Server.

You can grab it right now from the link at the end of this blog post.

Windows Power Pack one is stuffed full of cool features and enhancements heavily influenced by community requests and feedback.

PowerPack 1 also fixes the 'corruption bug' in Windows Home Server which affected a small set of Windows Home Server users saving to Windows Home Servers with multiple drive configurations.

This public release candidate follows the Windows Home Server teams die hard approach to taking customer feedback very seriously and the team looks forward to any and all feedback from the community regarding this release candidate.


Amongst the features included in the release are:

• The ability to run Home Server Connector on x64 Vista.
• Backup of the home server Shared Folders.
• Remote Access improvements.
• Improved Power Consumption.
• Support for Chinese and Japanese Languages.

I personally have been running PP1 for a while now and I can honestly say I love it. I have had basically no issues at all. I've never experienced the corruption bug with PP1 and I run 12 drives on my WHS and save from many applications directly onto the shares. Performance has also never been better. I saw a nice CPU drop on my WHS with PP1 and haven't seen any errors in my event log for a long time :)

I think the WHS Team should be very proud of this release. It very much follows the quality of the original product. I think we've got some amazing things still to come from this team, and if the quality of PP1 is anything to go by, I think we're all going to be very happy.

Download WHS PowerPack 1 Release Candidate from Microsoft Connect

Read more details on the Windows Home Server Team Blog

PROCESSOR - Core™2 Q6600 Quad-Core (8MB L2 cache,2.4GHz,1066FSB)
OPERATING SYSTEM - Windows Vista® Home Premium with Digital Cable Support
MEMORY - 4GB Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 667MHz - 4 DIMMs
HARD DRIVE - 500GB - 7200RPM, SATA 3.0Gb/s, 16MB Cache
OPTICAL DRIVE - 16X CD/DVD burner (DVD+/-RW) w/double layer write capability
MONITORS - 20 inch E207WFP Widescreen Digital Flat Panel
VIDEO CARD - ATI Radeon HD 2400 PRO 128MB
SOUND CARD - Integrated 7.1 Channel Audio
WI-FI AND MODEM - 56K PCI Data Fax Modem

 Check out the best part, add a Dual ATI OCUR tuner and change the graphics card to a Radeon HD3650 and you've got yourself a kick ass Media Center box with Dual Digital tuners for : $1527!!!

Be quick though, this ends today!

Click here to get the deal! - MARCH 29TH ONLY

Here I present my top 5 things you can do using your Vista Media Center PC.

Enjoy! I hope you like this one guys!, Let me know what you think on the forums. Take it easy!