Acer takes on HP in home servers

(Credit: Acer)

Acer plans to unveil its first home server for the U.S. market on Thursday, called the Acer Aspire easyStore Home Server.

The server is intended for home use as well as small businesses that have a need for networking multiple PCs. The easyStore will run Microsoft Windows Home Server. It enables users to access files, including photos, videos, and documents on any other computer connected to the network, and creates an image-based backup of each PC daily.

The home sever is an 8x7x7 inch shiny black box, powered by Intel's Atom processor 230 and 2GB of DDR2 memory. There is a 1TB hard drive as well as three bays for swappable hard drives. Together, the easyStore can hold up to 7TB of data. There are also five USB ports, one eSATA port, and a Gigabit Ethernet port. The total price is $399.

Acer follows HP into the consumer home server market. Palo Alto, Calif.-based HP recently refreshed its MediaSmart server, and Acer's server has very similar specifications, including running Windows Home Server.

Microsoft announced its Windows Home Server product at the 2007 Consumer Electronics Show, but has struggled to get strong backing from big-name computer makers other than HP. It also had to grapple with a well-publicized glitch that could lead to data loss under certain circumstances. It fixed that issue and added additional features with a"Power Pack 1" update last July.

Home servers in general have been a tough sell. Microsoft resorted to a mock children's book last year to explain why such a device is necessary in a home.

But Acer is diving in. This is part of Acer's effort to expand its market share by offering more products besides Netbooks, notebooks, and desktops in the U.S. Acer already sells the third most computers in the world after HP and Dell, and much of that is due to its success with low-cost laptop sales, and its acquisition of Gateway in 2007. Earlier this year the Taiwanese company also dipped its toe in the smartphone waters.

[RitoMan]

Nice, I'd hit it!!!

[dcdrew10]

My first question is if it is Apple compatible. The great advantage of the HP series is they are Time Machine friendly. I also wonder what is available as add ins (iTunes server, UPnP for PS3/XBOX, print server, etc). The price is certainly lower than the HP, $100 less for more space and lower power consumption.

[viper396]

Mac's cannot use some of the features, such as the client backup and recovery, but I imagine the basic file sharing and remote access features should work on any Mac with web access.

[dcdrew10]

That is a damn shame because its a nice looking box and has a bit more memory that the HP, but I guess you have to pay that Apple Premium for everything. Not complaining too much, because I love my Macs. It also helps me temper my desire to buy everything under the sun.

[Remo_Williams]

You know what would be better than the home server? The home server with a built-in router, so I can just install one device into the outlet.

[jamesburns00]

I have acer laptop and i not satisfied with that , let's see the Acer server

[SarahHappy]

Any idea what the power usage is on that device when it is sitting idle?

[shootfirst]

Ya imaging is a good idea... I would rather have the data backed up than imaged as imaging does not work great if you image it to different hardware. Also images will have the same inherent flaws that get stored on your computer. Most machines come with reinstallation media or partitions, use these and not images along with copying over backups of your data. Also what verifies that these images were pulled correctly as well, you usually don't know till you cast it back and most users don't have a spare machine with similar hardware to cast it on to test if it worked.

[NWLB]

Interesting, but I haven't wanted one of these since Sun destroyed the Cobalt series of home web servers.

Take an older PC, bolt on as many drives, external and otherwise, and you'll be happier. These little serverlet things are just not powerful enough for geeks, and too technical for non-geeks.

[Squashman2]

viper296, I asked about this during beta testing. I was out at Microsoft a few years ago and we asked about a simple proxy integration, where it would also help control Internet content. They certainly listened to us but they said it wasn't possible in the first release. Maybe in a release down the life cycle.

[nova1313]

What I'd really like to see is tests of multiple computers streaming files and the data throughput rates.

[johnrhoward]

Brilliant. Just what we need to manage and organize our docs, software, photos and videos!!!

The one touch download and sort is great for the wife and web access to photos is fantastic for grandma!

Does anyone know when it might be available in the UK?