As far as operating systems go, I can be pretty conservative with respect to what operating system I chose to have at home as a network server, currently a second generation ML 150 server by Hewlett Packard with dual Xeon 3Ghz (not dual core, but dual socket, with hyperthreading) and sadly only 1GB of RAM right now, but soon to change.  My x64 install on this hardware has performed well over the past almost four years, as well as the hardware, so I've stalled long enough the upgrade process. Plus there is also the motivation, after living with Windows Server 2008 on the laptop (still happy with the albiet small Samsung 128GB SSD), to have operating system uniformity, which is much easier for those family evening support calls ( 🙂 ).

And no, in case you are wondering, why don’t I just move the x64 install onto VM…well, that would be a great if VMware actually recognised Adaptec HostRAID (which has been very reliable for everything else, mind you) - but sadly it doesn't, since it's not a full-on RAID card, but a HostRAID only. 

To prepare for the new setup of Windows 2008 server standard on this critical machine, I’ve picked up four new hard drives.  Two Seagate Cheetah 73GB 15krpm SCSIs for the operating system, swap, and program files with two SAS 2TB Seagate Barracudas for all personal and business data space, plus much will be used for keeping some serious backup space for the Dell XPS M1530 and phone (Nokia E75 - loving the MicroSD space, use video frequently, and a bomb-proof mobile OS, although a little dated).   We always end up hoarding so much data from traveling (especially photos and videos from the Canon G9 - e.g. just got back from a day trip to Chicago see photo below), thus it is not very hard to imagine where it all ends up getting used!

Now I cannot wait to get the whole Server 2008 install finished, just hope all the 64-bit drivers work out 🙂 Updates to follow as the hiccups arrive! 

1 -- timeout errors on the SCSI device, despite connecting the drives from the termination end first, when using the SCSI hostRaid setup utilities. On boot up both Sata HostRaid and SCSI HostRaid are in the sequence, but two SCSI disks timing out so far...later fixed by placing a jumper on the second 73GB SCSI to ensure different IDs and disabling parity (RAID 1 to be used on both HostRaids).

2 - install working in x64 Windows 2008, and even the sound card is good, however Adaptec Sata HostRaid 8130 has no driver for Windows 2008 x64 although it did for x64 on Windows Server 2003