Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s

March 15, 2005 @ 12:36 am

Arrgh... it's happened again. Got burned by software that doesn't run on my Windows 2003 server install that I run on my laptop.

I’m about to install a new Hard disk into my laptop as I’ve run out of space and really need to reinstall my Windows version. It’s just about that time, things are locking and going bang in the night.

I decided the easiest way to back up everything is to use some disk imaging software to take a snapshot of the drive then do the new install to make sure I don’t forget to back up anything as I usually do when I reinstall (at least this time I’ll have the drive around).

After reading a few reviews I decided I’d get True Image as it looks simple and efficient and it’s relatively cheap ($34 from NewEgg). Fine.

Unfortunately for me I’m running Windows 2003 Server on my laptop and I didn’t do my research to check whether this thing would run under a sever OS. I run server mainly because I do tons of IIS installs for demos and tests and I like to run them on separate Web sites to keep things isolated without blowing my main Web site out.

This sort of thing really pisses me off everytime I see it and it happens quite frequently with just about any consumer ‘utility tool’. The vendor of True Image sells a server version that retails for $699. Sure enough it provides a bunch of additional features over the plain version but I don’t need any of these features, but I don’t need any of this and I’m sure as hell not going to pay $699 (or even a couple of hundred) for backup software I’m going to use once in a blue moon when I’m swapping hard disks. I’m running my machine as a desktop – WTF are you keeping me from treating it like one and why would you care if we back up a server the same way as a desktop?

Basically this is reaming the customer, right? It would work just fine, but sorry we want $600 from you to do that. This seems almost criminal – no technical limit just a $$$ to preserve the ‘Enterprise market’.

The part that I really hate about this is that it’s usually not advertised if you buy a tool. When I pick up a small tool like this for a few bucks it’s easy to forget to do additional research – you read a review or hear a recommendation from somebody you trust and you basically impulse buy it. Of course, getting your money back is pretty unlikely in this situation, since you downloaded the software and basically got the full version.

It’s not the money but the time that went into this. Checking around, finding a store, buying, waiting for the download, downloading and then get that maddening dialog on first start. Screw you! It’s not even worth going through the headache of a refund for the time wasted…

Personally I think if a company wants to charge more money for Enterprise versions they should have to give you something extra. They do, but wouldn’t it make sense to at least make a version that works treating a server like a desktop and not charge 20 times the amount?

Ok, I’m ranting… I feel better now.

Hmmmm… I seem to remember isn’t there some way to fake Windows into pretending to be a different OS? I actually tried using a shortcut to the installer and using the Compatibility tab to run as Windows XP, but that didn’t work – I guess it’s hard to disguise the registry, but what good is that feature with a program that looks on the system to find this information?

I suppose I could install on my Virtual PC, but bet it doesn’t allow a back over a network drive and man that would be slow.

Back to the original plan and just doing a full backup – I do have a 250 gig firewire drive, that can hold all 50 gig of data I suppose… Grumble, grumble, grumble…

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re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by Kevin Wright March 15, 2005 @ 12:43 am

At least you got 2003 on your machine. I have been trying to buy myself a new Dell, which like you I want to mainly run as a desktop but with a server o/s. I also want a quiet machine in my office. Dell, however, think I should buy both the workstation I am looking at (Precision 370 - I don't know if they have similar models your side of the Pond), leaving it running XP AND a big noisy server...

Kevin

re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by Rick Strahl March 15, 2005 @ 12:58 am

I never buy a machine with Server on it. Few sell laptops that way and if they do they ream you for it. It's cheaper to buy the software separately or use MSDN if you have that. It's your Dev machine after all <g>...

re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by Kevin Wright March 15, 2005 @ 2:33 am

> use MSDN if you have that. It's your Dev machine after all <g>...

That is what I was trying to do, but AFAICS 2003 doesn't support the video card and various other drivers. I was trying to get some advice from them as to how to work round this, but they seem not to want to be helpful.

Kevin

re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by Rick Strahl March 15, 2005 @ 3:08 am

Go to the OEM hardware manufacturer's Web site and get drivers rather than from Dell. XP drivers work fine on Win2003 so there shouldn't be any issues.

re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by Michael Giagnocavo March 15, 2005 @ 4:37 am

So? Hack the installer. There are lots of tools for InstallShield, and if they use MSI, then open it up with Orca and be finished. I've done this to install "server" software (Commerce Server 2002 anyone?) on Windows XP, as well as install tape backup software utilities on Windows 2000 server. Almost always, the check is only in the installer.

re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by Brian Schkerke March 15, 2005 @ 7:27 am

I've been burned by this as well, several times. One recent example was DiskKeeper from Executive Software. In my mind this is the classic example of the software trying to outsmart the user -- something I've never been very fond of to begin with.

How about a warning that says, "This software is untested with your operating system. It could very well damage your filesystem beyond repair. Vendor isn't responsible for any damage to your system if you continue installation on this unsupported operating system." Gives the user the choice while giving the vendor the ability to say, "Hey, we told you!"

As for hacking the installer - come on. Yes, it's possible, but do you really want to bother? The only way to right wrongs is to protest them, not to fix them. If you spend your life cleaning up after someone they'll never know they made a mess. Nor will they care. ;p

I'd love to run Windows 2003 64 bit or Windows XP 64 bit on my desktop here but unfortunately the number of drivers in that realm really does suck. I have an Adaptec 2410SA card with a RAID array attached that has no 64 bit drivers available for Windows. Score another for Linux, I guess. :(

re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by Paul Mrozowski March 15, 2005 @ 6:36 pm

I've used Hard Disk Manager from Paragon in the past, exactly for this reason. Their "consumer" version works just fine on the Server versions of the OS. They have other versions if you need to run it on multiple servers, or use it for deployment.

http://www.paragon.ag/hdm/home/personal/features.htm

For $80, it's pretty reasonable, especially compared to the other alternatives.

re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by Kevin Wright March 16, 2005 @ 1:28 am

> Their "consumer" version works just fine on the Server versions of the OS.

Paul, some of the text on the page you linked to suggests this version does support 2003, but some of it says their "Professional" version only. Do you know what the difference actually is?

Kevin

re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by Brian Vander Plaats March 16, 2005 @ 6:30 am

I feel the same way about the 10 connection limit in XP for IIS and file sharing. Obviously anyone needing to run a serious website is going to have to spend the money for a Server OS (and hardware), but what if I'm running a low-volume website/web service from home? Any midrange desktop PC today could handle more than 10 connections. It's like Ford prohibiting you from putting a tow hitch on your Taurus, because you really should buy an F-350 to do any pulling...

re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by Michael Giagnocavo March 16, 2005 @ 2:21 pm

Brian S: Oh, I let the company know they screwed up. In fact, I sent them a patched installer.

Brian V: Yea, XP on a desktop can obviously do some high performance! I just tried doing some SOAP services w/SQL backend, and so long I kept to about 4 threads connecting at a time, I could sustain over 450 requests/sec (limited by CPU). Any more than 4 test driver threads and I'd get the IIS connection limiting causing errors.

App compat: re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by Michael Giagnocavo March 19, 2005 @ 10:38 pm

Hey, what about app compat? Just had someone else message me about installing Avid on 2003. Suggested decompiling, but then realised that just setting it to run as WinXP app should work... and it did. So, if you're lucky, your utility is already in the OS.

re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by Bryan Linton March 23, 2005 @ 8:29 am

FYI, I've been running True Image 8.0 for a couple months and might be able to help regarding Virtual PC. It might be worth your while to install on Virtual PC for several reasons:

TrueImage DOES support image creation/restoration across a network; it's my favorite feature. I created a boot CD for True Image and it even this boot-time version provides full network support for Microsoft networks.

If you run a client OS on Virtual PC, you should be able to install to that, and Virtual PC supports connection of the Host PCs drives to the virtual machine. There may still be some issues, but it's worth a try.

I can tell you that I've created and restored many images of XP Pro SP2 to and from new Dell Optiplex computers across a gigabit network connection from the True Image boot CD, and image creation takes about 7 minutes. A restore takes barely two minutes. That's for about 5 gigs of data.

That said, I agree with you about server versions costing over 1000% more that the similarly-featured client OS versions. It's a racket. The logic is that enterprises should pay more simply because they CAN is stretching the "charge the maximum the market can bear" philosophy just a bit too far, IMHO.

re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by Michael Cummings April 02, 2005 @ 11:30 am

Yeah, that "Enterprise" label must cost a lot to stick on the box.

You can have multiple web sites on XP.
We got the code to do that from... YOU!

Only one of the sites can be active, but that is easy to manage.

Is there any other reason to run a server OS on your laptop?

re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by Rick Strahl April 02, 2005 @ 1:59 pm

Michael, how do you run multiple sites on XP? Separate configurations?

As to running Server - the main reason for me is that the IIS model is different for configuration and security and I want to make sure I have an environment that most people will be deploying on.

I run XP and Win2000 in Virtual PC sessions so that's gets checked too.

re: Consumer Utility Software and Server OS’s
by band May 03, 2005 @ 8:53 pm

youre not alone: partition magic & ghost9 ...i kicked the same stone 2 times... i have to use windows server os for developing and i need to run more than 1 website at the same time ... so when i tried to get out of the warez industry they pull me back in.

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