ASUS TS Mini SOHO Home Server w/ Intel Atom N280 1.66GHz 2GB DDR2 2TB HDD installed, powered by Windows Home Server

Pros: I have the 500Gb version but its the same-
This is a GREAT unit for the Price - Plugged in 8 bay e-Sata device and now have up to 16GB (currently 7GB)
Unit is simple but great. Does what it should - makes sharing AND backup easy.

Cons: ASUS - Support and Rebates -
They have lost me as a customer.
I sent in the Rebate the Day it came. I xeroxed everything. I gave up 10% of the rebate for "fast service" - Within a week I get a response saying no UPC code recieved. I am 100% I included it. The number for Support and rebate info email and phone - did not work)

Spent weeks with other Asus Support (non English speakers) never got it. I send copied of every document - I even sent my new egg invoices for 2 laptops - netbook - networking stuff etc .telling them they will lose moe as a customer - but they don't care - So I will NEVER buy from them again.

Also comes with 500GB of online storage - great but all the mail come in Chinese so I have no idea how to use it.

Documentation and website VERY week ...

Other Thoughts: main advice on the unit - keep it simple!! I added a lot of other utilities and then got messed up permissions. Reformatted and kept it simple - it runs like a charm

Also - opening the box to swap drive .repair etc is a bear!!

Asus Makes great products real shame

Pros: easy to set up got all 5 pcs in my house on it in a matter of hrs. interface is easy to use and being able to share the holiday pics around without having to load a flash drive is nifty. it backs up automatically at 2am and wakes the computers to do it. so no resources used up while your working on something else

Cons: i mistakenly thought that a home server would work as a print server out of the box. so that bites. 1 of my computers will not back up for some reason i know its on the computer side not the server cause the other 4 back up daily

Other Thoughts: i caught this the other week when it was on sell. highly impressed. even without the print server ability

Pros: Windows Home Server works fine. Box is adequately powerful and virtually silent.

Cons: Unit failed after 5 months. Asus tech support said they would send a replacement unit. They emailed a confirmation. BUT they didn't mean it! After several weeks of shipping inquiries, they said they would NOT send a replacement but instead we needed to return the unit for repair. It's now been a month without a functioning unit thanks to their inconsistencies and inaccuracies.

Pros: Very compact and low power consumption compared to other home servers. eSATA ports support hot-swap so you don't even have to power down the server to add extra drives at SATA speeds. Actually DOES have a video port (VGA). Just take a hobby knife (or box cutter) and slice the plastic around the port. Might help to open the cover and remove the HDs so you can see roughly where it is. This enables you to get to the BIOS and the Administrator account (no password...go figure) on WHS. It also allows you to install another OS if you aren't happy with WHS such as Linux or anything else that will run on an Atom processor.

Cons: I believe that because the video port isn't advertised or officially supported, it might be difficult to get video drivers for another OS. When I booted into WHS, I was able to get 1920x1080 resolution though. If you are ok with the stock WHS or you plan on running a *NIX server without a GUI, then this isn't a problem.

Other Thoughts: I decided to put Ubuntu Server 10.10 on it. I tried using the USB key method and it would just boot past it into WHS. However, the CD method worked great. I did have a problem once the OS was installed that it would hang right after the GRUB screen. I was able to fix it (temporarily) by pressing 'e' on the GRUB menu and then adding "i915.modeset=0" (minus quotes) to the end of the boot line starting with "linux". Hopefully this helps anyone trying to load Ubuntu on this box. Once the server was up and running, I was able to telnet/ssh into it without any additional configuration. I haven't tried loading the desktop edition yet to see how well the graphics/VNC are supported.

Pros: Easy setup. Worked out of the box. Unobtrusive, quiet amd low power consumption. Amazing value considering the piece of mind a server delivers. Seems robust as I live in a lightning belt and the server has been subjected to several outages and brownouts and with only front end line protection - it starts up automatically and without any problems.

Cons: Not all is slam dunk especially when comes to ISps, firewalls and routers. I am still working on internet access to my server and I ended up purchasing a WHS textbook because the owners manual is absolutely vacuous. I am confident I can make it work though.

Pros: Windows Home Server is a fantastic software product to build your home network around...

Cons: ...but build it on different hardware.
-The HDDs are NOT easy to remove
-ASUS tech support is a maze of awful -- my first server failed and instead of sending me a new HDD to swap out and minimize my downtime, I had to send in the whole unit. And after keeping it for two weeks, instead of fixing mine, they sent me a new one, losing all the data I had on my first one.
-'quiet' after you adjust the thumbscrews in the back and the case -- otherwise it makes a horrible buzzing sound
-32-bit processor means NO UPGRADE PATH to Windows Home Server v2 (AKA Vail)
-Only two internal HDD slots
-Asus EasyStore backup is worthless, and it will sign you up for emails in Taiwanese

Other Thoughts: I haven't had this thing for a year and I'm seriously considering swapping it out for an HP. Based on my terrible support experience, I'm never getting an ASUS product again. Do yourself a favor and look into the Acer or HP models, or price the hardware and build one yourself.

Pros: The longer I own this server the more I love it. Hardware: It's smaller than a shoebox, quiet, feels like its well built. The 2 1TB drives are great for redundancy in backups along with the online storage if you need that extra bit of security. Software: Pretty sleek! Anyone who wants this product for the stated capabilities will have no problem setting it up or operating it. I had the server running and on screen in less than 15 minutes. Our PCs are backed up, videos and music now streaming, and I have setup a guest account for family and friends to download and upload pictures through the remote login feature. For the gadget geeks, this machine will be alot of fun. Beyond the stated functions, there are many more abilities thanks to the huge online community. My torrents are now being managed through the server along with a magic jack.

Cons: None to think of. There's one trade off of course, but it will be the reason you buy or move on. The atom processor so far has not let me down. I chose the Asus TS mini for the low power consumption. Those expecting greater performance beyond a casual service provider may want to look at the larger home servers.

Other Thoughts: Very impressed with Asus and Microsoft for putting together a great product for a great price.

Pros: Small footprint, awesome little media server box.

Cons: Takes a little while to configure.

Other Thoughts: If you need a central place to put photos, videos and that sort of stuff this little guy is for you. FYI, it has 2 x 1 TB hdds installed and not 1 x 2 tb

Pros: Incredible performance from such a small box and with a plethora of external options I will never have to move everything again!

Cons: none

Other Thoughts: To the guys above that are complaining about it having 2x1tb drives all I can say is you should have read the overview on page 1 instead of skipping to the specs page because it clearly states that there are 2 drives!

Pros: None

Cons: None

Other Thoughts: I have been looking for these servers all over the web and every where I've looked they have stated that there are 2 1TB drives installed in the details. Not sure if this is a correction but I don't think it's deceptive at all to put 2TB in the title of the item for sale. They can't write all of the details in the title. That's the reason most sites have a section called "details".