I bought a HP MediaSmart machine running Windows Home Server the other week and had my first problem with it tonight. For some reason, the client connector software wasn't working right on my Windows 7 laptop. After uninstalling the "Windows Home Server Connector" client software and reinstalling (I tried reinstalling from the CD and from the //SERVER/Software/ folder) it always failed on the bit that said "Configuring computer backup".
Hmm... that's strange. It's a brand new server, running the brand new Windows 7, I'm installing what must be the latest version of the client software from the server share... but it's failing.
A colleague had problems with the same thing and suggested installing Power Pack 3 on the Home Server to ensure I have Windows 7 support. I checked, and sure enough it was already installed. My server and laptop were all up to date.
After digging around for a while I saw that in the Event Viewer on my Windows 7 laptop it was logging an error each time the connector software failed:
"Windows Home Server protocol mismatch. This computer uses protocol version 6.0.2030.2, but partner computer SERVER uses protocol version 6.0.2423.0. A connection cannot be established."
There was another similar one in there too:
"Windows Home Server protocol mismatch. This computer uses protocol version 133038082, but partner computer bb328f67-0000-0000-0000-cd7e35e1d99f uses protocol version 158793728. A connection cannot be established."
Hmm, strange: it seems like the connector client software I'm trying to install isn't the latest version! After more digging around, I found a WeGotServed thread on a similar problem and one commenter mentioned finding a folder on the server (C:\WHS) with some connector software in it, which fixed it for him. But wait, that's strange. The latest connector software should always be in //SERVER/Software/ right? So I used Remote Desktop onto my Home Server and found the two folders and compared the installer files. The //SERVER/Software/ connector software was about 5 months older than the software in the hidden-away C:\WHS folder!
I installed the newest connector on my client machine and that solved my problem :-)