Windows Server

Windows Server 2025 is coming! In Part 1, we explore the new installer UI, compare Windows Features (hello NetworkATC!), note removed features like PNRP and SMTP, and review PowerShell module changes.

Worried about how hard you’re pushing your S2D cache SSDs? This post covers identifying cache disks, querying storage history, using Cluster Performance History, and a new tool to check cache wear across your environment.

If you’re experiencing Event ID 5120, CSV timeouts, or VM pauses when patching S2D clusters, Microsoft has identified the cause. Here’s the workaround using Storage Maintenance Mode and ready-to-use CAU pre/post scripts.

WS2016Lab by Jaromir Kaspar lets you deploy an entire nested S2D lab on any Hyper-V host (even a Windows 10 laptop!). Perfect for testing Windows Server 2019, S2D, Storage Replica, Project Honolulu, and many more scenarios.

The best information on S2D often comes from blog posts rather than documentation. Here’s my curated list of essential reads covering storage pools, SSD endurance, volume resiliency, and why you shouldn’t use consumer SSDs.

Discovered a bug where physical disks stay in maintenance mode after applying September CU to S2D clusters. This breaks CAU patching and causes capacity issues. Here’s how to recover and avoid the problem.

Discover the magical Get-StorageQoSFlow command in Windows Server 2016 that reveals IOPS, latency, and bandwidth stats for all VHD(x)s on your cluster, perfect for finding those VMs burning through your storage.

A step-by-step guide to expanding S2D volumes using PowerShell. Learn how to resize individual storage tiers (Mirror or Parity) and expand partitions to match your workload needs.