What are the differences, advantages, disadvantages? It seems Server 2008 is basically Vista with a lot of useless crap stripped away and since I can get either via MSDNAA I was thinking about maybe trying Server 2008. What do you think? Worth it?
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Vista Business 64bit vs. Server 2008
- Thread starter l0calh05t
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Server 2008 has the "crap" you probably meant. If you install the user experience package, you'll get Aero and all that in Server 2008 just like Vista. It's just optional, thats all.
Server 2008 is as the name implies, a server. It has IIS, terminal server, FTP server, SMTP server, Sharepoint, DNS, Active Directory and so on.. all of them optional of course. You just have to assign roles to your server once installation is finished.
Server 2008 is as the name implies, a server. It has IIS, terminal server, FTP server, SMTP server, Sharepoint, DNS, Active Directory and so on.. all of them optional of course. You just have to assign roles to your server once installation is finished.
CrimsonKnight13
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You can compare all of the features
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008/en/us/compare-features.aspx
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-vista/compare-editions/default.aspx
The biggest difference is that Vista Business is a workstation OS that includes Home Premimum's features.
Server 2008 focuses on server features & software. You can convert it to be a workstation if you like by following this site -> http://www.win2008workstation.com/wordpress/
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008/en/us/compare-features.aspx
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-vista/compare-editions/default.aspx
The biggest difference is that Vista Business is a workstation OS that includes Home Premimum's features.
Server 2008 focuses on server features & software. You can convert it to be a workstation if you like by following this site -> http://www.win2008workstation.com/wordpress/
DeaconFrost
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The OS should be chosen based on the intended use of the computer. If it is meant as a workstation, use Vista. If it is meant as a server, use Server 2008.
That's exactly what I meant. Sorry for being somewhat unclear. AFAIK even the desktop/user experience package does not install some Vista features like the Sidebar, which I also don't need...
That site -- and the fact that one gets to choose for most options -- was one of the reasons I thought it may be worth a try.
There is nothing wrong with using a server OS for a workstation OS and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. You may have to tweak things, you may have incompatabilities and you may loose features but if you are fine with that then go for it.
I've been using Server 2003 over XP for a couple of years and had no issues despite all the nay-sayers. I don't recommend someone go and buy a server license over an workstation license due to cost but if you can get it through other (legal) means like MSDN then go for it.
I've been using Server 2003 over XP for a couple of years and had no issues despite all the nay-sayers. I don't recommend someone go and buy a server license over an workstation license due to cost but if you can get it through other (legal) means like MSDN then go for it.
DeaconFrost
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Damn I love reading these forums everyday. Simply put, there may be "nothing wrong" with doing so, but there's no reason to do so, either, other than maybe to boost e-wang size. By the time you tweak a server OS down to run as a workstation, you are pretty much left with the workstation OS, so why go through the extra work and hassle? Just because you can bang in a nail with a brick, doesn't make it a better tool for the job than a hammer. Commonse sense. K.I.S.S. Call it what you want, but the concept and advice is the same. Use the right tool for the job.
DeaconFrost
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I've seen those links posted before, but honestly, I've seen no difference in performance between the two. I was quite happy with how they both performed on the same computer, but I didn't see any noticeable difference in performance or snappiness.
SuperSubZero
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I don't have those benchmark apps, but the handful I did try the other day (3DMark06, 3DMark01, PassMark, and some regular ol' file copying over LAN and USB) did not produce any significant performance differences between 2008 and Vista SP1 when running the exact same drivers on the same hardware.
Actually, Vista ran 3DMark01 "infinitely" faster, since 2008 wouldn't even run it at all due to a DirectX problem. Same DXWEBINSTALLER and everything.
Joe Average
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No offense folks, but if you install 2K8 and run it untouched - aka Leave it alone - you'll never get any other version of Vista to work that fast, and I don't care what you break, tweak, twist, dismember, cut out, vLite out, stream out, disable, terminate, uninstall, or whatever.
2K8 ain't Vista and I don't care what people say otherwise... and Vista Business is the only edition of Vista I'd use, but 2K8 blows it out of the water, period, no matter how much tweaking you to do Vista Business.
'Nuff typed.
2K8 ain't Vista and I don't care what people say otherwise... and Vista Business is the only edition of Vista I'd use, but 2K8 blows it out of the water, period, no matter how much tweaking you to do Vista Business.
'Nuff typed.
YeOldeStonecat
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What is "all this time spent" you speak of? When I installed 2K8 on my laptop..it installed in like 15 - 20 minutes...a reboot, I put NO32 on it (I'd have to do that with XP or Vista anyways)..I put Firefox and my usual IT productivity software on it (I'd have to do that with XP or Vista also).......and it runs undeniably clearly much faster than Vista did. It's usable for me. With Vista..I ended up not having the patience..and booting into PCLinux or Ubuntu instead.
With newer servers OS's...on that first boot to desktop..when it's just a stand alone server..it pretty much IS just a desktop OS..until you "configure my server"..and stuff it with DCPROMO or IIS or terminal..or whatever. There is no "time spent tweaking and removing stuff".
Same exact laptop I had Vista on, same exact hard drive, ram, cpu, hardware, etc. Night and day difference.
Oh well look down there below at the additional sections:
Yeah all that extra work you will eventually have to do totally makes it worth getting very little performance difference. Seriously I'm with Deacon, it's only going to bite you in the end. Using Server as a workstation OS isn't "cool" or "thinking outside the box." It's just going to make you groan when you want to use that one application that just won't install or work right. Then what, dualboot? Ridiculous. Besides how are all of you actually spending money on the server OS, is it really worth all that extra money for so little gain and much more headache?
swatbat
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Its more adding or I should say enabling with the server os. Turning on direct x, video acceleration, sound, etc.
Either way it takes only a few minutes extra. 08 should go smoother then the 03 setups as well. Wireless support sucked in 03 before sp2.
Joe Average
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You folks actually have software that won't work under Server 2K8? How very interesting... works with everything I've ever thrown at it and then some... weird.
swatbat
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Yea but most of my experience is with server software. First 08 box I deployed has eset on it for av(including exchange 07 sp1). We had ordered a kaspersky license but it wouldn't work with 08(they have fixed this now). At first they said it would work then came back a week later and said no. At the time symantec's mail security and gfi's didn't work either.
Hell symantecs endpoint protection still doesn't fully support 08 which I found out today. The client runs on it but the manager doesn't. We have been pushing people away from symantec whenever possible but this is for a non-profit and symantec pretty much gives the stuff away. Want to say esets non-profit price for a church we did was like 20 some bucks a seat. We can get symantec for less then 10 easy. For the other church we did we got eset in. This one is a church school with 80 or so systems and symantecs pricing won out.
Software that won't work on an operating system it wasn't designed for. How is that weird? All it takes is one application or driver and you're hosed unless you want to settle or compromise with something else. Why bother, the gains do not outweight the risks.
Joe Average
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Because it's fast as fuck, lean and mean, that's why. Would have thought you folks got that point by now... perhaps not. I used to think Windows Server 2003 was the highest performance OS Redmond ever put out... until Window Server 2008 came along and I did some pretty extensive performance testing with SuperFetch enabled. It makes Vista look like it's standing still, especially with a lot of RAM to play with.
And 8GB is plenty, lemme tell ya... and it screams... but, alas, I still prefer XP Pro x64 and will for a long time to come.
You can use 8GB in Vista just fine. So what, would you say its one million times faster or only like 453,000 times faster? Get some perspective, you know it's barely faster and once again the dramaticly smaller compatiblity list is just not worth it. But more power to you, may you have a long and happy OS experience (until you hit that one app
).Joe Average
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Such a thing doesn't exist unless it's 16 bit (for 2K8 x64)... as a software tester I spend an inordinate amount of time just installing shit to see how it installs, testing new installer routines, offering bug reports, compatibility info, etc. Ain't found nothing that won't work yet, as long as you understand how all this stuff works it's fairly easy to install anything save for 16 bit apps as already mentioned for the x64 edition.
Maybe someday I'll find something... who knows.
Maybe someday I'll find something... who knows.
SuperSubZero
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No, not enough. As I said, I could not reproduce this. I did all of my tests with a stock Server 2008 Enterprise x64 install, with the print spooler disabled. That was it. Nothing else stopped, nothing tweaked. I used the *exact* same driver as my Vista SP1 Ultimate x64 install. My Vista install is a general desktop install. It's not tweaked much and has Aero. Vista has even been installed since March. Server 2008 was installed last weekend. They benchmarked the same. Virtually identical scores.
basementjack
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My 2 cents..
If you're an IT guy, and you think you'd like to mess around with stuff, and given that you have access to both at the same cost, then here's some stuff to consider...
Virtual machines run faster on Server 2008 with Hyper-v than they do on vista with virtual PC 2007.
- if you're going to do any significant amount of virtualization, its something to think about.
If you earn your living in IT then will the experience you gain with 2008 be more valuable than the experience you'd gain with vista?
If you are a web developer, is most of what you develop for hosted on IIS? 2008 has a newer version of IIS than vista.
Do you play games? Want a Media Center experience? Vista might be the way to go - on the 2008 side, if you install hyper-V, it installs at a base level - everything gets virutalized, including 2008 - I'm told that can lead to sound issues.
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if you have more money than decisiveness, you could build one of each.
If you're an IT guy, and you think you'd like to mess around with stuff, and given that you have access to both at the same cost, then here's some stuff to consider...
Virtual machines run faster on Server 2008 with Hyper-v than they do on vista with virtual PC 2007.
- if you're going to do any significant amount of virtualization, its something to think about.
If you earn your living in IT then will the experience you gain with 2008 be more valuable than the experience you'd gain with vista?
If you are a web developer, is most of what you develop for hosted on IIS? 2008 has a newer version of IIS than vista.
Do you play games? Want a Media Center experience? Vista might be the way to go - on the 2008 side, if you install hyper-V, it installs at a base level - everything gets virutalized, including 2008 - I'm told that can lead to sound issues.
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if you have more money than decisiveness, you could build one of each.
Since that cost is 0, I might as well get both. Anyways, I'm not exactly an IT guy. More of an EE, but I also develop software in my free time.
Yes, Hyper-V is quite interesting. The alternative would probably be Linux+Xen.
No, and no.
Sometimes. As in Windows Media Center? No.
Build one of each? It's not like I couldn't dual-boot, eh?
DeaconFrost
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I couldn't tell a difference either. If I was forced into only using one or the other, I wouldn't have any complaints because both ran very well, but I couldn't say one was faster than the other. I set them both up with my identical software I use on a daily basis, and I spent a week with each going about my usual daily routines.
Monkey God
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I wonder how many of the arguments against using 2008 are applicable in the XP vs Vista debate.
YeOldeStonecat
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Zero need for that for me, I game on my home rigs.
YeOldeStonecat
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Yeah..but you benchmarked with "game junk". 3DMark is mostly video benchmarking. Even this site here laughed at it as a serious benchmark.
Most of us here who are installing Server2008 on their laptops are people who have access to its licensing..mostly for free (aka TechNet, MSDN, etc). Thus we're using our laptops in the work environment, carrying around the network, doing work work, not gaming. We game on...."gaming rigs".
Server OSs are not designed for gaming, I don't think anyone here is installing it under the pretense that they'll be getting wicked FPS in Battlefield or COD. What counts for us...bootup and shutdown time (which means not just to the login screen..but to full functional desktop..once services have all started and its responsive), application launching, changing of network properties..which we do all the time...manual IPs, wireless, etc.
For most of us doing these server installs on laptops..we've been in IT for a while, not our first day on the job...we have more than a great "feel" for the responsiveness of a PC...even drunk and blindfolded. It's not like I have to "defend it..because I bought it"...which is what leads to most fanboy debates. I have more than 10x licenses of everything Microsoft...so I'll always install what I feel like..and decide which to keep from the collection.
Joe Average
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Benchmarks are not the end all be all final stamp of approval on whether one OS is superior to another on the same hardware. If people can't notice how fast 2K8 is after a default installation compared to any other OS, then something is wrong with their visual receptors, I'd say, or they're suffering for something that just doesn't let them catch how fast, snappy, and responsive it truly is. Hell, it even makes my XP Pro x64 look snow in terms of quick the UI is - and that's the basic UI without Aero and GPU acceleration too.
Bleh... people focus entirely too much on benchmarks, they really do.
Bleh... people focus entirely too much on benchmarks, they really do.
I would get business, then get an Ultimate Upgrade for 65 bucks, that's what I am planning on doing.
I love Server 2008 and I have thought of running it as an OS but since I can get Vista Ultimate for cheap and upgrade my free Vista Business I am going to go that route. You should too cause you won't find the upgrade cheaper anywhere else. http://www.microsoft.com/student/discounts/theultimatesteal-us/default.aspx
Look under additional products on the left, you can't get the upgrade till 9/8/08 though.
The problem with Server 2008 is (depending on how serious one takes licensing), that a lot of apps simply won't run and tell you that you need to purchase the enterprise version to run the app on a server system.
You can install Vista without a bunch of the components (see: http://www.vlite.net ) and that will cut down on the "junk" you don't need. Although, I always thought the sidebar is total junk, till I actually installed Vista and started to use it, now I wouldn't want an OS without the sidebar anymore. It's functional, extensible, and just plain useful. YMMV of course.
You can install Vista without a bunch of the components (see: http://www.vlite.net ) and that will cut down on the "junk" you don't need. Although, I always thought the sidebar is total junk, till I actually installed Vista and started to use it, now I wouldn't want an OS without the sidebar anymore. It's functional, extensible, and just plain useful. YMMV of course.
SuperSubZero
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This is not a strong argument. "Well, you only tested THIS,," The original comment was that it was faster. Period. My testing did not show this. This comparison is a *perfect* place for synthetic benchmarks, even crappy ones. What's even more revealing is that they benchmark the same. If one was dramatically faster than the other then yeah, I'd probably question it, but this is not the case. They benchmark in these apps exactly the same.
They are when you're comparing apples to apples. My testing was not between radically different things. I wasn't comparing XP to Vista or an AMD to an Intel. I was comparing two very similiar operating systems using drivers that were the same between both.
You can't say it's faster or better or anything without any evidence. Your personal opinion doesn't mean much to me. If 2008 is SOOO much better than Vista, it should be reproduceable in some numerically quantifiable way. So far I have seen nothing to show that at all.
I would get business, then get an Ultimate Upgrade for 65 bucks, that's what I am planning on doing.
http://www.microsoft.com/student/discounts/theultimatesteal-us/default.aspx
Look under additional products on the left, you can't get the upgrade till 9/8/08 though.
Why would I need Ultimate? IIRC it just adds Media Center which I don't really need anyways... Besides, I can't get that upgrade because I don't live in the US (and just being a US citizen probably won't help)
I'll have a look at that URL. The sidebar seems pretty excessive IMO. I just need a calendar, for which I use Rainlendar at the moment.
DeaconFrost
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The sidebar has a nice calendar built in to it, or you could get a gadget that ties it in with your Outlook Calendar.
Aww, ok I want to upgrade because I need Media Center program so I can use my 360 as an extender.
If I didn't need it though then I wouldn't bother either. For now though I am running business on my laptop it runs great, a/v playback is messed up on it though, if I have any tasks, or dls going the audio gets choppy and the video frames skip . I think it mostly because I had force an install of Nvidia drivers for my video card since the Go Series isn't supported.I don't really like the look of the default sidebar calendar. Does it support skins? Since we're already on the topic of the sidebar, how much memory does the sidebar (with only the calendar gadget) use? Rainlendar uses ~11 MiB
Aww, ok I want to upgrade because I need Media Center program so I can use my 360 as an extender.
Ah, I suppose there actually are uses for it
Personally I don't need an "extender" since I don't have a TV but a 24" monitor with 8" speakers next to it On the topic of memory usage, given a 64 bit system, and given the price of memory, there's very little reason to not stick 4-8 GB in one's system. I am tempted to say that even though the stated minimum requirement is probably lower than 2 GB, 2 gigs is the absolute minimum one should run Vista on.
I am running it on an Opteron 185 with 4 GB at home, and I get 5.9 scores on all but memory (4.7), but that's because I am using DDR, not DDR2. With everything open and running, bowsers, Dreamscape, gadgets, etc, I am using 1.37 GB of RAM, plenty left to run a couple instances of WoW or EVE Online.
I am running it on an Opteron 185 with 4 GB at home, and I get 5.9 scores on all but memory (4.7), but that's because I am using DDR, not DDR2. With everything open and running, bowsers, Dreamscape, gadgets, etc, I am using 1.37 GB of RAM, plenty left to run a couple instances of WoW or EVE Online.
Rest assured, I will be getting 4 GiB of DDR2 for my next build (planned for october/november). Of course as 2x2GiB for easy expansion to 8 GiB, should the need arise.
Anyways, I booted up vista a few minutes ago to check out the sidebar and it seems to use ~25 MiB of RAM. Also, it would appear the default calendar is pretty much useless since it (apparently) doesn't allow you to add events etc. I suppose I'll be sticking with Rainlendar Lite.