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Windows Server 2008 One Year On — Hit Or Miss?
magacious writes "Friday marked a year to the day since Microsoft launched Windows Server 2008, but did it have quite the impact the so-called software giant expected, or did it make more of a little squeak than a big bang? Before its arrival on 27 February 2008, it had been five long years since the release of the last major version of Windows Server. In a world that was moving on from simple client/server applications, and with server clouds on the horizon, Windows Server 2003 was looking long in the tooth. After a year of 'Vista' bashing, Microsoft needed its server project to be well received, just to relieve some pressure. After all, this time last year, the panacea of a well-received Windows 7 was still a long way off. So came the new approach: Windows Server 2008."
Love them or hate them, Microsoft is a factual software giant...
I run a few 2k8 servers and must say that there are very few features that distinguish it from 2k3. For me, those are the new remote-apps terminal server feature and hyper-v. not a whole lot has changed other than rearranging a bunch of stuff.
Basic Open Source versus Proprietary issue. It's a lot easier for a hardware company to get drivers added to Linux distros than to Windows install disks.
I recently setup a client of mine with two Win2k8 64-bit servers (in a larger virtual VMware setup). So far, it's worked out very well. It's fast, stable (uptime is exactly equal to the number of days since we last had to reboot for a patch), and played nice with everything already present. Active Directory and Exchange 2007 migrated from the previous Win2k/Exchange 2k setup without a hitch. In other words: no complaints at all, other than the price (which wasn't too bad, since the client received non-profit pricing - but most of what I setup is Linux or FreeBSD and I greatly prefer that pricetag!).
Things I noticed that have improved:
* The group policy editor is a bit easier to use, and less confusing.
* The Vista performance/health monitor is actually pretty good, and provides a really handy ntop-like interface for seeing which service is doing what with the network (not as fine grained as I'd like, but it's a good starting point).
* The old Services-For-Unix services are more tightly integrated, and it was very easy to get NFS up and running.
* Less is installed by default, and adding just the required services was very straightforward.
* The scheduler seems to have improved, because processes distribute over CPUs more widely, and throughput/responsiveness "feels" better.
* The new role-based manager for file serving is a bit easier to find, but is really similar.
* A couple of new diagnostic wizards have appeared, including one for Group Policy - it helped me find a couple of problems I hadn't thought about.
Items I wasn't so fond of:
* Activation. It doesn't matter if you have a charity volume license anymore - you still have to activate. That bugs me, because this server has to last for years, and I worry that if I have to restore a backup in 5 years time the activation wizard may make my life difficult.
* Volume shadow copies are STILL not configured to my liking by default.
* If you want to use some of the new active directory features, you need a pure Win2k8 domain on the server side. It works with "legacy" Win2k/2k3 systems around, but only if they aren't domain controllers.
* The start menu/icons are straight from Vista.
* License management makes less sense, since the license control tools are now hidden away - checking CAL status is a pain.
Overall, for an MS operating system it's pretty good. I don't see a compelling reason to run out and upgrade any Win2k3 systems that are working well - but for new servers, it works great.
Lead developer, http://wisptools.net
The problem isn't that it's difficult to get storage drivers into Windows -- Microsoft actively solicits all the major IHV's to provide them. The problem is that the cutoff date for submission can be a year or more in advance of when Windows finally ships. This guarantees that drivers for the latest hardware won't be included.
"64-Bit goodness" was available with win2K3 as well so even that's not a reason to go with win2K8.
Run and catch, run and catch, the lamb is caught in the blackberry patch.
The terminal service gateway is also pretty good. A controlled way to allows TS from the Internet into the clients on the subnet.
Server 2008 has a much improved backup utility. It's easy to setup (I just make one backup job that repeats nightly), and will provide a BMR (Bare Metal Restore). The best part however, is the ability to assign multiple USB drives to a backup job. Which ever one is plugged in at the time, it will backup to it. This allows the admin or employee to swap drives before they leave office at night.
My only major gripe is that the backup utility will only do a file level backup. Exchange 2007 is not supported. In theory, you could stop the Exchange Store prior to the backups taking place, be we all know that's just not feasible. Instead, Microsoft states you *must* use a 3rd party backup program or their DPM 2007 product for backup/restore of Exchange! Damn :(
Life is not for the lazy.
let me google the fix for you
You don't get 5 nines out of a single server install, sorry. The only way you get that is with HA clustering and automatic failover.
PC hardware, even expensive stuff, is not reliable enough no matter what $VENDOR's sales pitch is.
You might get lucky and get a single reliable box, but if you deploy a non-trivial number of servers you will need to plan for hardware/software failures.
We deployed internally (we're an IT consulting company).
We use it to run our DC/DNS/DHCP primary infrastructure server. Works fine. I see no advantage right now though, and wouldn't deploy such a setup at a customers site.
In WS08 R2, .NET support will be added to Server Core. This will make it a great option for big web server farms.
We just switched to 2k8 in my shop (not my choice, AD and Exchange are "mandatory") and I've gotta say, I don't like it.
The only new feature that I've seen is DFS and even that is broken. The UI design team moved stuff for the sake of moving stuff and made everything bigger and chunkier. It also spams new windows that have a tendency to put themselves in the background like nobody's business. Also, the new DC's are giving all kinds of DNS errors.
Now maybe the DFS and DNS problems will be worked out in time (it's a new setup) but I still don't like the UI.
I don't see the point of switching.
I've been using Server2008 x64 on my t61p laptop since it first came out.
It's great! It feels zippier than Vista. It has a smaller install footprint. (actually even wireless isn't installed by default: you have to add it manually). It's been completely rock-solid.
I even use Hyper-V when giving demos at conferences. (unfortunately Hyper-V doesn't cooperate with wireless and disables sleep/hibernate, so I can't use it routinely.)
Two position statements first: 1) I'm primarily a Unix sysadmin of multiple flavours and love it, 2) I've only used Server 2008 on my test VM network.
Having setup a private network thanks to a company purchased Technet subscription, I now have two Active Directory Domain Controllers, a WSUS server and Terminal Server. My take on 2008 is that when approached the right way, it's actually a very nice operating system.
I like the new Terminal Services seamless window capability, the default policy of only installing the minimum required services, the new look Server Manager, even IIS7 looks nicely moduler. In fact, I could imagine managing a network of 2008 machines in a way that I never could with 2003. Now that might be my lack of fundamental 2003 knowledge (I can use it, but wouldn't describe myself as a "Windows System Administrator").
The reality, even for us Unix/Linux advocates, is that we're probably going to have to interop with Windows Server from time to time, and if it's Server 2008 that I'm having to work with, then I can live with that.
Most large OEMs provide install disks that load all of the drivers for you. For example at the place I work, we use HP Proliant boxes. The Proliant install DVD handles all of the disk partitioning, setting the RAID/disk controllers as primary, driver support, etc. HP has a whole slew of great system tools for the enterprise.
I don't know whether to mod the parent or reply, but I second this sentiment wholeheartedly.
I am running one as a replacement for my 2003 server/domain controller at my house and also as a Vista-like workstation and game machine. I absolutely love it!
It's just like Vista except for no UAC, no DRM and no annoying slowdowns. In other words, it's everything that Vista should have been, and this is running on only $500 worth of hardware (quad 6600, 4GB RAM).
The 64-bit Vista drivers were a bit difficult to find because my motherboard "doesn't support" Server 2008, but after crossing that hurdle (loading the network driver from a different motherboard with the same chipset because Asus locks out 2008), it's been the best computer I have ever owned.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
Yeah, I know what you mean. IME, Linux is much more valuable to me because it offers more flexibility over the life of a system. If the organisation grows and I need more concurrent users, I don't need to worry about the license. If I need to add a service on an existing server, I don't need to worry about whether Moderately Enterprisey Edition has what I need, or if I can only do it on one of the Really Quite Enterprisey Edition boxes. I can install a zillion times in different VM's, and not have to read the EULA with a fine toothed comb to know if it was legal. In many ways, I'd consider an expensive Linux preferable to a free Windows.
That said, the Windows Server thing isn't that hard to grok. It's just market segmentation, plus a decision to only bundle the server and administrative application bundle with particular variations of the OS. If you prefer, think of it as buying the application bundle, and getting a free, tuned and tweaked version of Windows that is just there to run the expensive application bundle. Net result is that you don't need to worry about compatibility between the applications and your existing OS. MS comes to the table from a proprietary mindset. That's not inherently 100% terrible. And, more important than anything else, they bring some quite good tools. You can decide those tools aren't worth the headaches that come with MS for your situation. But, if you've ever set up NIS and NFS home directories on a bunch of Linux boxes, and you've joined Windows machines to a domain... You know that joining a Windows box to a domain is a heck of a lot more convenient than deploying NIS.
I'm a UNIX admin who has worked with Windows servers, but even coming from my "UNIX 4 eva" side of the fence, I have to admit that the MS solutions make some things very convenient compared to the most analagous UNIX options. Just make sure you know which edition you need, so you install the Windows Server OS that will actually use all of your RAM. :)
If you install "Server Core" for 2008 it doesn't have IE...
One cool thing about HP ProLiant servers is that they have the RAID drivers in system ROM (Virtual Install Disk), and Windows Server 2003 loads them automagically. It lets you install from a standard Microsoft CD without worrying about drivers.
The logic is simple... There is a special OS for a server so the cost can be different. There is no technical reason that Windows couldn't be like Linux and allow you to add every server component to a single base operating system, The only reason is that they want to charge people that buy servers with 256GB of RAM $3000 per server and those that run small companies $600 per server. Both companies get a good deal (of course, not as good as free).
Where I work, a typical server costs $5,500, Windows costs around $600, physically putting the server in the datacenter costs $2,000, and labor for installing, configuring, and supporting the server costs $3,000 over the its life. At the end of the day, Windows servers cost around $11,100. Switching to Linux would save us $600, reducing our costs by 5%.
A typical server with 256GB of RAM would run about $60,000. This server would require the Enterprise editions of Windows Server, so that would run about $3,000. The other costs would remain the same and at the end of the day, the OS is still only five percent of the total.