You guessed it - Experiment Time again LOL

Well this time I set about installing the release candidate of Windows server 2008 onto my desktop PC.

I knew right from the start that this would need a bit of "tweaking" to be any use as a desktop OS.

The first thing I noticed was the problem with downloading and running Windows Live services. I use messenger quite a lot and therefore wanted to install it. However I was greeted upon install with "Windows live services cannot be run on Windows Server". Undeterred, I download and install Windows Live Messenger on a spare Windows XP machine, open up regedit and navigate to HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uni nstaller and go browsing for Windows Live Messenger. Within a couple of minutes I find the entry and also find that it has cached the MSI to: C:\Program Files\Common Files\WindowsLiveInstaller\MsiSources\Install_{917 6251A-4CC1-4DDB-B343-B487195EB397}.msi So I copy this file to my Windows Server 2008 laptop, expecting to have to modify it with Orca. What the heck, I'll try running it first. And it installs without problem. And I'm using it just fine.

On to driver installation. Most drivers were automatically installed, after all Server 2008 shares kernel and codebase with Windows Vista, so this was to be expected. The drivers that Server 2008 didn't handle on it's own, were for the most part handled by advent Update which identifies my system as Vista.

Wireless LAN features are not installed by default. All you have to do, is to add the "Wireless LAN Feature" to the server. That brings us to the new "Server Manager" console that Microsoft provides in Server 2008. Start "Server Manager", click on "Features" then go to "Add Features" and right at the bottom you'll find "Wireless LAN Service".

In conclusion to everything. Windows Server 2008 performs better, even with the Aero features enabled, than Vista ever did on the same hardware. To me, this a bit strange, even if a lot of services are still disabled, as the codebase is pretty much the same as Vista. For all I know, Vista might perform better now that Service Pack 1 has been released.

- Do u have some crazy experiment you want me to try out?? if so let me know and if possible ill give it a try. -

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Mr Pickles
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Oooh, now this was a good idea!
I think I mgiht have to give this a try.

Are there any other problems with running other applications on the server?

Jam

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There were a few other little clitches but nothing unfixable. I still cant believe how well it performs when compared with Vista.

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Hmmm, I think I'm going to give this a try out.
Is the server edition much different from the normal desktop one?
Like are all the things in the same place etc. ?

Jam

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Yep everything is pretty much the same layout, just with a few added extras really.

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