HELLO ALL need some help with installation

[jabman]

HI ALL,

Firstly, great site by the looks of it.

I was suggested to run server 2008 as a workstation, ive been reading around for a while but most of it seams to be over my head 😕

I have a new pc with no os installed at the moment. so if i could just throw a few questions out at you.

which version of this do i need? (64bit?)
how can i get it? (i have a dreamspark account, does the key work? pre moded version?)
how do i install it on the new pc? (i have external hard drives and flash drives)

massivly apreciate any help.

[halladayrules]

@jabman wrote:

which version of this do i need? (64bit?)

The question you should ask yourself is “Will I ever utilize the full capacity of a 64-bit operating system?” While a 64-bit operating system is able to fully address more than 4GB of RAM, will you ever plan to stress that mark? 64-bit applications require a higher memory footprint as does the OS itself, which results in an increased start time. Also the only time you will see a performance gain from running an application in a 64-bit operating system is when the application itself is 64-bit. A majority of common applications in use today are still 32-bit. You will not see a performance gain by running a 64-bit operating system. Quite the opposite actually you will see a slight percentage drop due to the fact that a 64-bit OS has to emulate a 32-bit environment in order to run a 32-bit application! The greatest example I can think of using a 64-bit operating system would be due to gaming. Some games can chew a lot of system memory and having that extended address space helps a ton. If you don’t plan to use your machine as a true gaming rig (like I do) 64-bit OS might not be necessary. Its more about what features you like and not whether its 32-bit or 64-bit, but i thought i’d point out the key differences between the two architectures.

@jabman wrote:

how can i get it? (i have a dreamspark account, does the key work? pre moded version?)

The product key provided through your dreamspark account will only activate a copy of Windows Server 2008/R2 standard edition only. It used to be possible to use the key to activate a copy of Enterprise edition but I believe Microsoft put a stop to that trick I believe. The differences between Standard and Enterprise in terms of workstation capabilities are minimal you probably won’t even use all the features in enterprise anyways. The point I’m trying to make to you is – you won’t see any noticeable advantages of enterprise over standard, at least in terms of using it as a workstation.

@jabman wrote:

how do i install it on the new pc? (i have external hard drives and flash drives)

Installing Windows to a USB device is not supported nor is it practical anyways. The read/write speeds of external drives are usually a lot slower than the internal drives that comes in your machine from factory. I’m sure its possible to trick it to install Windows on a USB but given the slow read/write speeds of the drive its not practical.

From personal experience I have had time to muck around on Windows Server 2008 32-bit, Windows Server 2008 64-bit, and Windows Server 2008 R2 (64-bit only) for an extended period of time. I have played around on all three of them for a while to used to how they feel in terms of performance and my likability of each one. In terms of benchmark comparsions, Server 2008 64-bit came out on top with a Passmark score of 1395, compared to Server 2008 32-bit 1241, and R2’s lousy 1023. Even though Vista/2008 share kernels and R2/7 share kernels from personal experience there are differences. My laptop came preinstalled with Vista and I have had Server 2008 on it for going on 3 years now simply because it truly is more user friendly than Vista. However using Windows Server 2008 R2 as a workstation is the complete opposite. I feel that using Windows 7 as a workstation is the better option over R2 in terms of performance and likability. To put it simply: Server 2008 > Vista… 7 > R2! Server 2008 has also been out for a litte bit longer and thus we at the win2008workstation site have been able to concoct more workstation solutions as a result (bluetooth, winsat, game controllers, superfetch, readyboost, etc). R2 remains a work in progress. However its not the work in progress why I refuse to run R2. I have run into far too many problems and inconsistencies with R2. Blue + black screens of deaths, endless windows updates reboots!, annoying laggy frame rates in games despite having the game explorer feature installed! The OS works great at first but once you begin to load programs on it, it feels like bloatware. Windows 7 behaves better to the same procedure for some reason. I have tested similar scenarios on my machine of both 7 and R2 and i can tell you that 7 for some reason handles applications better. I cannot tell you how many times I have forgave R2 and reinstalled it as a result only to be disappointed. Server 2008 32-bit is my preferred OS of choice because it has worked the best for me. I can’t speak for the entire win2008workstation website but I can also tell you that i’m not the only person to run into problems with R2.

[jabman]

Thanks for that, thats cleared up some issues.

With the installation I was thinking in terms of how do I load windows onto the other computer which currently has no OS. like do i download it on this one, make a note of the key, put it on an external hard drive, plug the hard drive into the new computer, and install it onto the computers own hard drive (i dont know how to do that, but we will have to come on to that later 😳 )

based on what you said I think I will go for just server 2008 standard first. is that a good choice? though it now looks like i posted in the wrong section 😳

in terms of 32 bit vs 64 bit. Do I need to download a specific 64 bit version or do I just need sever 2008 standard and then it asks we which one I want to install?

On balance i think i will try for 64 bit version on the account that I will be running 8 gb of ram and a 1TB hard drive, amongst orther reasons.

Thanks again for the feedback, i would be stuck other wise!.

[halladayrules]

The Windows Server 2008/R2 OS download from dreamspark comes in the form of an ISO file which is a disk image file you must burn using a capable DVD R/RW writer. For this you need access to a computer with an OS already installed (possibly the one you used to type to this forum). There are many different programs which will burn ISO files (Nero, MagicISO, etc)

Here’s a very simple one http://www.freeisoburner.com/

Just browse to path of the ISO, insert your DVD and hit burn.

[jabman]

i see, i know of a computer with a dvd burner, so i need to install that burning software on it, download the OS from dreamspark, burn it to the disc. fire up new PC, throw the disc in with product key ready for when it asks.

As far as the 32/64 bit does it prompt during installation which one you want?

thanks

[halladayrules]

@jabman wrote:

i see, i know of a computer with a dvd burner, so i need to install that burning software on it, download the OS from dreamspark, burn it to the disc. fire up new PC, throw the disc in with product key ready for when it asks.

As far as the 32/64 bit does it prompt during installation which one you want?

thanks

Windows Server 2008 Standard from dreamspark comes only in 32-bit flavor.
Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard is 64-bit only so it only comes in one flavor.

You only get one or the other, not both in the case of dreamspark. There are custom built ISO images that contain both but they are located on torrent sites. I cannot provide a link to a 32/64-bit ISO because it contains pirated software which is against rules on this forum.

[jabman]

OK, in that case i think i will have a look into getting r2 instead, i hope it works ok but i guess ill have to try and if all else fails fall back on 2008 standard.

[halladayrules]

@jabman wrote:

OK, in that case i think i will have a look into getting r2 instead, i hope it works ok but i guess ill have to try and if all else fails fall back on 2008 standard.

For what its worth R2 makes a good general purpose OS but I still won’t give it high marks because of all the troubles i’ve had.

[AsciiWolf]

@halladayrules wrote:

Windows Server 2008 Standard from dreamspark comes only in 32-bit flavor.

You can download Windows Server 2008 R1 Standard x64 Trial directly from Microsoft and activate it using your DreamSpark key. 😉

[jabman]

thanks for that!

i think it will go for 64 bit

im still a little in the dark about the difference between r2 and just 2008. 😕 what are the pros and cons of each? (im aware this may start a large debate, so feel free to direct me to websites if you wish!)

[halladayrules]

@jabman wrote:

thanks for that!

i think it will go for 64 bit

im still a little in the dark about the difference between r2 and just 2008. 😕 what are the pros and cons of each? (im aware this may start a large debate, so feel free to direct me to websites if you wish!)

Pros and cons is mearly in the eye of the beholder. What may suit you may not suit another.

However here are some of the noticeable additions available in Server 2008 R2:

-Remote Desktop Aero (see main page at http://www.win2008r2workstation.com) to see how.
-Aero Snap (See example)
-Aero Shake (See example)
-Windows Media Player 12 (mostly notably native H.264 support)
-Jump lists (See example)

There is also an added Action Center, advancements to Windows Defender, DirectAccess (which only works on 7 and R2 systems only), advancements to Media Center, Bitlocker drive encryption, applocker (aka software restriction), new powershell and also a new biometric framework (aka using your fingerprint to logon type of thing) Paint and Wordpad are now controlled by a ribbon interface which can either be annoying or useful depending on your tastes. It was annoying at first to me but i got used to it.

An impressive list of additions and advancements indeed. But for my personal preference none of this extra eye candy suited me. Aero snap? Annoying. Aero shake.Not impressed. Jump lists…never cared about them or used them much. Action Center… meh. Windows Defender… I’ve got Malwarebytes! Bitlocker…don’t need it. Applocker… don’t need it. DirectAccess… can’t utilize that. Paint and Wordpad… a little different but I only ever used paint to paste photos in and hit CTRL+S to save them lol. As you can see I really don’t even need any of these features and thus 2008 is preferred.

Here’s a list of features available in Vista/2008 but not available in R2/7. Most of the features listed in this link are available on 2008 as well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_features_removed_in_Windows_7

[Author]

Posts