Using server 2003 as a workstation?

[Joswin]

What is there to know ?, enable DirectX install game and play.

I didn't mean how to play games i meant how it plays games ;) as in performance blah blah

But i was more joking than anything else :D

[John Veteran]

It plays games. (pause) ... :huh: What else matters if you want to play games? Gaming performance shouldn't be an issue on a server OS, if it is, don't spend over $1000 (or even a few hundred) on a new OS, get better hardware (Y)

[Joswin]

lol - Who buys software these days? ;) I get all my hardware off the back of a lorry too. ;)

Seriously though, you know what i mean :) the people that try out say Photoshop will be able to give first hand experience on if there is any noticable improvement in performance or if a certain game runs better or runs at all... i dunno whatever. I dont see how someone who uses Server 2003, Active Directory and maybe clicks something on the machine once a week could know this... that was all i was saying. It's very well understanding the OS as a server, but why does that mean they automatically know how well it performs with Quake3? :D

[Jason]

lol - Who buys software these days? ;) I get all my hardware off the back of a lorry too. ;)

Seriously though, you know what i mean :) the people that try out say Photoshop will be able to give first hand experience on if there is any noticable improvement in performance or if a certain game runs better or runs at all... i dunno whatever. I dont see how someone who uses Server 2003, Active Directory and maybe clicks something on the machine once a week could know this... that was all i was saying. It's very well understanding the OS as a server, but why does that mean they automatically know how well it performs with Quake3?  :D

They don't only click Active Directory Server Admins are constantly monitoring the performace of the server either via perfom (built in) or third party apps as well as many other things on a daily basis.

Edited May 17, 2004 by Jason

[Joswin]

Fair enough, but the servers in use ive seen were setup and then left without any maintenance. Infact some of them didnt even have monitors - only hooked it up if something went down which was not often (once a year maybe max). If they did check it, it was done remotley and not at the workstation itself.

Oh well :)

[Jason]

Fair enough, but the servers in use ive seen were setup and then left without any maintenance. Infact some of them didnt even have monitors - only hooked it up if something went down which was not often (once a year maybe max). If they did check it, it was done remotley and not at the workstation itself.

Oh well :)

Yes you normally "Term" as in Terminal Services in to them so you don't need a monitor on them.

[Joswin]

There you go then :) the servers i saw though were not exactley mission critical either...

Oh well :) each to their own i guess

I partley agree with some of the comments about people who dont know what they are doing, and who just download it because it says 2003 in the title shouldnt be using it btw... when they come here asking the simplest of things or stupid stuff like "why wont xxx game work" or "why wont my gamepad work" - if they have to ask and cant discover it for themselves they shouldnt be using it, definatley NOT if their primary goal is games anyway - I mean if u spend most of ur time playing games then the OS really dont make much odd's your not exactley making full use of it that often. ;)

[sandman45654]

Lets see WinS2k3 in action!!!

Here is a list of everything I had running at the time I took the screenshot.

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running Windows Server 2003 Web Edition, running PaintShop Pro 8

+

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running Mandrake Linux 10, running Gimp

+

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running Sound Forge 7, encoding an audio file into Wma file

+

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running Vegas 4, converting an mpeg file into a Divx file

+

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running Dreamweaver 2004 MX

+

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running Photoshop 7 with a couple of images open

+

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running Microsoft Office (Word) 2003

+

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running PaintShop Pro 8

+

A little eye candy for the guys :)

Click here to see the screenshot

When I was done with that I fired up Call of Duty :rofl:

Now why wouldn't you want an OS that can do all of this??

[frease]

Lets see WinS2k3 in action!!!

Here is a list of everything I had running at the time I took the screenshot.

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running Windows Server 2003 Web Edition, running PaintShop Pro 8

+

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running Mandrake Linux 10, running Gimp

+

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running Sound Forge 7, encoding an audio file into Wma file

+

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running Vegas 4, converting an mpeg file into a Divx file

+

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running Dreamweaver 2004 MX

+

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running Photoshop 7 with a couple of images open

+

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running Microsoft Office (Word) 2003

+

Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition running PaintShop Pro 8

+

A little eye candy for the guys :)

Click here to see the screenshot

When I was done with that I fired up Call of Duty :rofl:

Now why wouldn't you want an OS that can do all of this??

Wow... how much ram do you have to run that many programs at once?

[sandman45654]

I've got one gig of ddr memory.

When I had all that running I still had 150 megs free. There could have had more free memory but I assigned 256 megs to both Mandrake and WinS2k3we.

[Joel]

Wow... how much ram do you have to run that many programs at once?

Don't need much to have opened them and not really be using them. ;)

[sandman45654]

Don't need much to have opened them and not really be using them. ;)

They were all being used. Dreamweaver had a 107k page open, Word had a 30k file open. Not to mention 3 operating systems running. You just can't see it all in one 1280x1024 screenshot. I was still surfing the web and switching between the progs/OS's with no problems whatsoever. When I took the screenshot I wanted the main cpu/ram hungry windows in the front. Ms Virtual PC makes taking a decent screenshot hard, if your not careful one of the guest OS's will capture the screenie.

Silly_walk is there anything specific you'd like to see?

This is what WinS2k3 looks like with many unused apps open.

Edited May 18, 2004 by sandman45654

[Frank]

I would like to see the WINVER box in those screenshots...

[sandman45654]

One Winver coming right up!

[Joswin]

Is it just me or dont those links work right now :(

[sandman45654]

The images are still up over here. Are you still having problems RobertH?

[Joswin]

They work fine for me now :) ta

[GrandMasterFlash]

Heres another convertion page for all of you out there that want to run 2k3 as a Workstation..

http://www.<< spam >>/win2k3/

;) i have been running 2k3 as a workstation for about 5 months now and i have not had any problems with compatibility... just to me i think its harded to get somethings to leave... such as Trojans and such... but there are scanners such as AVG and Norton 7.6 & 8.x Corprates that work perfectly fine on 2k3 server..

if there should be an alliance there should be one for the people who know that you can do anything that you want with what you have... and if you cant get it to work... try starting over and working around a problem in a diffrent way... i disagree with all of you people flaming out cause 2k3 is a server OS... well.. who cares... it is stable.. it is reliable... and it is convertable... so what is your beef... people can do what they want.. if microsoft did not want people to use 2k3 server as a workstation then they would have released a 2k3 workstation version... but since they know that they are droping something into a market where people are now smart enough to go about converting something themselves.. they didnt...

[GrandMasterFlash]

gaa... the link is Convertion for w2k3 server to workstation

[Jason]

Heres another convertion page for all of you out there that want to run 2k3 as a Workstation..

<a href='http://www.<< spam >>/win2k3/' target='_blank'>http://www.<< spam >>/win2k3/</a>

;) i have been running 2k3 as a workstation for about 5 months now and i have not had any problems with compatibility... just to me i think its harded to get somethings to leave... such as Trojans and such... but there are scanners such as AVG and Norton 7.6 & 8.x Corprates that work perfectly fine on 2k3 server..

if there should be an alliance there should be one for the people who know that you can do anything that you want with what you have... and if you cant get it to work... try starting over and working around a problem in a diffrent way... i disagree with all of you people flaming out cause 2k3 is a server OS... well.. who cares... it is stable.. it is reliable... and it is convertable... so what is your beef... people can do what they want.. if microsoft did not want people to use 2k3 server as a workstation then they would have released a 2k3 workstation version... but since they know that they are droping something into a market where people are now smart enough to go about converting something themselves.. they didnt...

People can do what they want if they purchased it, did you purchase it ?

[+BudMan MVC]

Now why wouldn't you want an OS that can do all of this??

Um - exactly what are you doing there, that can't be done using XP?? I have run a complete test network - 2k3 server, NT4 server running exchange - couple of work stations, 2k, NT, linux for migration to AD testing. All run on virtual machines, on a XP workstation.

I see nothing from your screen shot that can not be done using XP.

[Garrett Socling]

People can do what they want if they purchased it, did you purchase it ?

You mean that everyone didn't get a Promo NFR Premium Ed?

Why not? It wasn't hard, requirements weren't steep, M$ wants everyone to try it out, you know, ya'll pimp their product and turn some tricks.

[sandman45654]

Um - exactly what are you doing there, that can't be done using XP?? 

I see nothing from your screen shot that can not be done using XP.

Sure Xp can do these things, but WinS2k3 does them much better. Unfortunately, things like resource management do not show very well in screenshots.

The bottom line is that WinS2k3 is a better OS than Xp. If you haven't used Windows Server 2003 yet I recommend downloading the 180 trial version. Try the same things you've done on Xp on WinS2k3 and see if you can notice any difference.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003...al/evalkit.mspx

[+BudMan MVC]

The bottom line is that WinS2k3 is a better OS than Xp. If you haven't used Windows Server 2003 yet I recommend downloading the 180 trial version. Try the same things you've done on Xp on WinS2k3 and see if you can notice any difference.

Have I used it yet? Um yeah - quite a few of my servers are 2k3, and as time permits - the remaining NT and 2K servers that are not retired will be migrated to 2k3.

But what possible use do I have for a $400+ Server OS on my desktop?? It adds no features I need on my desktop, but you say it has better resource management. SWEET, since I am not having any resource issues with my current paid for OS - let my go fork over a few hundred dollars for an OS I will not notice any difference in with the day to day use of my machine.

But man that trial for 180 days is tempting ;) Man how sweet would that be, I can wipe out my current system - spend a few days getting it set back up the way I want it. Spend some money on software - since some of my current tools like defrag, partition management and virus protection will not run on 2k3, etc.. Where do I go again for this trial???

Oh wait, I just remembered - guess what. My desktop is really my production machine - I do all my day to day email, surfing, work, gaming, etc.. etc.. on it - so yeah its a production type box -- and it says right there in the trial EULA;

---

DESCRIPTION OF OTHER RIGHTS AND LIMITATIONS

Not for Production Use. You may not demonstrate, test, examine, evaluate or otherwise use the Software in a live operating environment or with data that has not been sufficiently backed up.

---

Oh what the hell who reads those EULA things anyway!! I can spend the next 180 playing with windows 2k3, which is chock full of all kinds of features I have no use for and then what the hell blow off a car payment so I can be legal on my desktop OS - oh wait I was. Why am I doing this again -- Oh yeah, so I can run 5 virtual machines - with paintshop loaded in 1, another loaded with photoshop, etc.. etc... Oh wait I can do that now.

Why exactly am I doing this again?? ;) Other than to give MS more money - and what I will be in the 'in' geek crowd cuz I run a $400+ OS to surf the web and read email, play a games with, etc.. Which everyone will know I got though not so legit means, or think I'm a complete MORON - cuz who in their right mind would pay MS some $400+ dollars for a OS that provides no new features needed for the desktop user. And then use that OS as their desktop OS??

Yeah I know - just another rant, making noise about 2k3 being a server OS, not a desktop OS, yada yada yada - but I feel better ;)

[AltecXP]

ummm basicly it just said that you shouldnt use it when if it want down(trial is up) it would leave you screwed