Windows Server 2008 Features: Windows Server 2008 ships with many new features and improvements that takes Windows Server to a new level making it the most flexible and feature rich server platforms on the planet.

 

Below I have briefly outlined some of Windows Server 2008’s many features and improvements.

 

Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V (Windows Server Virtualization)  

 

Hyper-V is Windows Server 2008s Hypervisor based virtualization technology that provides the virtual infrastructure & enterprise management tools to manage this virtual infrastructure.

 

For those new to the technology the Hypervisor is a layer that sits directly on top of your hardware allowing multiple operating systems to be run on a single Server independently of each other. In a traditional virtualization model your virtual operating systems ran with on top of the host operating system, with Hyper-v this is no longer the case, allowing better management, and utilization of hardware resources.

 

A site note Hyper-v will only run on newer systems that have the latest Intel & AMD CPU and is only available on the x64 version of Windows Server 2008

 

 

Windows Server 2008 Feature Hyper-v 

 

Windows Server 2008 Server Core

 

Windows Server 2008 introduces the new option Server Core allowing a system to be managed via only the command line interface (No Graphical User Interface GUI). The amount of CPU and memory load placed on your hardware by a graphical user interface should not be underestimated.  

 

Another benefit of Windows Sever 2008 Server Core is the reduced application footprint that improves systems security. Windows Server 2008 Server Core only supports the following 9 roles Virtualization Hyper-v, AD, DHCP, AD LDS, DNS, File, Print, Web Server IIS, and WMS

 

Improving security and the number of operations which can be performed on a server is of great benefit, especially for organizations that have hundreds if not thousands of servers.

 

Active Directory & Group Policy Improvements

  Read Only Domain Controller (RODC)

 

The Windows Server 2008 Read Only Domain Controller (RODC) feature gives organizations the ability to deploy domain controllers into branch offices that are in effect “read only”, making your domain more secure should the branch office RODC be compromised or become corrupt.

 

Some key features of a Read Only Domain Controller:

 

• Replication only occurs to a Read Only Domain Controller not from a RODC

• Logon times a greatly improved

• The Windows Server 2008 Read Only Domain Controller Password Replication Policy allows the administrator to decide which user password are allowed or not allowed to replicate to this DC, this further strengthens the security of the RODC, by not allowing passwords of Administrators, other high privilege users or groups to be replicated to the branch office.

  

For a further explanation of the Windows Server 2008 Read Only Domain Controller feature you can read my article titled  Windows Server 2008 Read Only Domain Controller RODC

 

 Restartable Active Directory Directory Services

 

This nifty feature allows an administrator to restart Active Directory services  on a domain controller without restarting the server, greatly reducing the downtime when fixing or troubleshooting Active Directory Service issues on a Domain Controller

 

  Group Policy Improvements

 

Network Access Protection & Branch Offices features in Windows Vista are controllable from Windows Server 2008 Group Policy, Along with Domain Granular Password settings. Group Policy Objects are now indexed for faster searching.

 

BitLocker Drive Encryption

 

The Windows Server 2008 BitLocker drive Encryption system allows servers drives (including system drive) to be encrypted, and therefore protected against drive and system theft. The BitLocker encryption system will be of great benefit for servers in branch offices where physical server security is not as ridged as servers located in the organizations main office or data center.

 

This technology was first introduced in Windows Vista and has now been adapted for server use.

 

Terminal Services

 

Terminal Services in Windows Server 2008 has been greatly improved with the introduction of RDP 6.0, with features such as application publishing technology called Terminal Services Remote Programs (previously seen in other products like Citrix Presentation Server), Terminal Services Gateway & Terminal Services Web Access, allowing users to connect via RDP over HTTPS in the case of Terminal Services Gateway and users to connect via a web browser in the case of Terminal Services Web Access.

 

Server Manager

 

The Window Server 2008 Server Manager feature is basically a console or dashboard where all the day to day server administration can be performed, no matter if you are a non-regular system administrator, one of those that have a different main duty and are elected to look after the branch server, or an experienced administrator the new interface is very intuitive and lays everything in an easy to access manner, it’s a real time saver.

 

 

 

Windows Server 2008 Features Server Manager Console/Dashboard 

 

Disk Management & Storage Improvements

 

Have you ever faced a disk space shortage on a critical system and wanted to extend or resize a partition on the fly without a reboot? I put my hand up and say yes, Windows Server 2008 now allows you to do this, and this feature also applies to a system volume.

 

Shadow copy has also been extended allowing block-level backup with support for Network shares, optical and Windows Recovery Environments.

Windows Server 2008 Active Directory Domain Services ADDS Setup walkthrough: The release of Windows Server 2008 has brought about some new options when promoting a server to be a Domain Controller. This article will step you though these advanced options which are found in the new Windows Server 2008 Active Directory Domain Services setup.

The first item that should be noted is that the binaries required for the Windows Server 2008 Active Directory Domain Services ADDS Dcpromo setup are no longer installed out of the box, therefore when the DCPromo command is run the first thing that happened is the existence of these binaries are checked and then installed when not found, after this a reboot is required after which the DCpromo can be ran to start the configuration process. The install of the Windows Server 2008 Active Directory Domain Services binaries can also be kicked off by installing this role using the Window Server 2008 add role wizard.

 

On starting the DCPromo process after the ADDS binaries have been installed you will get see the following window

Note the option Use advanced mode installation, this advanced mode install gives you additional options that previously were only available via a DCPromo command line switch, these additional options are not displayed when installing the first forest root DC, but only displayed when installing additional DCs into an existing forest.

 

 

The option to add a DC into an existing forest, to create a new domain in an existing forest or to create a new domain in a new forest, as seen in figure 2.

 

Figure 3 prompts for the Name of a domain in the forest to join, and credentials to use to join this domain.

 

 

In figure 4 selecting the domain for this additional DC

 

Selecting a site for the new Domain Controller is seen in figure 5

 

Additional options for this domain controller, give the option to install with DNS Services, Global Catalogue, and read-only domain controller (RODC)

 

If you are installing this DC into a remote site with slow WAN speeds, you might want to install from media to speed up the dcpromo process.

 

Selecting the DC to replicate from, note this window is displayed even if you select to install from media, as the changes since the install from media files were created still need to be replicated.

 

Selecting the location of your ADDS database folder, log files, and sysvol folder

 

Setting the active directory services restore mode administrator password

 

 

Following this the install completes and you are prompted to reboot your server.

 

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DHCP in Windows Server is one of those little thought about services that do not get much attention unless you are setting up a new DHCP server, configuring a DHCP scope, or migrating to another physical server.

 So just how do you go about migrating a Server or Scope from Windows NT Server, Windows 2000 Server or Windows 2003 server to a new Windows 2003 Server? The tools used and procedure depends on what version of Windows you are migrating from.

If you are Migrating from either Windows NT Server 4.0 or Windows 2000 Server DHCPEXIM is used for the export and netsh used for the import into Windows  Server 2003 where as if you are going from Windows Server 2003 to Windows Server 2003 netsh is used for both the export and import.

The entire procedure involves the following steps:

·         Compact the DHCP Database (Only required for Windows NT and Windows 2000)

·         Export DHCP Database & DHCP Configuration (Windows NT 4.0 and 2000 Server DHCPEXIM) ( Windows  Server 2003 netsh)

·         Import DHCP Configuration and Database into Windows Server 2003 (Use Netsh) 

 

Compact the DHCP Database

 

This first step is only required for Windows NT 4.0 and Windows 2000 Server and is outlined below:

 

1.       You first need to stop the DHCP Server Service this can be achieved by running the following command from the command prompt.  (Start Run CMD Press enter)

Net stop dhcpserver  <press enter>

 

2.       This second step involves running the jetpack command against your DHCP Database, open a command prompt (Start Run CMD Press enter) and run the following commands

Cd %systemroot%\system32\dhcp     <press enter>

Jetpack dhcp.mdb TempFileName.mdb <press enter>

 

 

Figure 1: Compacting the DHCP.mdb Database

 

Export the DHCP Database

 

This part is broken down into two sections Exporting the DHCP Database from Windows NT 4.0/ Windows 2000 Server and Exporting the DHCP Database from Windows Server 2003

 

Exporting the DHCP Database from NT 4.0 and Windows 2000 Server

 

In the entire process of migrating a DHCP server the export of the DHCP Database for both NT 4.0 and Windows 2000 Server requires use of the Server Resource Kit tool DHCPEXIM, DHCPEXIM is also available as a separate download from the following URL:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/927229

First begin by downloading and installing DHCPEXIM.

 

Once installed run DHCPEXIM.exe from the following location C:\Program Files\Resource Kit  you would be presented the start window as seen below in figure 2

 

1.       As shown in figure 2 below select Export configuration of the local service to a file

 

Figure 2: DHCP Export Import Tool start Window

 

 

2.       On the export to file window (figure 3 below) select the path and name of the export file.

 

Figure 3: DHCP Export to file window

3.      Finally as seen in figure 4 select the scope/s that you want to migrate, if you are migrating the entire server then select all scopes. Also ensure that you check the checkbox Disable the selected scopes on local machine before export, then click Export.

 

Figure 4: DHCPEXIM Scope Selection Window

 

If you are exporting all of the scopes you may want to consider disabling the DHCP Server Service, so that the service will no longer start.

 

 

Exporting the DHCP Database from a Windows Server 2003 DHCP Server

 

To export the DHCP Database from a Windows Server 2003 DHCP server is performed via the use of the netsh command, as follows:

 

1.       Open a command prompt Start in the Run box type cmd press Enter

2.       In the command prompt type the following command

Netsh dhcp server export c:\temp\dhcpServerName.txt all <press enter>

               

You have now successfully exported the DHCP database and configuration from Windows Server 2003, copy this export text file to your import server and you can continue to the Import section below,

 

Importing the DHCP Database and configuration into a Windows Server 2003 DHCP Server

 

To start this task requires that you have the DHCP Server Service installed.

 

1.       First ensure that you have the DHCP Server Service installed, this service is started.

 

2.       Open a Command Prompt (Start Run Type cmd Press enter)

 

3.       Type and run the following command in the command prompt

 

Netsh dhcp server import c:\temp\dhcpServerName.txt all  <Press Enter>

 

4.       Finally open the DHCP Admin tool and check all scopes if all is ok, in the DHCP Admin tool where you see the server name right click and select Authorize as shown in figure5 below

Figure 5: Authorize DHCP Server

 

You have now completed migrating your DHCP Server, please post any comments or suggestions below. In addition if you have any article suggestions please send them to me via the contact link/form.

 

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The Network location feature in Windows Vista is really just an easy way to customize Vistas firewall, based on if you trust (Private) or don’t trust (Public) the computers around you. In reality there are three Network Location settings Private, Public and Domain. The domain setting you don’t really need to worry about as it is configured for business/enterprise PCs that are on an Active Directory Domain, if your PC is on an Active Directory Domain then you won’t be able to change the Network Location Setting, if it’s not on a Domain it won’t affect you at all.

How do I decide if I should chose the Private or Public Network Location?

Private Network Location If you are in your own home which is behind your routers firewall and the only computers on your network are your own, then you would trust these other PCs so you should set Vistas Network Location to Private, thus allowing your PC to be discovered and for its resources to be accessed by your other PCs on your network.

Public Network Location If you were travelling or using your PC away from home for instance in your Airlines Club Lounge, you would not and should not trust the other PCs on this network so you should set Vistas Network location to Public. This will make your PC/Laptop fairly secure on the network, and less likely to be hacked.

For each new/separate network you connect to Vista is intelligent enough to ask you each time if you would like to set the network location to either Public or Private.

 

How Can I Change the Network Location Setting Once it has Already Been Set?

To change Vistas Network Location Setting go to the Vista Start Icon (as shown in figure 1 below)

 

Figure 1 The Vista Start Icon

Click Network | Network and Sharing Center |Customize Next to the Network you want to Change (as shown in Figure 2 below)

 

Figure 2 "Vista Network and Sharing Center"

You will be presented with the Set Network Location window (as shown in Figure 3 below) now just select either Public or Private and click Next then click close, and you are all done changing your network location.

Figure 3 "Vista Set Network Location Window"

Thanks for reading my first article on WindowsIS.com, I have many new articles planned in both the windows client and server areas, so drop past the main page at http://WindowsIS.com

If you are interested in Microsoft Exchange Server then drop past my original website http://ExchangeIS.com

Please feel free to leave a comment about this article or contribute your experiences with the Windows Network Location feature. I love to hear what you have to say.