First time with windows server 2012

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firstserverpcbuild

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Jun 29, 2013
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I am a student building a home lab and have a computer that I want to put windows server 2012 on. It has one three core processor and 12 gig of ram. In trying to learn about networking and windows server 2012 I was going to put windows server 2012 on it and do 2 vms with windows 7 pro as clients, but I am not sure if I can put windows server on the other vms and use 2 desk tops for the clients. And since I am a student getting it from dreamspark maybe I should get the data center version instead of standard. One more when they talk about the VM's per host are they talking about how many times you can put windows server on one physical host or how many VM's that you can have a clients. Thanks for any suggestions and clarification,
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All versions of Windows Server include a licence to use the Microsoft Hyper-V virtualization software. You may install as many virtual machines as you wish, but you are responsible for observing the licence requirements of the operating systems that are installed on each VM.
A single Server 2012 R2 licence may be used for one physical host, as well as two guests provided that both of the guests are run on the host. You may also run additional guests on...
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Pinhedd

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Aug 7, 2007
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Hi!

First off, you're going to have a lot of fun mucking around with Windows Server. It can be frustrating at times, but you'll learn a lot.

Second, rather than using Windows Server 2012 you should use Windows Server 2012 R2. Server 2012 is based off of Windows 8, and Server 2012 R2 is based off of Windows 8.1. You can get licences for each through Dreamspark.

Down to business about what the "vm limit" means. In the enterprise sector it's becoming increasingly common to install a bare operating system on the metal and then install one or more instances of that same operating system again as virtual machines. This way, if a catastrophic error occurs on the virtual machine, it can easily be recovered by connecting to the host.

Windows Server (and RHEL for comparison) both provide for this in their licences. The standard edition allows for one installation on the host as well as the installation of two virtual machines using the same licence. There is a limitation to this though, the operating system on the host must be provisioned solely for running the guest operating systems.

What may be confusing you is that this is a limitation on the total number of deployments that the operating system licence provides for, not the total number of virtual machines that may be created. You may install Server 2012 on the host, as well as two additional Server 2012 guests using the same (standard) licence. If you wish to use additional Server 2012 guests, you will need additional Standard licences. Datacenter editions of Server 2012 are not subject to this limitation, the entire server may be provisioned with as many Server 2012 guest operating systems as the administrator wishes. You may also install other guest operating systems including Linux, Solaris, and FreeBSD as you wish; the number of deployments is subject to the licence for each piece of software.
 
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firstserverpcbuild

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Jun 29, 2013
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Thank you for your response and I am learning a lot just trying to figure out what to download. Just a few more clarifications please.

If I use standard and install server 2012 r2 and provision it for running guest operating systems and put two VM's running server 2012 r2. Then on the same system with standard put e.g. two more VM's running winn7 pro as clients or would I need Datacenter in order to do that?
And If I do have VM clients as well as a desk top and a laptop to connect to the server will I have to have additional licensing, like CAL's. since this is educational purposes will Microsoft let me do with out CAL's? if needed.
How many VM's do you think I can run with 12 gig ram? I could get 4 gig more.
How do you think I should set this lab up with what I have in order to just start up and expand for more learning?

Once again I have one computer with 12 gig of ram running winn 8 pro (which I think I need in order to download the server2012 r2 from dream spark) and I was wondering If I would be able to reuse the winn 8 Pro on a VM?

I have a laptop currently running vista, and a desktop running XP with plans on upgrading them to winn 7 or 8 pro. and if this a good idea, will I need CAL's and can I get around that being a student?

This is a lot of fun and Thanks again for your answers and suggestions

P.S. I think I should work toward learning clusters and is that what a server host with two VM's running server is anyway? and if I only ran one VM can I put multiple rolls on the same server for learning since I do not have a lot of computing going on?
 
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Pinhedd

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Aug 7, 2007
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All versions of Windows Server include a licence to use the Microsoft Hyper-V virtualization software. You may install as many virtual machines as you wish, but you are responsible for observing the licence requirements of the operating systems that are installed on each VM.
A single Server 2012 R2 licence may be used for one physical host, as well as two guests provided that both of the guests are run on the host. You may also run additional guests on the host as well, subject to the licencing requirements of each operating system that you install. In this case, you would need one Server 2012 R2 standard licence to account for the host and two of the guests, as well as two Windows 7 Professional licences.
If you had the Datacenter edition you may install as many Server 2012 R2 guests as you have the time and resources to deploy provided that all of the guests are installed on the same host. You may of course install other guest operating systems on the Server 2012 R2 Datacenter edition, but you are responsible for observing the licence requirements of each of those software products. Using your example above, you would still need two Windows 7 Professional licences.



CALs are a real pain in the rear to figure out. Microsoft has been dodgy about really clarifying what's needed and in the past they haven't been enforced at all. In general though a CAL is needed for each remote user that is concurrently accessing the Windows Server using Windows Authentication. Anonymous authentication and Forms authentication do not require CALs. Some services such as Terminal Services may require additional CALs. In any case, as a student with Dreamspark access you've got free reign to play around with it to your heart's content. You are bound by a personal/educational use limitation clause though. As long as you observe this and don't try and sell multi-thousand dollar software products that you obtained for free Microsoft is happy to let you do whatever you wish including ignoring CAL requirements.



If it's a retail copy of Windows 8 Professional you absolutely can. If it's an OEM copy you should also be able to reuse it on the same PC, but you may have trouble activating it. This can usually be resolved through a phonecall though. Windows 8 is substantially less picky than Windows 7 in this regard so it may not be an issue at all.



All editions of Windows Server that require CALs (web server and some other special editions do not require them) ship with at least 5 CALs. As far as I know though, the base Authentication CALs have not ever been enforced. It's wise for high profile companies to observe CAL requirements for legal reasons, but as a student you can safely ignore them. In any case, connecting to the server as an Administrator via RDP does not require a CAL though as far as I know so if you are the sole user you should be just fine.



You're most welcome!
 
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