Server 2008 R2 is a powerful desktop operating system that can be used to power your business’s desktops. In this article, we will continue our installation and setup of Server 2008 R2, this time focusing on the desktop experience. In our first article, we covered the basics of installing and configuring Server 2008 R2 as a desktop OS. In this article, we will cover some of the more common tasks that users may want to perform on their systems. We will start with installing software and then move on to configuring settings and security. Installing Software: One of the first things you may want to do is install software that is specific to your business needs. For example, if you are using Server 2008 R2 as a mail server, you may want to install Microsoft Outlook 2007 or 2010. You can also install programs such as Adobe Photoshop or Microsoft Office 2010 if you need them. Configuring Settings: After you have installed the software and applications that your business needs, it is important to configure settings for each program so that they work correctly together. For example, if you are using Outlook 2007 or 2010 for emailing, make sure that your spam filtering settings are correct for those programs. You can also configure settings such as display options for programs such as Windows Media Player or Internet Explorer 9. Security: One of the most important aspects of using Server 2008 R2 as a desktop OS is ensuring that your systems are secure from unauthorized access by users who do not have appropriate permissions. You can use features such as Windows Firewall with Advanced Security or BitLocker Drive Encryption to help protect your systems from unauthorized access by users who do not have appropriate permissions. ..
In this four part mini-series we are going to look at using Server 2008 R2 as an everyday operating system. In this article we will help you get the OS installed, install the Windows Desktop Experience and get your wireless working.
Editor’s Note: this is obviously a very geeky topic, and the average user would want to stick with Windows 7. If you do a lot of server maintenance and other tasks, however, it could be useful to run Windows Server as your desktop.
Installation
Installing Server 2008 R2, can be done on almost any machine that can run Windows 7. The installation process is almost identical to that of Windows 7 as well, however if you are still a little bit unsure of the steps you can always check out our guide over here.
Installing the Windows Desktop Experience
The Windows Desktop Experience brings a whole bunch of stuff that is included with Windows 7, to Server 2008 R2. This makes it feel more like a Desktop OS, as opposed to a Server OS. To be more precise it installs the following components:
Windows Media Player Desktop themes Video for Windows Windows SideShow Windows Defender Disk Cleanup Sync Center Sound Recorder Character Map Snipping Tool
To add the Windows Desktop Experience open the Server Manager and right-click on Features and select add Feature from the context menu.
This will bring up a list of the Features that can be installed on Server 2008 R2, since we know exactly which we want, we can go ahead and check the Desktop Experience, this will bring up a required Features dialog, click on the Add Required Features button and we are good to go. Click next to continue.
After you have read the overview of your installation, you can click install.
The installation is very quick, once it has completed you will need to restart you machine. This can quickly be done by clicking on one of the links.
Once Windows begins Shutting Down it will add all the components to your installation.
That’s all there is to installing the Windows Desktop Experience, this will come in handy for future articles.
Why Wont My Wireless Work?
If you are following this guide on a laptop or even a desktop with a wireless card, you might be surprised to find that your wireless card is picked up and the driver gets installed but is disabled by default. To make things even worse when you try enable it, it just stays disabled. This is by design as you will almost never see a server using a wireless network, so they decided to make the WLAN AutoConfig Service completely optional. It can, however, be installed easily, again using the Features section of Server Manager. Once you have clicked on Add Features, scroll all the way down and select the Wireless LAN Service then click next and then install.
You should reboot your PC again at this point. Once you log back on to your PC you should see that your Wireless is now working.
You network icon should also change
This is just the tip of the iceberg, in the upcoming articles we will look at getting Aero themes, making the Sound work, enabling search, and fixing some annoyances.
RELATED: Using Server 2008 R2 as a Desktop OS: Themes (Part 2)
