Where have I been all year? Server 2008 is exactly what I need.
Server 2008 is a fantastic Desktop OS. My laptop came with Vista on a 2.4 Core2 Duo, 3GB RAM and a 250GB HD, but I was never happy with its performance.
Don't be fooled by the word 'Server'. All server services can be disabled using the useful guide, giving you 'Workstation 2008' - what Vista should have been.
Vista has always been very stable and I've never had any probs with it, but it is just so goddamn slow. From Day one, Vista was noticeably sluggish compared to XP. Simple things like moving or deleting files seemed to take twice as long.
I tried everything to speed up Vista. A clean install, used the Window Classic theme, disabled practically every service and startup program, leaving only the critical ones. But still, I could never seem to get it to be as snappy as my dual-boot XP.
Thanks to this thread I have discovered Server 2008. I downloaded it yesterday and followed the manual over at win2008workstation.com, and holy crap, it is SO much faster than Vista - snappy as hell.
On boot up, 2008 uses 401MB RAM (on the button). Vista used almost double that my laptop, even with zero startup programs and minimal services.
Many blogs say there is a 10% - 20% increase in performance, but I think there's at least a twofold increase on my laptop.
Windows Explorer works much faster now - before, I'd be waiting for a few seconds for the delete dialogue to appear, but now it's instant. Moving files across folders and drives is noticeably faster, too.
I've installed all of my Web Dev programs onto 2008: Dreamweaver, Photoshop, Illustrator; now I just seem to be getting a lot more work done - no more waiting for Windows Explorer and much less drive swapping.
Many blogs say that there is no difference between Vista and Server 2008, but they obviously haven't tested it. There is a lot less bloat under the hood and a huge performance incease, for me, anyway.
If you find Vista to be a little bit too sluggish on your hardware, I recommend Server 2008.
Server 2008 is a fantastic Desktop OS. My laptop came with Vista on a 2.4 Core2 Duo, 3GB RAM and a 250GB HD, but I was never happy with its performance.
Don't be fooled by the word 'Server'. All server services can be disabled using the useful guide, giving you 'Workstation 2008' - what Vista should have been.
Vista has always been very stable and I've never had any probs with it, but it is just so goddamn slow. From Day one, Vista was noticeably sluggish compared to XP. Simple things like moving or deleting files seemed to take twice as long.
I tried everything to speed up Vista. A clean install, used the Window Classic theme, disabled practically every service and startup program, leaving only the critical ones. But still, I could never seem to get it to be as snappy as my dual-boot XP.
Thanks to this thread I have discovered Server 2008. I downloaded it yesterday and followed the manual over at win2008workstation.com, and holy crap, it is SO much faster than Vista - snappy as hell.
On boot up, 2008 uses 401MB RAM (on the button). Vista used almost double that my laptop, even with zero startup programs and minimal services.
Many blogs say there is a 10% - 20% increase in performance, but I think there's at least a twofold increase on my laptop.
Windows Explorer works much faster now - before, I'd be waiting for a few seconds for the delete dialogue to appear, but now it's instant. Moving files across folders and drives is noticeably faster, too.
I've installed all of my Web Dev programs onto 2008: Dreamweaver, Photoshop, Illustrator; now I just seem to be getting a lot more work done - no more waiting for Windows Explorer and much less drive swapping.
Many blogs say that there is no difference between Vista and Server 2008, but they obviously haven't tested it. There is a lot less bloat under the hood and a huge performance incease, for me, anyway.
If you find Vista to be a little bit too sluggish on your hardware, I recommend Server 2008.
