Windows Server 2008 Enterprise delivers an enterprise-class platform for deploying business-critical applications. Help improve availability with clustering and hot-add processor capabilities. Help improve security with consolidated identity management features. Reduce infrastructure costs by consolidating applications with virtualization licensing rights. Windows Server 2008 Enterprise provides the foundation for a highly dynamic, scalable IT infrastructure.
Windows Server 2008 Enterprise delivers high availability, increased performance, and superior business value. Organizations also benefit from a highly productive infrastructure that is optimized for business-critical applications and services.
High Availability
Providing uninterrupted business services to employees, vendors, and partners around the clock has become a critical business factor for global businesses. Remote employees and international customers and partners need to have continuous access to systems and data. A disruption in services can result in diminished productivity and lost opportunities.
Windows Server 2008 Enterprise provides high availability for mission-critical applications such as databases, messaging systems, and file and print services through such features as failover clustering, Server Core, fault-tolerant memory synchronization, and cross-file replication (DFS-R).
Failover Clustering
Windows Server 2008 Enterprise offers robust, rapid failover clustering that is easy to set up and manage. The multiple servers (or nodes) in a failover cluster remain in constant communication; if a node becomes unavailable (due to failure or planned maintenance, for example), another node immediately begins providing the service. Users’ access continues, uninterrupted.
- Failover clustering in Windows Server 2008 Enterprise supports up to 16 nodes and provides:
- Dynamic failover for both planned and unplanned server downtime.
- Scalability by adding nodes as your needs increase.
- Geographically dispersed clustering for even more disaster-tolerant clusters.
Server Core
High availability is also about avoiding downtime before it occurs. Windows Server 2008 Enterprise enables you to take advantage of Server Core, a minimal installation of Windows Server 2008. With Server Core, you can remove the functions and drivers that are nonessential to your workloads, leaving only the necessary subsystems required for the supported server roles. This capability provides you with a more reliable, secure server that is optimized for running the most demanding applications and services, and that requires less patching and servicing.
Fault-Tolerant Memory Synchronization
Windows Server 2008 Enterprise provides fault-tolerant memory synchronization, which lets systems request that the operating system copy a current instance of Windows to another system. The two identical memory images can then operate in lock step, providing complete hardware fault tolerance (similar to RAID 1 mirroring for hard drives).
Cross-File Replication
Windows Server 2008 Enterprise features cross-file replication, which can scan a group of files and replicate a single section of data to several files. By replicating similar files only once, cross-file replication can result in significant reduction in replication traffic across your network.
Cost-Effective Virtualization
Many organizations find that patch management, resource utilization, maintenance costs, and server sprawl are among their biggest challenges. Server virtualization technology can aid in meeting all of these challenges and lets you consolidate your resources and realize significant infrastructure and management cost savings.
Windows Server 2008 Enterprise provides an ideal platform for enterprise-scale virtualization through Hyper-V, a flexible, high-performance virtualization technology.
Windows Server 2008 Enterprise licenses include the use right to run up to four additional virtual instances of Windows Server with one server that is licensed with Windows Server 2008 Enterprise. This gives you a cost-effective way to virtualize and deliver significant value to your organization by:
- Logically consolidating servers and streamlining management.
- Reducing the costs associated with power, cooling, and data center space.
- Using virtual machines for high availability, further reducing server sprawl
Further advantages can be gained by utilizing Quick Migration – a new cluster functionality in Windows Server 2008 Enterprise to give you greater control over your virtual machine environment. If a host server requires scheduled or unscheduled downtime, another server is ready to quickly begin hosting the virtual machines.
Increased Scalability
As people access information from increasingly heterogeneous environments, devices, and systems, there is a constant need not only to securely make information available, but also to increase productivity. IT infrastructures must remain flexible and scalable to help support, manage, and secure expanded functionality, an influx of additional users and locations, and increasingly robust applications.
Windows Server 2008 Enterprise provides the headroom to meet spikes in demand for business-critical applications, enabling you to maintain or increase productivity as your mobile workforce expands.
Windows Server 2008 Enterprise provides:
- Support for up to eight processors to handle peak demands.
- Memory capacity of 2 terabytes on 64-bit operating systems (or 64 GB on 32-bit operating systems) to support resource-intensive applications.
- Support for an unlimited number of virtual private network (VPN) connections.
- Authentication and authorization for an unlimited number of network access service and network policy server connections.
Windows Server 2008 Enterprise also enhances scalability through Hot Add Memory, a feature that enables banks of memory to be added to a computer and made instantly available to the operating system and applications as part of the normal memory pool without rebooting.
Enhanced Security with Advanced Identity and Access Management
Today, employees are doing more business in more places—and on a wider variety of devices. At the same time, information loss, whether via outright theft or accidental leakage, is a growing concern for many enterprises.
Windows Server 2008 Enterprise delivers advanced identity and access management with features that productively secure remote access to keep people productive while securely managing the flow of data in a security-enhanced environment.
The new authentication architecture in Windows Server 2008 Enterprise helps you guard against malicious software attacks and helps prevent data and confidential information from being distributed inappropriately.
Windows Server 2008 Enterprise enables you to:
Provide federated access to internal resources for external users through Active Directory® Federation Services (AD FS).
Improve security features and more easily ensure regulatory and privacy compliance with Advanced Certificate Services.
Gather more audit detail for management and compliance with Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS).
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