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dragonmantank
Asked: 2010-03-18 15:02:34 +0800 CST

Which version of Windows Server 2008? [duplicate]

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Possible Duplicate:
Can you help me with my software licensing question?

One of the projects I'm working on is looking like we're going to need to migrate from CentOS 5.4 over to something else (we need to run Postgresql 8.3+, and CentOS/RHEL only support 8.1), and one of the options will be Windows Server.

Since 2008 R2 is out that's what I'm looking at. I'll need to run Postgres and Tomcat and don't really require anything that Windows has like IIS (if I can run Server Core, even better!). The other kicker is it will be virtualized through VMWare ESXI 4.0 so that we have three separate boxes: development, Quality, and Production servers.

From a licensing standpoint though, and I good enough with just the Web Server edition? Am I right in assuming that will be three licenses? Or should I just jump up to Enterprise so that I get 4 VM licenses?

windows-server-2008 tomcat vmware-esxi postgresql

2 Answers

  1. You really shouldn't move to Windows for your PostgreSQL server - you will get a lot worse performance and a harder to maintain system.

    But really, you can run PostgreSQL 8.3 or 8.4 just fine on CentOS 5.4. Packages are at yum.pgsqlrpms.org. CentOS/RHEL 5 is definitely one of the by far most common deployment platforms for PostgreSQL these days...

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  2. Best Answer

    Depends on pricing.

    • You need to license either physical or virtual processors. Now, you also need VM rights.
    • It may be cheaper to go with a web edition licensed per virtual processor (count processors in public vm), OR with a datacenter licensed per physical processor (of the vm).
    • In general that does not account for dev and test. Sorry - no SPLA here to rent.
    • For dev and test you leglly need proper licenses, but you may be able to use them from MSDN, which you may get cheap from Biszspark / Webspark programs. Or buy.

    So, I think cheapest is Web edition licensed per virtual server.

    Btw, do yourself a favour and drop as much of the Open Source stuff for Microsoft stuff as you can. You are probably looking for PHP anyway - so use PHP on IIS. Reason? LESS MAINTENANCE. You dont have to apt-get on Windows, and the Microsoft stuff (IIS, etc) has automated central updates. I wish that was that standardised for other software too, but it is not.

    Server core: Stay away unless you are a pro. Or willing to learn ;) Try it out - but expect going back to full server during trials. It is a lot more complicated to configure and a lot less people can help you out ;)

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