How to use Windows Server as Workstation

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Some of you are in between two stuff of choosing between a Server and Workstation. There is a big difference between both. A workstation is just a client system for your person work while a Server is a an dedicated machine for prescribed task. So here when we buy system it becomes our choice what to for. There is an option where you can use an server operating system on workstation as an regular machine and then after sometime you can switch back to the original state you want. This will make your job much easier and better. There are some number of options which you need to disable and some configuration settings that you have to manage.

It is also right to say that there is an noticeable differences between Windows XP Professional and a server operating system. I will stick with Windows XP because of more stability. You just need to disabled some by default features which are not really needed in your workstation. It become mandatory to disable the desktop themes and other stuff for better performance of your server. Sometime even sound is stopped for gaining more performance. On the web there is lot of materials that can guide yoy on how to make this system little closer to the user but in particular it is working on server operating system. I had mentioned here some minimum stuff which is needed to do.

Most current operating systems include desktop networking capabilities and allows access to multiple users. Typical applications of workstations or desktop low may include word processing, spreadsheet and program financial management. Workstations in high-level, applications can include graphic design or computer management and more, as mentioned earlier. A disk less workstation is a kind special computer designed to run on a network . As its name implies, has no hard drive but includes monitor , keyboard, memory, starting instructions in ROM and a network card . The software used to establish a connection to the network is loaded from a ROM chip located on NIC.

Optimizing Windows Server 2003

1. The first step you have to do is disabled the Manage Your Server screen on your startup. This appears each time immediately after booting the PC. To do this you can see a checkbox below where you have to remove the tick.

2. By default to increase the performance of Windows Server most less applications and least settings are enabled. Windows Server 2003 is somewhat similar to Windows XP with similar features. The server operating system also has the ability to use desktop themes, but it is disabled. You have to enable the same. For that click on Start > Run and then type services.msc. In the list of service tick on Themes and set the startup mode to Automatic. You can then manage the visual effect of server setup.

3. The third thing you have to do is to Shutdown Event Tracker. This is necessary to stop the log service at the time of shutdown. Or else whenever you shut down your pc then you will get an reason box. There is an extra dialog box which appears and which is really not needed. For that Click on Start > Run > gpedit.msc and in that go to Local Computer Policy> Computer Configuration> Administrative Templates> System, and then click Display Shutdown Event Tracker. Set this parameter to the position of Disabled.

4. The fourth step is quiet important for every system. Now in Windows Server 2003 Internet Explorer is the by default web browser. So it has very strict security settings. The web browser works on the Enhanced Security Configuration of Internet Explorer which allow access only to trusted domains. This directly means blocking of unwanted website. In practice, this stands for blocking the entire Internet. To bring down the security settings of Internet Explorer in the normal state, it is required to go in Option > Security and move the slide to the end.

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5. The fifth step here help you to work with the streaming and surfing stuff. Here in Windows Server 2003 hardware acceleration is set to disabled by default. The video streaming will effect even if the video card drivers installed correctly. So here you just need to end up the all the settings of server so that the admins are not abused afterward. Open the Display Properties > Settings tab > Advanced > he Troubleshoot. From here you have to move the Hardware Acceleration slider to the end. This is the maximum ode settings for hardware acceleration. Now what this will help you. It is necessary for initiating functions of DirectX, DirectDraw, Direct3D and AGP Texture Acceleration. So if that is disabled then you cannot run dxdiag.exe.

6. In server there are necessary user accounts. So it is your job to create them if not available. And if such accounts are not present then all the work on the PC comes from an administrator account. For that click on Start > Run and type lusrmgr.ms. Hit enter and from here you can manage the user accounts with permission.

7. On a server are important background services so that Windows is configured to give priority, in a Desktop is not, for that matter to System in Control Panel and change the settings as follows: Click the Performance Settings. The first enables the effects and the latter gives priority to programs on services, this change requires restart the computer to apply. To add users to start -> run put control userpasswords2 and appear active users, there can add, modify and delete users.

8. Disable the remote assistance. For that press Win + Break key and in the tab remove the check mark.

9. You have to establish the optimal value of the swap file. Like 128Mb or 256Mb - 400 megabytes, for 512Mb - 200 megabytes, etc. Right click on My Computer > Properties > Advanced > Performance > Advanced > Virtual Memory. Here you have to specify the size of the swap file and you must reboot properly to check your system or accessing the hard drive.

10. Do not forget to disable Windows Update. You can do that from Control Panel. If you want to add any kind of update then you can manually download the same from Microsoft site and run it. You might not needed those unnecessary server updates. And also enable System Restore.

11. Disable error reporting. For that you have to right click on My Computer > Properties Advanced tab > Error Reporting. Select the Disable error reporting and remove the check mark. Choose But notify critical error.

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12. It is recommended that you must disable Indexing. For that right click on My Computer > choose Properties. In that you have to look for the Indexig setting and from there remove the check mark Allow indexing disk for fast searching. Reboot once to properly set the settings to appropriate.

Argue with the fact that Windows Server 2003 has a higher version number than Windows XP - is meaningless. But the fact that WS 2003 is newer than Windows XP, arguing it is quite possible. It all depends on what kind of server and what kind of XP. Windows XP SP2, for example, is clearly newer than the server without the patch. In several previous versions of Windows NT workstations and servers out simultaneously and have the same version number.

To make it easier to distinguish between client and server, the server builds have changed the first digit of two rooms on the top three, the remaining three digits were identical. And the server build some more time went along with the client and had the same kernel version. Only just before the release (in August), the build number of Windows XP has been increased relative to the nearest round number - 2600. Number is growing gradually build server.

Using Windows Server 2003 Workstation Converter

This is an converter tool for this. By this tool you can disable all those options which you have to do manually. This tool provide you a number of options between different categories that can help you to disable the services. Simply just by few clicks you can disable and enable a number of services easily. I am not sure about the download of this tool but you have to found the same over web. There are also more tools similar to this, but a manual setup is what most recommended here.