Windows Server 2012 R2 Licensing
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The windows licenses apply to the physical machine, everytime you add another fully licensed copy of Server 2012r2 (2 Server 2012 Standard licenses in the case of 4 processors) you can legally run another 2 windows VMs.
If you only had two processors instead of 4, for every standard license you would get 2 vms, so if you bought two standard licenses you could run 4 vms legally.
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@brianlittlejohn thanks, i have another question, if i install windows 2012 r2 standart on my bare metal server with 2 processors, and i enable hyper v as a role:
1- I need one licence as there are 2 processors ?
2- do i get to have 2 virtual machines (WS 2012 r2 Standart) for free? -
@Alket_tux said in windows server 2012 r2 licensing:
@brianlittlejohn thanks, i have another question, if i install windows 2012 r2 standart on my bare metal server with 2 processors, and i enable hyper v as a role:
Under no conditions should you ever do this!!
All this does is make your system have more overhead, increase risk and make it harder to deal with in the future. There are no benefits but major problems. It's an anti-best practice and should be absolutely avoided.
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@Alket_tux said in windows server 2012 r2 licensing:
@brianlittlejohn thanks, i have another question, if i install windows 2012 r2 standart on my bare metal server with 2 processors, and i enable hyper v as a role:
1- I need one licence as there are 2 processors ?
Correct, but don't do it.
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@Alket_tux said in windows server 2012 r2 licensing:
@brianlittlejohn thanks, i have another question, if i install windows 2012 r2 standart on my bare metal server with 2 processors, and i enable hyper v as a role:
2- do i get to have 2 virtual machines (WS 2012 r2 Standart) for free?
Yes, no matter how you install Hyper-V, the licensing stays the same. But this should never happen. Here is what happens under the hood...
- Hyper-V installs to the bare metal and removes Windows
- The Windows Server that you installed becomes a VM that "looks" physical
- You have the same licensing as always, so you may use up to two Windows VMs
- You may "not use" the VM that you just created (literally, you can't touch it, no installing anything on it that isn't needed for Hyper-V - it's useless to you, now you have a "dead" VM that you basically have to manage but can't use taking up resources.
- You may use two Windows VMs. Either the one that you just created and one more, or you can leave the one and make two more. No matter what you do, you can only use two VMs.
So as you can see, you would never install this way as it just makes a mess for no reason.
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@scottalanmiller so which is your suggestion?
suppose i am planning of creating a small virtual environment.. what would you recommend me?
how should i install hyper-v?thanks
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@Alket_tux said in windows server 2012 r2 licensing:
how should i install hyper-v?
Simply download Hyper-V itself directly, no Windows Server, and install it alone. Then build your VMs on top of it.
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This is the download link for Hyper-V 2016:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/evaluate-hyper-v-server-2016
It is totally free. The "evaluation" is unlimited. There is no other form of Hyper-V.
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@scottalanmiller said in windows server 2012 r2 licensing:
This is the download link for Hyper-V 2016:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/evaluate-hyper-v-server-2016
It is totally free. The "evaluation" is unlimited. There is no other form of Hyper-V.
This needs to be stated again. MS makes this very confusing. It looks like this is just a trial, but it's not. There is no time limit or other limitations to the use of this software.
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Need some tags on this thread.
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Updated
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@Dashrender said in Windows Server 2012 R2 Licensing:
@scottalanmiller said in windows server 2012 r2 licensing:
This is the download link for Hyper-V 2016:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/evaluate-hyper-v-server-2016
It is totally free. The "evaluation" is unlimited. There is no other form of Hyper-V.
This needs to be stated again. MS makes this very confusing. It looks like this is just a trial, but it's not. There is no time limit or other limitations to the use of this software.
I agree, it's terrible that they lump it in with other actual trials.
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And remember, running Hyper-V you still need to license your Windows VMs on top. But if you have additional VMs that are Linux or FreeBSD for example, those are free. So you can still do that without costly another penny.
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And, of course, you can use XenServer, KVM or VMware ESXi instead of Hyper-V and there is no change to licensing.
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A server with just HyperV core is a limited install, not the full windows features.
If you install server like a standard OS install and just add the HyperV role, that is different than the free HyperV Core and will need a license for that.That is my understanding.
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@Texkonc said in Windows Server 2012 R2 Licensing:
If you install server like a standard OS install and just add the HyperV role, that is different than the free HyperV Core and will need a license for that.
That is my understanding.
It is different, that is correct. The Hyper-V portion is identical, but you are encumbered with a Windows Server VM that is tied to the Hyper-V installation in a bad way and it requires a license.
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@scottalanmiller said in Windows Server 2012 R2 Licensing:
@Texkonc said in Windows Server 2012 R2 Licensing:
If you install server like a standard OS install and just add the HyperV role, that is different than the free HyperV Core and will need a license for that.
That is my understanding.
It is different, that is correct. The Hyper-V portion is identical, but you are encumbered with a Windows Server VM that is tied to the Hyper-V installation in a bad way and it requires a license.
Correct understanding, but the terms are bad and part of the confusion.
There is no such thing as Hyper-V Core. The product is Hyper-V Server 2016 (or 2012, or 2012 R2).
Server 2016 (or 2012, or 2012 R2) have a install method called Core.
Microsoft caused this problem by naming the ISO for Hyper-V Server
hypercore.14393.0.161119-1705.RS1_REFRESH_SERVERHYPERCORE_OEM_X64FRE_EN-US.ISOI do not have Hyper-V Server 2012 ISO handy, but it had a similar name.
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@JaredBusch said in Windows Server 2012 R2 Licensing:
Server 2016 have a install method called Core.
Actually it doesn't. The install options are
- standard
- standard with desktop experience
- datacenter
- datacenter with desktop experience
The ones without desktop experience are what used to be called Core installs. I think MS does have the term Core still sprinkled around inside the OS and documentation though.. just adding more to the confusion.
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@Dashrender said in Windows Server 2012 R2 Licensing:
@JaredBusch said in Windows Server 2012 R2 Licensing:
Server 2016 have a install method called Core.
Actually it doesn't. The install options are
- standard
- standard with desktop experience
- datacenter
- datacenter with desktop experience
The ones without desktop experience are what used to be called Core installs. I think MS does have the term Core still sprinkled around inside the OS and documentation though.. just adding more to the confusion.
They changed again? I have not installed 2016 yet.
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@JaredBusch said in Windows Server 2012 R2 Licensing:
@Dashrender said in Windows Server 2012 R2 Licensing:
@JaredBusch said in Windows Server 2012 R2 Licensing:
Server 2016 have a install method called Core.
Actually it doesn't. The install options are
- standard
- standard with desktop experience
- datacenter
- datacenter with desktop experience
The ones without desktop experience are what used to be called Core installs. I think MS does have the term Core still sprinkled around inside the OS and documentation though.. just adding more to the confusion.
They changed again? I have not installed 2016 yet.
Yep. And this time I actually agree. The whole idea, I think, being that MS is moving toward a non GUI on the servers being the standard way of installing/using Windows Server going forward.
