Win2k3 R2 & SharePoint SP2

So it took a few days but I finally got my VPC with the Windows Server 2003 R2 Customer Preview up and running. Some initial notes:

The trial download is only available for Win2k3 Enterprise Edition… but before you run out to your MSDN Subscriber downloads you’ll need to download the Win2k3 Enterprise 180 day TRIAL, not the full version, in order for the R2 install to work. Otherwise you might see something like this when you try to install R2:



Apparently the trial period for the R2 Customer Preview is based on your Win2k3 install.

Once you get it up and running you’ll notice one change right away:



Wow… nice new logon screen. That’s about where the obvious changes stop. I didn’t get too far but here are a few things I noticed:

• .NET Framework Beta 2 can be installed on the server, although WSS sites don’t appear to be configured to use .NET 2.0 right away.



• When you create WSS Sites you are prompted to use NTLM or Kerberos authentication – I’m guessing this is part of the “Federated Windows SharePoint Services” configuration (read more here) that allows “an organization to allow access to team members from other organizations using credentials from their local network.” Sounds like a great plan for Extranet WSS Sites.