Customize Windows 2008 to make it suitable for everyday use

Windows Server 2008 has been officially released. Although this is a server operating system, I estimate that quite a few users will choose to install Windows Server 2008 on their own work computers or even laptops. There are two main reasons:

1. Many people need to use the server-specific components provided by Windows Server in their daily work. Windows Vista/XP can't or can only partially meet their requirements, so you need to use Windows. Server;

2. Because Windows Server intentionally cancels or closes many features that are not used in the server (such as Media Center Media Center, Windows Search, etc.), many people think that Windows Server is better than Windows Vista. "Clean" a lot, choose Windows Server for the sake of improving operational efficiency.

There are not a few people who hold these two views. As early as in the Windows XP/Server 2003 era, many people chose Windows Server 2003 to replace Windows XP as the main operating system for everyday applications.

Since Windows Server 2008 intentionally cancels or closes many features that are not used in the server, there are many default system settings that are considered for the server and are not suitable for everyday applications, so we must be on Windows Server 2008. Make some necessary "reconstructions" to make it suitable for everyday use, many of which are available starting with Windows Server 2003.

1. Turn on some system services that Windows Server 2008 turns off by default, mainly: Windows Audio (sound service, if you want Windows to sound, you must enable this service), Themes (visual style service, if you want to use Windows) AERO, this service must be turned on), Windows Search (that is, the ubiquitous instant search in Windows Vista, you must turn this service on if you want to use search).

2. Open Control Panel - Display Graphics Acceleration in Properties, turn on Direct3D Acceleration and DirectDraw Acceleration in DirectX Detection Tool DXDIAG. As early as Windows Server 2003, these accelerations were not turned on. Turning on these accelerations requires proper installation of the display driver. Windows Server 2008 as a server system, driver updates will definitely be slow and incomplete. The drivers for Windows Server 2003 are hard to find.

3. Turn on the sleep option that is turned off by default. Turning on sleep requires proper installation of the motherboard chipset driver to enable the ACPI Advanced Power option. The motherboard driver for Windows Server is also hard to find.

4. Turn off the shutdown event tracking program. This is turned on by default in Windows Server 2003. Every time you shut down Windows, you must record why the server needs to be shut down. Open the Group Policy Editor, expand Computer Configuration - Administrative Templates - System, and set Show Shutdown Event Tracker to Disabled.

5. Enable "Desktop Experience" in the "Features" of Server Manager (name in Windows Server 2008 English). It mainly includes Windows Media Player, Windows visual styles, and components related to Windows AERO. The Desktop Experience Feature requires that the graphics card sound card driver must be properly configured and the appropriate system services turned on.

6. Turn on the SuperFetch feature of Windows Vista in Windows Server 2008. Run Registry Editor with administrator privileges and navigate to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\Session Manager\\Memory Management\\PrefetchParameters and set the DWORD values ​​EnableSuperFetch and EnablePrefetcher to 3.

With these changes, Windows Server 2008 can be used as much as possible for everyday work. However, Windows Server 2008 is not always able to implement all the features of Windows Vista, such as Media Center Media Center, Tablet PC Input Support, Windows Sidebar sidebar, etc., not by default, but not provided at all. In addition, various games and home media entertainment applications are not guaranteed to work in Windows Server 2008.