Thanks again Paul Thurrott he has submitted me his first part of a review for Windows .NET Server family. It's pretty extensive and well worth a look.
Joining several colleges from Windows & .NET Magazine at a late June Reviewer's Workshop for Windows .NET Server near Microsoft's Redmond headquarters, I received an almost mind-numbingly technical overview to the vast array of new features in the company's next server operating system. One thing is clear: Windows Server has grown up dramatically since the early NT days, and it now scales up to the most scalable and advanced hardware on the planet.
It wasn't always that way. Early versions of NT Server met with much market resistance, mostly because of the system's poor performance and low-end aspirations. So it wasn't until the release of Windows 2000 Server in February 2000 that Microsoft had a credible enterprise solution. "Windows NT 4 was all about small teams of people," said Cliff Reeves, Microsoft's Vice President of Product Management for Windows .NET Server. "Windows 2000 was focused on being a robust OS suitable for the data center. Windows .NET Server improves on Windows 2000 and NT and introduces developer and application server capabilities. It's the tip of the iceberg for what's coming in the future on the server."
Windows .NET Server began life in late December 1999 alongside what became Windows XP as part of "Whistler," the Windows OS project that Microsoft started in the wake of the failed "Odyssey" and "Neptune" projects. However, after the Beta 2 releases of XP and .NET Server in February 2001, Microsoft forked the two products and set them on separate development paths. XP was eventually finalized in August 2001 and released that October. Windows .NET Server, originally scheduled for late 2001, has been delayed several times since the Beta 3 release last fall (See my review of Beta 3). Now scheduled for release in late 2002, Windows .NET Server will be in customers hands in early 2003, according to the company.
View: Windows .NET Server RC 1 reviewed (Part One) @ WinSuperSite
