I recently re-configured my home/SMB network. A big part of the upgrade was replacing my main server, which had been in production for about seven years. The hardware was just outdated and could not keep up. I was considering a new OS for my new server, but I decided to stick with the old reliable -- Windows 2000.So when installed my new (well, newer) box I loaded an eight-year-old operating system onto it. After various service packs and driver updates, it is humming along just fine. On 2Gb RAM and a 1.5 Ghz processor it serves as our e-mail, file, print, iTunes, and web server, running Domino 8.01. And it does so very nicely.
Why Windows 2000? Well, frankly, it has a lot of things going for it, esepcially for me.
- It's proven stable and reliable. It pretty much never crashes.
- It's got very high compatibility. I have found no piece of Windows software (apart from games) that won't run on it. Apple even makes a current specilized version of iTunes for it.
- It's pretty simple to administer. This has something to do with my background -- most of my brief OS admin career was spent with Windows 2000 -- but that's a valid consideration for choosing an OS.
- Excellent support is available from a number of sources.
- I own it. No fees, upgrade path, etc.
- It does everything I need, simply, cheaply, and reliably.
I have, over time, looked at other server OS options and have rejected them for a number of reasons.
- Windows Server 2003 -- I don't own it. Why spend money when I don't have to? Plus I'd have some learning curve.
- Various Linux implementations -- too hard. I don't have any Unix background so Linux is Greek to me. I don't want to mess with all the downloading, re-compiling, partitioning, file editing privilge manipulation, and package management that seems to be necessary. Servers aren't a hobby for me, they are a necessity, and it's no longer fun to spend 50 hours getting something working when I can accomplish the same goal in a tenth of the time.
- Current WIndows server -- see #1. No signifcant advantages to me over WIndows 2000.
So I am curious about two things.
First, is there anyone else out there still running Windows 2000, and if so, why have you not supplanted it?
Second, if you run something esle, why do you run it?
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I realize this is nearly a year after you asked the question, but what the heck.
I'm running 2 Win2K servers. I plan on eventually replacing one of
them with a Linux box (because I want to play with LAMP stuff), but
the main server in my environment is Win2K -pretty much for the
exact same reasons you specified.
It just %%#^$* works.