Windows Server 2022 Standard License
As part of this release, we are bringing secured-core capabilities to help protect hardware, firmware, and Windows Server OS capabilities against advanced security threats. Secured-core server builds on technologies such as Windows Defender System Guard and Virtualization-based Security to minimize risk from firmware vulnerabilities and advanced malware. The new release also provides secured connectivity that introduces several new capabilities such as faster and more secure encrypted HTTPS connections, industry standard SMB AES 256 encryption and more.
Windows Server 2022 improves hybrid server management with significantly improved VM management, an enhanced event viewer, and many more new capabilities in Windows Admin Center. Furthermore, this release includes significant improvements to Windows containers, such as smaller image sizes for faster download, simplified network policy implementation and containerization tools for .NET applications.
For more details, read about Windows Server 2022.
Ways to try Windows Server:
In addition to downloading the ISO, you can also try the new features through the following ways:
Try it in Azure: Azure provides a great way to test Windows Server 2022 with pre-built images.
Choose an edition and an installation option:
Customers who download the full ISO will need to choose an edition and an installation option. This ISO evaluation is for the Datacenter and Standard editions. The Datacenter edition is the most complete edition and includes the new Datacenter-specific features (Shielded Virtual Machines, Storage Spaces Direct, and Software-Defined Networking) in addition to unlimited server virtualization.
Installation options:
Server Core: This is the recommended installation option. It’s a smaller installation that includes the core components of Windows Server and supports all server roles but does not include a local graphical user interface (GUI). It is used for “headless” deployments which are managed remotely through Windows Admin Center, PowerShell, or other server management tools.
Server with Desktop Experience: This is the complete installation and includes a full GUI for customers who prefer this option.
When you complete your evaluation, you can convert your evaluation versions to retail.
Languages:
Chinese (Simplified), English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Russian, Spanish
Evaluation options:
Windows Server 2022 | 64-bit ISO
Windows Server 2022 | 64-bit VHD
Windows Server 2022 on Microsoft Azure
Warning : This is not recommended
This blog post will guide you in performing an in-place upgrade of Windows Server 2022 on an Azure IaaS Virtual Machine.Performing an in-place upgrade on an Azure IaaS VM can cause potential issues.
VM being in an OOBE experience mode
VM being inaccessible due to RDP issues
VM being inaccessible due to whatever reason
Since we don’t have console access to an Azure VM, it’s hard to troubleshoot when things go wrong. It’s advised to perform an in-place upgrade on a hyper-v or VMware VM, which gives you complete access to the system.Below you can find an outline of the tasks that need to be performed.
Ready, Set, Snapshot, Go!
Tip: Before you start, make sure to backup or snapshot your system, this way, you can easily revert to your last working state.Download the latest version of Windows Server 2022 from the Windows Insider preview portal.
After downloading the ISO file, mount the file in file explorer.!Warning: Do not go through the setup wizard via GUI. It will leave your VM in an inaccessible state for sure!
Retrieve the KMS setup key, which can be found here, and enter it in the code below.Run the following command: (change drive letter to your drive letter)
1 E:\setup.exe /auto upgrade /Dynamic Update enable /pkey VDYBN-27WPP-V4HQT-9VMD4-VMK7H /showoobe none
Since we will be using it as a Windows Virtual Desktop host image, select the Windows Desktop Experience.
In our case, we want to re-use this host to capture an image, so we don’t want to keep any settings. Click “Next” and select “Yes”.
Before starting the installation, the installer will first check for possible updates, select “Install” once it is ready to proceed.
The upgrade process will take a couple of minutes to complete, during the process you will lose connectivity to the host.
To follow up on the process, it’s advised to look at the boot diagnostics screenshots. As soon as you hit the following screen, you should be able to reconnect to your VM. Once the upgrade has been completed, and everything went fine, you should connect to your VM.The reason why we are performing an in-place upgrade of the Azure Windows Server 2022 Datacenter image is that WinRM is not functioning, leaving close to 0 options to even remotely install software on it or add roles and features.
Thank you!
Thank you for reading through this blog post. I hope I have been able to assist you in the upgrade to a more stable release of Windows Server 2022.If you encounter any new insights, feel free to drop me a comment or contact me via mail or other social media channels