[Windows Software] Sever 2008 R2 - CAL and other Licenses

[sakwoya]

Hi all

Thinking of moving from Server 2000 to Server 2008 R2 and I am wondering about CAL licenses and the like.

Current setup is ad hoc admin network and the curriculum side uses the Server 2000 (Viglen Classlink). Admin machines get DHCP and internet connection from the 2000 server.

Reading up on the licensing suggests that I need CAL licences for

admin machines
all curriculum machines
all network printers using DHCP
laptops

Am I correct?

Also any recommendations as to which version of Server 2008 to get (maximum connected devices <100) ??

Thanks

Graeme

[SYNACK]

There is no maximum connected devices count for Server standard, its only limited by your amount of CALS. Yes you would need CALs for each of the devices that you specified above. Have you looked into a Schools Volume Agreement which would give you access to the later versions of Windows client and office as well.

Server Enterprise gives you extra features like clustering and up to four virtual copies per machine for use with virtualisation, standard only gives you one virtual copy. Enterprise is licensed per CPU socket and gives unlimited virtual copies on the machine.

[DMcCoy]

It appears that printers are not needed (from another thread). As there was a Q/A youtube video from MS. Although the license terms only references a "device", perhaps it's only if the device is used by a user to access the server. Which is not quite the case with printers.

The rest you mentioned would need CALs. Education prices for server are quite cheap, but which version depends on what you want.

In most cases standard will be fine, enterprise and datacenter have some additional features like multiple DFS roots etc. If you want to virtualise any servers then enterprise and datacenter are better options. Enterprise allows 4 virtual hosts on the licensed server. Datacenter allows as virtual hosts as you want but is licensed per cpu socket.