HowTo (Turning your Windows server into a Workstation)

[Admin]

Ok, so we recently started offering Windows 2008RC2 Web Edition full instalation as a VPS.
Thing is, many people do not really need a windows server, but want to transform it into an workstation. We are sorry we can't offer you Windows XP or Windows 7 due to licensing issues, however, Windows Server 2008RC2 is based on a Windows 7 kernel, so, let's see what we can do to turn it into an workstation.

Disable the annoying shutdown event tracker:
1. Click Run in the menu Start, then type gpedit.msc and click OK. Now the Local Group Policy Editor will open.
2. Browse to Administrative Templates in Computer Configuration, click System and double click in the right window on Display Shutdown Event Tracker. Change its value to Disabled and click OK to save the change.

Give higher priority to the applications instead of the background services:
1. To change the best performance setting into programs, open Start, right click on Computer and select Properties in the context menu.
2. On the left below Tasks click Advanced system settings. In the Performance section click Settings. After that the window Performance Options shows up. Go to the tab Advanced, select Programs and click OK twice to save these settings.

If you insist in using Internet Explorer 9 and not to install the Firefox kit you have on your desktop or install and use other browsers, then you will find highly annoying the default behaviour,
Disable Internet Explorer Enhanced Security
1. Start the Server Manager by clicking the Server Manager icon in the systray, or the Server Manager via the Administrative Tools menu in the Start menu.
2. Scroll down to Security Information within Server Summary and click Configure IE ESC. In the window that pops up select Off for both Administrators and Users. Save the changes by clicking OK.

For further, mainly cosmetic tweaks, please view the original article here:
http://www.win2008r2workstation.com/

Functionality and free programs to acomplish it:
1. Watching movies: VLC media player http://www.videolan.org/vlc/download-windows.html Has the most codecs built-in. You will not have sound tho.
2. Viewing pictures: Irfan View http://fileforum.betanews.com/download/ ... 67963863/1
3. Lightweight PDF viewer (apart from bloated acrobat reader): Sumatra PDF Reader http://blog.kowalczyk.info/software/sum ... iewer.html I recomend the portable edition.
4. Archiver: 7zip http://www.7-zip.org/download.html You will have to manually associate the archives with it.
5. Office functionality (view and edit documents): http://www.openoffice.org/

Please, do not install warez/cracked programs. We wont spy on you, but you may install trojans or other malware with it. If you need free alternatives to known expensive programs, please ask us. Some do not have all functionality of the original, some are even better, but you will not run heavy video editing software on a small VPS, would you ?

If you need further help with your Windows VPS, please ask here.

Admin