Build Your Future with Windows Server 2016 Datacenter Edition
Windows Server 2016 Datacenter Edition is the cloud-ready, high density operating system that includes unlimited virtualization rights, plus new features to build a software-defined datacenter.
Safeguard Your Business
Windows Server Datacenter has security built in to help safeguard data across devices and apps onsite or in the cloud, and help you recover from business disruptions.
Improve IT Efficiency and Productivity
Windows Server Datacenter gives you the business tools of a much larger company to help increase efficiency and maximize your IT investment.
- Develop and manage with agility using Windows Server containers.
- Cluster Operating System Rolling Upgrade enables you to upgrade the operating system of the cluster nodes from Windows Server 2012 R2 to Windows Server 2016 without stopping the Hyper-V or the Scale-Out File Server workloads.
- Provide a better graphics experience to mobile workers who use Remote Desktop Services sessions.
- Hyper-V Replica contributes to your disaster recovery strategy by replicating virtual machines from one Hyper-V host server to another to keep your workloads available.
- Build highly available storage at a fraction of the cost of SAN or NAS using Storage Spaces Direct and industry-standard servers with local storage and Ethernet.
- Deploy complex workloads in a matter of seconds using a scalable network controller, and automatically load balance and shift workloads.
Be Ready for the Cloud
Whether you are moving to the cloud now or in the future, Windows Server Datacenter gives you the best of both worlds with technologies designed for hybrid cloud IT environments.
- Run your workloads on Hyper-V, then easily migrate them from on-premises to a Windows Server virtual machine in the cloud.
- Combine the benefits of containers with Azure Service Fabric and Windows Server for true business agility in cloud-native apps.
- Enable real-time replication and transparent failover of your virtual machines to a backup vault in Azure with Azure Site Recovery Services integration.
- Use Azure Virtual networking integration to create a point-to-point (P2P) or site-to-site (S2S) virtual private network that makes Azure resources, such as virtual machines and storage, look as though they are on the local network.
Windows Server 2016 Datacenter Edition
Companies of all sizes that have demanding IT workloads, require advanced storage, virtualization and application deployment.
- Unlimited users* based on CALs
- Per Core/CAL(Core-based)
- Unlimited VMs
- Unlimited Hyper-V containers
- Unlimited Windows Server containers
- Storage features including: Storage Replica and Storage Spaces Direct
- New Networking Stack
- Shielded Virtual Machines
- * Each user and/or device accessing a licensed Windows Server Standard or Datacenter edition requires a Windows Server CAL.
Windows Server 2016 Licensing and CALS
Licensing is core-based and works with Client Access Licenses (CALs):
- New computing models enable greater mobility of data and apps between on-premises and cloud.
- Moving to Core Licensing model establishes a common currency for computing resources on-premises or in the cloud.
- Core Licensing model aligns to the evolution of hardware technology shift to core density, versus processor density.
- CAL required for each user and/or device accessing a licensed Windows Server instance.
To be compliant all physical cores must be licensed:
- Minimum 8 core licenses/processor.
- Minimum 16 core licenses/server.
