Description Windows Server 2012 R2 Standard Windows Server 2012 R2 Standard edition is ideal for those customers who want to have a physical or lightly virtualized environment. This edition enables you to run up to two virtual instances of Windows Server with each license and provides all the same features as Datacenter edition. The licensing for Standard edition will continue to be processor plus CAL, with each license covering up to two physical processors on a single server, just like Datacenter edition. How to Convert the Server 2012 R2 Evaluation Edition to Standard Edition: Please Run this Command as administrator: DISM /Online /Set-Edition:ServerStandard /ProductKey:xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx /AcceptEula How to Choose Windows Server 2012 R2 Edition： Server 2012 R2 Ideal for Licensing model CAL require Datacenter Highly virtualized datacenters and cloud environments Processor CAL Windows Server CAL Standard Physical or minimally virtualized environments Processor CAL Windows Server CAL Essentials Small businesses with up to 25 users and 50 devices Server License No CAL required Windows Server 2008 R2, Server 2012 R2, Server 2016 and Server 2019 comparison : Feature and description Windows Server 2008 R2 Windows Server 2012 R2 Windows Server 2016 Windows Server 2019 Feature and description Windows Server 2008 R2 Windows Server 2012 R2 Windows Server 2016 Windows Server 2019 Synchronizing file servers to Azure Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported HTTP/2 Fully Supported Fully Supported System Insights Fully Supported Latency Optimized Background Transport – LEDBAT Fully Supported Azure network adaptor Fully Supported IP address management (IPAM) and DNS Patial Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported VM protection Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported MultiPoint services role Fully Supported Fully Supported Unified management Patial Supported Fully Supported High-availability RDS connection broker Patial Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Storage Spaces Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported SDN with IPv4/IPv6 Patial Supported Patial Supported Fully Supported Enhanced Storage Spaces Direct (S2D): Patial Supported Fully Supported Enhanced Windows Defender Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) Fully Supported Mirror-accelerated parity Patial Supported Fully Supported Shielded VMs for Windows Fully Supported Fully Supported Nested Mirror Accelerated parity Fully Supported Shielded VMs for Linux Fully Supported Storage class memory Patial Supported Fully Supported HGS offline mode for shielded VMs: Fully Supported USB thumb drive (as cluster witness) Fully Supported VM Connect for shielded VMs: Fully Supported Storage Replica Patial Supported Fully Supported Cluster hardening Fully Supported Storage Quality of Service (QoS) Fully Supported Fully Supported SDN encrypted subnet: Fully Supported Data deduplication Patial Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Just-enough administration Patial Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Deduplication for ReFS Fully Supported Just-in-time administration Patial Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Virtual machine storage resiliency Fully Supported Fully Supported Credential guard Fully Supported Fully Supported Cloud Witness Patial Supported Fully Supported Control flow guard Fully Supported Fully Supported Storage health monitoring: Fully Supported Fully Supported Device guard (code integrity) Fully Supported Fully Supported Cluster-wide monitoring Fully Supported Dynamic access control Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Cluster sets Fully Supported AppLocker Patial Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Cluster OS rolling upgrade Fully Supported Fully Supported BitLocker: Patial Supported Patial Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Mixed OS mode cluster Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Linux containers Fully Supported Site-aware failover clusters Fully Supported Fully Supported Windows Server containers: Fully Supported Fully Supported Persistent memory Fully Supported Server Core base container image Fully Supported Linux and FreeBSD workloads Patial Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Nano Server base container image Fully Supported Fully Supported Hot add and remove for disk, memory, and network Patial Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Server Core Features on Demand Fully Supported Network controller Fully Supported Fully Supported Kubernetes platform support Fully Supported Virtual networking Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Group Managed Service Accounts Patial Supported Patial Supported Fully Supported Software load balancer (SLB) Fully Supported Fully Supported Windows Subsystem for Linux Fully Supported Virtual network peering Fully Supported Hyper-V isolation Fully Supported Distributed firewall and micro-segmentation Fully Supported Fully Supported Azure Service Fabric for Windows Server Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Hybrid SDN gateways Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported PowerShell 5.1 Patial Supported Patial Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Improved SDN gateway Fully Supported PowerShell Desired State Configuration Patial Supported Patial Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Converged RDMA Patial Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Visual Studio Code Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Precision Time Protocol (PTP) Fully Supported .NET Core: Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Fully Supported Leap Second Fully Supported Windows Server 2012 R2 Standard System Requirements Required processor 1.4 GHz or faster 64-bit compatible processor Required memory 512 MB (2 GB for Server with Desktop Experience installation option) Required hard disk space 32GB available hard disk space Required video card 1024 x 768 or higher-resolution
