I disagree that Windows 10 works "essentially" well enough to deploy in production with Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials.
Indeed, even with the latest patched connector software, the Windows Server Essentials Dashboard Devices tab incorrectly reports the status of Group Policy for Windows 10 clients. Considering that Windows 10 is Microsoft's flagship desktop operating
system and Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials is the latest-and-greatest small business server actually available for purchase, I find it inexcusable that it doesn't report correctly all of the status information presented on the Dashboard.
I'm not even going to dwell on the hard-to-stomach time it took for Microsoft to release the current, shoddy version of the connector software; but I will mention it. For months after Windows 10 was released, there wasn't even a version of the connector
software available that would install on Windows 10 clients! It seemed Microsoft didn't have any understanding that we needed time to test Windows 10 with Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials BEFORE we could recommend it to our clients. That meant we didn't start
testing until we had access to the "working" connector software in November.
Just as we got started testing Windows 10 with Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials in the lab, we were hit with another big issue: the connector software is removed every time Windows 10 installs a Feature Upgrade. See the link below:
https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/sbs/2016/01/22/windows-10-feature-upgrade-breaks-client-connector-for-window-server-2012-r2-essentials-windows-server-2012-essentials-and-windows-small-business-server-2011-essentials/
If we had deployed Windows 10 in production, one day after a Windows Update Feature Upgrade was released, all of our client's workstations would lose their connector functions the next morning! The workaround is to simply reinstall the connector software
on each workstation again. That's not so easy if you have to do it on a few hundred workstations all at once! The "coming fix" was described more than six months ago; since then, no fix and no updates about when we'll see it.
Because we considered it too risky to deploy Windows 10 in Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials environments, due to the fact that the next Feature Upgrade will take out the connector software, we continued to rely on Windows 7 in those environments. And
since Microsoft never provided the "coming fix" before the free upgrade from Windows 7 to Windows 10 expired, we probably won't ever upgrade those client workstations to Windows 10.
That brings us up to where we are now. And right on que, the Windows 10 Anniversary Feature Upgrade was just released:
https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2016/08/02/how-to-get-the-windows-10-anniversary-update/
All of you who did deploy Windows 10 with the Essentials Connector, enjoy reinstalling the connector on all your Windows 10 workstations again!
Oh but wait--it get's better! It appears that not only will the connector be removed again by the Anniversary Update, but after the upgrade, it won't reinstall correctly. After attempting to reinstall it, the connector icon no longer appears in the system
tray, and there doesn't seem to be a way to open the Essentials Launchpad. I'd say that pretty much puts us right back to where we were before last November when we couldn't get the connector to work on Windows 10 clients.
If and when Microsoft provides a stable Windows 10 client that connects--and stays connected--with a Windows Server Essentials environment, we'll begin testing it in the hopes that one day we can deploy it for use by our customers. And it wouldn't hurt if
the Dashboard displayed correct information about Windows 10 clients, too! I suspect we may have to wait for Windows Server 2016 or 2017, as Microsoft has shown very little progress in getting the Windows Server 2012 R2 version to work reliably with
Windows 10 clients.
If and when they do finally provide such an environment, Microsoft should allow us to upgrade the clients from Windows 7 to Windows 10 for free at that time. After all, it isn't our fault that it was impractical to take advantage of the free upgrade
while Windows 10 doesn't work right with Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials. Ironically, we did upgrade all of our Windows 7 clients to Windows 10 in our Small Business Server 2011 sites. The SBS 2011 connector works on Windows 10, and stays installed--even
during the initial upgrade from Windows 7 to Windows 10. In those environments, we now can't upgrade the server because nothing newer than SBS 2011 supports Windows 10 clients reliably!
Trilon, Inc.
