Forum Discussion
Defender for Endpoint Server standalone license
As of September 1, Microsoft has removed the Defender for Endpoint on Servers P1 and P2 licenses, forcing on-premises customers to use Azure ARC / Defender for Cloud! Onboarding to Azure ARC is no...
Keith_Powell
Microsoft
MicrosoftYour information may not be complete. There is no "Defender for Endpoint Server P2" per se--you should ask your Microsoft account team about the 'Defender Endpoint Servers' license (SKU #1NZ-00004) to see about making your purchase.
Also, FYI, the Microsoft Defender for Servers Plan 1 is fundamentally the same thing as "Defender Endpoint Servers". There are 2 core differences: (1) 'Defender Endpoint Servers' DOES NOT have the flexibility to use Microsoft Defender for Cloud or the Microsoft 365 Defender portal; and (2) MDE for Servers is paid for 100% each month--whether you use it or not. MDS P1 or P2 are paid for during EACH hour that they are used--if your server is 'down' then there is no cost paid for MDS. So, you should be able to achieve the functionality that you want, at a similar (or lesser) price point, depending on your actual usage. Something to consider, anyway.
Also, FYI, the Microsoft Defender for Servers Plan 1 is fundamentally the same thing as "Defender Endpoint Servers". There are 2 core differences: (1) 'Defender Endpoint Servers' DOES NOT have the flexibility to use Microsoft Defender for Cloud or the Microsoft 365 Defender portal; and (2) MDE for Servers is paid for 100% each month--whether you use it or not. MDS P1 or P2 are paid for during EACH hour that they are used--if your server is 'down' then there is no cost paid for MDS. So, you should be able to achieve the functionality that you want, at a similar (or lesser) price point, depending on your actual usage. Something to consider, anyway.
Hi Keith, do you have any information about if Arc is required for Defender for Server Plans? From what I’ve gathered from Microsoft Pages it is recommended but not required. (for additional Defender for Cloud based recommendations) We have some customers running defender on Server with the "old" License Defender for Endpoint Server. We now get the information that we cannot renew this license.
We try to figure out if we need to onboard all Servers to Azure Arc now or if there still is a standalone license and onboarding via Powershell is still a valid choice.
Thanks in advance, cheers Felix