Forum Discussion

Anonymous

Aug 30, 2018

When will Essentials Role/SKU be added to 2019 Insider Preview flights?

Is there any expected timeline for when the Essentials Role (and Essentials SKU) will be included in the Windows Server 2019 Insider Preview flights? Very keen to start to understand what has been ch...

general

Anonymous

Sep 06, 2018

Just seen the announcement about the Essentials SKU and apparent removal of the Essentials Role https://cloudblogs.microsoft.com/windowsserver/2018/09/05/windows-server-2019-essentials-update/. Although I can understand much of the rationale here, the removal (if my assumptions are correct) of the excellent Client Backup capability which is both very fast and network efficient for image backups and space-efficient on the server is a major loss for the smaller SMEs and larger Home users. It would be really good if this capability could be separated out as a new role for Server 2019, allowing those using this to move to the latest server with all of its advantages without losing the Client Backup capability.

Neville Mattick

Copper Contributor

Sep 13, 2018

Indeed Andrew; With the removal of the client backup feature this product has no benefit to my SME client's and will be dismissed for a third party utility which we are now exploring.

The only hope is that it ("Essentials Experience") could be added as an independent role for what was an excellent operating system with a broad scope of features in the 2016 Essentials incarnation.

Anonymous
Sep 28, 2018
Some extracts from the feedback from the community on this announcement as posted over at https://cloudblogs.microsoft.com/windowsserver/2018/09/05/windows-server-2019-essentials-update/ showing a depth of feeling around this decision:

I use cloud services for most tasks now, but there is one thing where there isn’t a viable alternative yet: Client Backup. This is nicely solved with Essentials Client Backup (in combination with Storage Spaces). Will this be still supported in Windows Server 2019 Essentials? And will it still be possible to use the Client Backup on a Windows Server 2019 Standard Edition by installing Essential tooling? And what will be the solution for client backups in the future when all Essential Edition features are likely to be deprecated in future Windows Server versions?

With the release of Server 2019 Essentials, the end of an era has been reached. Gone are the wizards and tools designed for the small business owner.
* Gone is the Remote Web Access feature.
* Gone is the Essentials Connector.
* Gone is Client PC Backup.
* Gone is Office 365 Integration.
* Gone, is the Dashboard.
* Gone, indeed, is the Essentials Role.
All that remains of Essentials, is the name Essentials and the licensing limits of the Essentials SKU, of 25 client access licenses. What we are presented with, is now more in line with Windows foundation server from several years ago. The first (and last) non-essential Essentials release. Way to go Microsoft!