server os or no

[OhYou_]

I need to set up some crap on a windows os to run 24/7, its fairly light so I am going to use an older thinkcentre tiny form factor pc.
it has a baked in windows Home license that can be used for win11 probably. but should I consider using windows server 2025 and uh, "activating" it?
is there any benefit if i'm not at all using microsoy stuff? I guess for update management, but I can always just disable updates so it doesnt restart randomly.

[Agall]

2 minutes ago, OhYou_ said:

I need to set up some crap on a windows os to run 24/7, its fairly light so I am going to use an older thinkcentre tiny form factor pc.
it has a baked in windows Home license that can be used for win11 probably. but should I consider using windows server 2025 and uh, "activating" it?
is there any benefit if i'm not at all using microsoy stuff? I guess for update management, but I can always just disable updates so it doesnt restart randomly.

One problem with Server is driver support. Depending on the hardware of the machine, things like chipset and GPU drivers simply aren't supported on Windows Server. As long as none of that is needed, then its probably fine, but 2025 is stretching it. 2019 still has plenty of EoL left in it and its exceptionally stable with an older Win10 UI.

[Levent]

If you have to ask wheter you need WS or not, that generally means you dont need it.

[OhYou_]

2 minutes ago, Levent said:

that generally means you dont need it

i just dont want it to shove stupid updates in that cause it to restart randomly

 

[Levent]

Just now, OhYou_ said:

i just dont want it to shove stupid updates in that cause it to restart randomly

 

Then dont? there are ways to do that everywhere, not just in WS.

[OhYou_]

1 minute ago, Levent said:

Then dont? there are ways to do that everywhere, not just in WS.

the only reliable way I've found is to write a 3 liner batch file to kill windows update service and update orchestrator and then set a scheduled task to run it every 1 minute forever. even then the thing managed to install a update and start complaining about a restart after 450 days of uptime

[tkitch]

Why are you so against restarting every so often?  

That's not healthy for you or for computers 

[Electronics Wizardy]

31 minutes ago, OhYou_ said:

i just dont want it to shove stupid updates in that cause it to restart randomly

 

You gotta do monthly updates that need a reboot on both of there Windows versions. I'd design your job to auto start after a reboot.

[OhYou_]

I went with this
running the bat file every minute in a scheduled task to ensure its not an issue
https://github.com/tsgrgo/windows-update-disabler

 

5 hours ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

I'd design your job to auto start after a reboot.

id have to design an os that makes sure that HAPPENS every time first.

[Electronics Wizardy]

48 minutes ago, OhYou_ said:

I went with this
running the bat file every minute in a scheduled task to ensure its not an issue
https://github.com/tsgrgo/windows-update-disabler

 

id have to design an os that makes sure that HAPPENS every time first.

Starting your server tasks after a reboot should be pretty easy. You should have this in place even without updates in case the server crashes, power is lost or something else has a issue. Disabling updates seems like a bad idea.

 

You coudl also use WSUS to manage what specific updates you want, but really just let it reboot every month.