Windows Server 2008 R2

Windows Server 2008 R2 is the server counterpart of Windows 7, which reached RTM on 22 July 2009 and was released on 22 October of that year, becoming the first server release to ship day-and-date with the client counterpart since Windows 2000 Server. This release drops support for the x86 architecture. It was also the last version of Windows Server to ship with the IA-64 architecture and to receive a Service Pack from Microsoft.

This is the last version of Windows Server to support processors without PAE, SSE2 and NX (Update KB4088875 removes support for processors without SSE2) and include Enterprise Server and Web Server SKUs.

It replaces Windows Server 2008 and was replaced by Windows Server 2012.

Hardware compatibility
Windows Server 2008 R2 is fully compatible with the Intel Skylake and earlier processor families. However, later processors are not officially supported as both the Windows Update service and integrated graphics drivers do not properly function (although users have come up with workarounds to get both features working). In some cases, integrating USB 3.0 drivers into the installation media may be necessary in order to successfully install the operating system on modern machines due to the lack of USB 3.0 support, which was not introduced until Windows Server 2012. The P-cores and E-cores on Intel Alder Lake processors are incorrectly identified as being seperate devices in Windows Server 2008 R2.

Build 6801 introduced a feature internally known as “drift correction”, which resolves issues related to CPU clock circuit timing that could potentially prevent either the operating system or services from starting up correctly. Clock drift/timing issues plague Windows Server 2008 on Intel Haswell processors and newer, as the OS will often fail to successfully boot to the desktop or cause many services to not function as a result of drift.