Windows Server 2008 build 4028

Windows Server 2008 build 4028 is the earliest available build of Windows Server 2008. It resembles Longhorn client builds and uses the WIM-image extraction installation method.

This is one of the only four available Server builds that are based on pre-reset code, the others are builds 4031, 4038 and 4066.

This build is also mentioned in the setup of all pre-reset builds starting with build 4039, where this build is the minimum required to upgrade.

New features and changes
This build contains many notable changes from Windows Server 2003 and build 4020 of the client version, making it more similar to the client build 4029:


 * The setup interface has been updated to resemble that of build 4029.
 * The login screen and Windows Explorer shell have also been updated to be identical to the interface from 4029.
 * This brand wallpaper from several prerelease builds of Windows Server 2003 would be reused.
 * The sidebar has gained more updates. The clock is now larger and no longer has the Longhorn logo. Alongside, even though this build defaults at the Windows Classic theme, some areas (such as the notifications) still use the Plex theme (note that the start button Windows logo is light blue, this would be kept until build 5384.4 for the Classic theme when it was changed to the Windows Vista logo). If you turn on the 'Themes' service and restart, this build will have the Plex theme.
 * This build still has Libraries, but oddly it includes the Game Library even though games aren't installed by default on server versions.
 * Like the client build 4029, this build uses the Pig Latin strings.
 * Sync Manager is included. It was used to help sync WinFS files to other systems.

General

 * On some machines, the Windows logo on the start button will be incorrectly cropped.

Installation

 * This build will often hang or crash during setup in newer versions of VMware and QEMU. Using Microsoft Virtual PC or VirtualBox is recommended.
 * The hardware setup tends to hang easily, after a while, you can press Shift+F10 to open the Command Prompt. Then, run  and terminate the process   to log in.
 * Normally, it is not possible to upgrade to this build as setup complains about requiring build 4000 or higher. However, by using an external program called  you can bypass the restriction and successfully perform an upgrade.