Microsoft hopes for a bigger slice of the data centre pie with the Windows Server 2012 release-- the first version customers can manage entirely through the command line.
Users can remove Windows Server 2012 GUI through PowerShell, turning the OS into a command line-driven system similar to Unix.
Windows Server 2012 is the first major upgrade since 2009 and features a number of features designed for large-scale data centre deployments and cloud-based applications.
Microsoft Hyper-V virtualisation now supports up to 64 virtual processors and 1TB of memory for guests (up from 4 virtual processors and 64GB of memory), the Server Message Block (SMB) communication protocol handles faster data transfers and the Server Manager is able to handle multiple servers at once.
Windows Storage Server also gets an upgrade as a platform for NAS appliances.