I'm right now installing win 2008 R2 from scratch.
It's been ~3HRS hunting down drivers.
Still, I cannot change the size of system fonts (tiny on a laptop) nor enable aero.

I'm also downloading arch for this laptop. Let's see which one detects more things right off the box.

Still, I'm pretty sure I'm spending more time on windows all-in-all, so the linux install will sit there unused because quite frankly the apps suck.

btw, does anyone know to change CD-rom letter in windows server 2008 R2 ?

As with Server 2003 or 2008, Disk management should do the trick, but even if it does look quite a bit different, all the features are there.

@urlwolf- Did I read your first comment correctly? You're installing Server 2008-R2 on a laptop???

Yes, because it will replicate my desktop (I synch the two before travel) and also I get the license free thanks to Dreamspark. windows server 2008 makes a very good desktop (!). It was what our sysadming recommended when I had to move to 64-bits and vista was the only game in town.

But, the amount of fiddling! It takes me 2 days to get to a good desktop. And this time (R2) things are just broken. I'll start from scratch...