What you should already know

- [Instructor] Now before we get started, there are a few things that you should know. This is a foundational course in Server 2016. We're just getting started here. And we'll be providing some instruction on how to install, and how to do basic configuration, of a Windows 2016 server. And along with that, we'll be introducing some additional features. Some features whose configuration may be a little bit beyond the scope of an initial installation, or a basic install, but I want to make sure these are placed in front of you.

Also, you should know that all of our demonstrations are done in Hyper-V. All of these demo servers are virtual machines, which are very much like what you will probably be using in a production environment. If you don't have a server running Hyper-V, or some other virtualization platform, to allow you to try out some of these features, to be able to create and test out servers in a safe environment, I highly recommend that you consider getting one.

And as we go on, I want you to take a look at the handouts in this course. We will be doing some of our configuration at the command line, so I've included a command reference that you can go back to, to take a look at what the commands are, what they accomplish, and where you can use them. I've also added a planning guide for installing a Windows server, which we'll be using in several of the videos, especially in the first chapter. And I've also included a diagram of the virtual machines that we've used, and how they might come together in a network topology, so you can get kind of a visual of what we're working with.

And I've also included a walkthrough lab on installing a virtual server with multiple hard drives, to give you some practice with the various hard drive configurations. I encourage you to take advantage of those, and try this stuff out. But with that, let's go ahead and get started.