What is Windows 2000?

Windows 2000 is an upgrade to Microsoft's Windows NT operating system, intended for business use. It incorporates most of the features of its predecessor and includes additional support for new hardware devices, along with advanced security features.

The Windows 2000 platform offers many different products, including Windows 2000 Professional, Server, Advanced Server, and Datacenter server. You can find more information about these products at:

Note: To obtain the current hotfixes for Windows 2000 Server, visit:

Windows 2000 features

• Reliability
  
  
  • Windows File Protection protects core system files from being overwritten by application installs.
  • Driver certification provides safeguards to assure you that device drivers have not been tampered with and reduces your risk of installing non-certified drivers.
  • Full 32-bit operating system minimizes the chance of application failures and unplanned reboots.
  
  
• Mobility
  
  
  • Hibernate turns off your computer and monitor after a pre-determined time, while retaining your desktop on disk.
  • Offline Viewing makes entire web pages with graphics available for viewing offline.
  • Synchronization Manager allows you to compare and update your offline files and folders with those on the network.
  • Smart Battery gives you a more accurate view of your battery's life, enabling you to reduce power to specific functions to extend your battery's power.
  • Hot Docking lets you dock or undock your notebook computer without changing hardware configuration or rebooting.
  • Universal Serial Bus (USB) lets you connect and disconnect a wide array of peripherals such as joysticks, scanners, and camcorders without configuring or rebooting your computer.
  • IrDA support provides secure, wireless communications between two Windows 2000 computers using the popular infrared protocol.
  • IEEE 1394 provides a higher bandwidth connection for devices that require faster data transfer.
  
  
• Maintainability
  
  
  • System Preparation Tool (SysPrep) helps administrators clone computer configurations, systems, and applications.
  • Setup Manager provides a graphical wizard that guides administrators in designing installation scripts.
  • Multilingual support allows users to easily create, read, and edit documents in hundreds of languages.
  • Windows 2000 offers 25% faster performance than Windows 95 or Windows 98 on systems with 64MB or more of memory.
  • 32-bit architecture allows you to run more programs and perform more tasks at the same time than Windows 95 or 98.
  • Windows 2000 can support up to 4GB of RAM and two symmetric multiprocessors.
  • Encrypting File System (EFS) encrypts each file with a randomly generated key.
  • IP Security (IPsec) support helps protect data transmitted across a network.
  • Kerberos support provides industry standard high-strength authentication with a fast, single login to Windows 2000 enterprise resources.
  
  
• Internet Capability
  
  
  • Internet Information Services (IIS) 5.0 includes web and FTP server support, as well as support for FrontPage transactions, Active Server Pages (ASP), and database connections.
  • Windows 2000 has strong development platform support for Dynamic HTML behaviors and XML.
  • IntelliForms alleviates the tedium of filling out forms on the web by automatically entering your name, address, or other information that you've securely stored on your computer.
  • Automated Proxy automatically locates a proxy server and configures Internet Explorer 5.01 to connect to the Internet through that server.