Windows Server Insider Preview Build 16267 is now available for Insider members. The latest insider build comes with bug fixes and other improvements. There is no new feature in this build. However, there are some known issues with this build. A couple of key functionalities to enable end-to-end testing of Cluster Sets scenarios are not present in this build, so defer all evaluation of this scenario to a future build. Check out full changelog below.

General Scenario Highlights

Developers and Containers:

• New base container images (available on Windows Insider Docker Hub repo)
  • Optimized Nano Server base image (over 70% smaller)
    • The .NET team is providing a preview image based on Nano Server with .NET Core 2.0
    • The PowerShell team is providing a preview image based on PowerShell 6.0
  • Optimized Server Core base image (over 20% smaller)
• Support for SMB volume mounting
• Infrastructure for Orchestrators
  • Networking enhancements for ongoing Kubernetes work
  • Named pipe mapping support
• Bug fixes, performance enhancements

Cloud Guest:

• IIS
  • TLS info: administrators can make specific recommendations to default to HTTPS
• Disaster Recovery
  • Storage Replica Test Failover
• Guest + Host better together
  • vPMEM in Guest: Tenants can use and manage PMEM/SCM
  • Tenant-Aware VM Start Ordering: App Ready / OS Heartbeat for better load balancing
  • Guest RDMA
• Improvement in time accuracy
• Azure enlightened clusters – optimized to run on Azure IaaS

Cloud Host:

• Software Defined Data Center (SDDC) host
  • Security
    • Shielded Linux VM
    • SDN: Encrypted virtual networks
    • Secure clusters
    • SMB 1 disabled by default
  • Resiliency and Availability
    • SDN: Reduced downtime for tenant connections through gateways
    • Spaces Direct: Scoped Spaces to mitigate impact of multi-node loss
    • Spaces Direct: Marginal drive handling for predictive detection of drive failures
  • Efficiency
    • Data Deduplication available for ReFS
    • New Data Deduplication DataPort API for optimized ingress/egress
    • Space efficiency with ReFS Compaction
    • Performant Spaces Direct Multi Resilient Volumes (MRV)
  • Hyper-converged Scale
    • Cluster Sets: Significantly increases hyper-converged SDDC cloud scale by grouping multiple clusters into a larger fabric
  • Hardware support
    • Support for Storage Class Memory (SCM) in Spaces Direct

Known issues 

• Cluster Sets: A couple of key functionalities to enable end-to-end testing of Cluster Sets scenarios are not present in this build, so defer all evaluation of this scenario to a future build.
• When a computer runs the Windows Preinstallation Environment (WinPE) from a local drive, the EFI system partition, which contains the WinPE image (boot.wim), does not have a drive letter assigned. This issue can adversely affect some automation.
• Apps that call into the firewall, such apps that use networking, may become unresponsive until the user reboots because of an application hang end-task error (0xCFFFFFFF) in the Windows firewall API library (FirewallAPI.dll), which occurs when the library is blocked on an advanced local procedure call (ALPC) port while attempting to diagnose a connection failure and retrieve information.
• A stop error may occur during volume repair in a cluster. The recommended workaround is to restart the computer. No corruption or data loss is expected.

How to Download Windows Server Insider Preview Build 16267

NOTE: If you signed up for Windows Insiders for Business using an AAD account, there is a temporary issue with access to the Windows Server Download page using AAD accounts. If you registered using an MSA account at the Windows Insider program, your MSA account may be used to access the page and to download builds until this is resolved.

The latest Windows Server build and matching symbols are available for download here.  Simply click on the desired file(s) and save locally. Matching Windows Server container images will be available via the Docker Hub.

The following keys are available for unlimited activations of Windows Server. These keys may be used throughout the pre-release cycle.

• Windows Server Datacenter Core: B69WH-PRNHK-BXVK3-P9XF7-XD84W
• Windows Server Standard Core: V6N4W-86M3X-J77X3-JF6XW-D9PRV