Windows Server 2016 comes with many brand-new features and options. One of the new deployment options is Nano Server, a new headless installation option for Windows Server 2016. Nano Server is a highly minimized installation that is 20-25x smaller than traditional Windows, which only includes the required bits for the running OS. A unique component of Nano Server is the fact that it has no Graphical User Interface (GUI) and no built-in management tools, it’s the only recovery console where you can change network settings, firewall rules, and reset WinRM. The administration is required to be completed remotely via remote management tools such as PowerShell or Server Manager. The main premise behind this allows the server and applications to utilize resources better while at the same time providing higher security due to the much smaller attack surface.
If you have specific requirements, such as Hyper-V power, Windows Failover Cluster, IIS, Scale-Out-File-Server or the DNS role, then you need to add those specific packages during (or after) the Nano Server deployment. During the image package generation process is when you can set the required roles that will be present.
Today I will walk you through the process of creating a Nano Server host that will serve as a Hyper-V node. This Hyper-V node will become a member of a Windows Failover Cluster as well.
Creating a new Nano Server
There are several ways to build Nano Server. You can use Nano Server Image Builder with a graphical interface or PowerShell. In this post, I’ll concentrate on the PowerShell deployment. So, unlike traditional Windows Server installations, the Nano Server install is initiated via a folder that is located on the Windows Server 2016 ISO. Within this folder are all of the required components to get up and running. To start with, you should download the Windows Server 2016 ISO image and mount that image to a Windows Server or Windows 10 machine already deployed within your environment. The first step is to fire up PowerShell ISE in administrator mode and then load the Nano Server module. Below you’ll find all the steps for the new deployment.
Once we have our PowerShell ISE session running, let’s set the PowerShell execution policy. This will let us run PowerShell Scripts without any restrictions. Without this, only single commands or digitally signed scripts can be run (defaults depends on Windows version you are running):
Set-ExecutionPolicy -ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted
Next, we’ll need to create the image. In my environment I have Windows Server 2016 ISO mounted to d:\ so I’ll start with going to the Nano folder on install ISO:
cd d:\NanoServer
Import-Module .\NanoServerImageGenerator\NanoServerImageGenerator.psm1
New-NanoServerImage -Edition Datacenter -DeploymentType Host -MediaPath d:\
-TargetPath E:\Temps\nano\NANO_SRV.vhd -DomainName demo.local -ComputerName NANO_SRV -OEMDrivers -Compute -Storage -Clustering -EnableRemoteManagementPort
- InterfaceNameOrIndex Ethernet -Ipv4Address 10.11.0.30
-Ipv4SubnetMask 255.255.255.0 -Ipv4Gateway 10.11.0.1 -Ipv4Dns 10.11.0.10
At this stage, we should have the Nano Server image ready. With our next article, we will deploy it to a physical server.
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