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Following the release of Service Pack 1 Release Candidate for Server 2008 R2 and Windows 7, is it worth upgrading using the RC or wait until the Service Pack is released properly? I know in effect this is a "beta" of the service pack but surely there are not going to be any major ill effects if we do put this on? And what extra does the Service Pack provide?

I'm tempted to install on a non-critical server to see if anything happens. Any thoughts?

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Personally I would never install a RC in production unless there was a strong business driver. As for installing on a non-production box - that's what it's for, test it out. – CurtM Nov 23 '10 at 22:20
Does anyone know the tentative release schedule of SP1? We are looking to deploy a Hyper-V infrastructure by end of year, and would really love to use Dynamic Memory from the start. – Jeff Miles Nov 23 '10 at 22:45
@Jeff Miles - The service pack blocker tool was recently (11/11) updated to block SP1 for both R2 and Windows 7. I'd guess that the release will be very soon, although I haven't found any official word anywhere. – CurtM Nov 23 '10 at 23:44
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Production servers only get production code.

Only install non-production code on non-production servers.

RC-code also has support impacts if that matters to you. Don't go there unless you're OK with flattening the server and rebuilding it on a released service-pack before calling in.

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I wouldn't install a release candidate on a production server.

I'd only install a release candidate if I needed to "get ahead of the game" and have something production ready when the RTM or full release version became available.

So if you know you need to upgrade to SP1 as soon as it's released, install the RC on a test server and test your software on that to highlight and fix any problems so that when you do "go for gold" your downtime will be kept to a minimum or may be non-existent.

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