Windows server 2012 Active Directory VS Windows server 2008 Active Directory

Question

I want to do a test to compare "Windows server 2012 Active Directory" and its earlier version "Windows server 2008 Active Directory" in performance and functions. My question is, where should I start? What should I first look into for comparison? Which parts are important? If anyone has any suggestions I would be very happy to hear them.
I'd really like to see if there's some kind of performance jump that I can evaluate if possible. I have both version built on virtual machines.

Thank you.

Solution 1

One notable difference in Windows Server 2012 R2 is the performance optimization of complex LDAP queries, however this has been back ported to Windows 2008 R2. You can read about it here:

https://technet.microsoft.com/library/dn535775.aspx#BKMK_LDAPQuery

There are Directory Service Event Log id's 1633/1644 for logging LDAP query performance, and you can identify inefficient/expensive thresholds, and a search time threshold. This has also been back ported to Windows Server 2008 R2.

Solution 2

You can find a list of the new Active Directory features in Windows Server 2012 here; and here is a corresponding list for Windows Server 2012 R2.

Comments

[iPath]

@andrew-davis I also vote for Active Directory Replication throughput improvement: technet.microsoft.com/library/…