Just a quick post in advance of the Windows 8.1 tech release preview tomorrow. Today Microsoft made the latest  latest Windows Server 2012 R2 Preview availble to consumers (downloads can be found here – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-US/evalcenter/dn205292)One of the often rumoured features of the next large update to both Windows 8 and Server 2012 was the return of a start button.To quash any fears of the rumours being untrue – here is a screenshot of a Server 2012 R2 virtual machine that I spun up in my lab this evening:- Suffice it to say – it’s BACK!Right-clicking on the new start button also brings up Shutdown and Restart options!Hopefully this new wave of ‘blue’ products is here to stay. IT professionals the world over no longer need to worry about finding the ‘hidden’ pixel to bring up metro interface (which was particularly annoying through RDP sessions).Also worth noting – through the aforementioned link you can also download System Center 2012 R2 Preview as well as SQL Server 2014 CTP.Please understand that these releases are previews only and should therefore never be used in production. Enjoy!Neil