Windows Server 2012 Essentials provides small businesses with a server solution that can support up to 25 users and 50 devices. It provides management, networking, data storage and backup, security, and document and printer sharing. All your applications and information are protected, centralized, and organized using Windows Server 2012 Essentials and can be accessed almost anywhere using virtually any device.
Windows Server 2012 Essentials provides improved data protection capabilities by offering Windows Azure online backup that can be used to protect files and folders in a cloud-based storage service that is managed by Microsoft. Another feature is Storage Space that allows you to group physical drives together into a storage pool to create storage spaces, which are virtual drives that appear in File Explorer. This allows you to create larger storage spaces by adding more drives when you run low on pool capacity.
The Essentials edition is used on servers that have 1 or 2 CPUs, and each physical server requires one license. For example, two licenses are required when you have two servers with one CPU each, while one server using 5 CPUs would need three licenses. This OEM version of Windows Server 2012 Essentials is not transferable to another server, and support is the responsibility of the computer manufacturer or installer.