It's an extreme example but...
You'd have to know the client. In the past they had 3 admins on their WinSBS2003 Server before I got to them. Have you ever heard the joke:
How many sys-admins does it take to change a light bulb? 5 - 1 to actually change the light bulb and 4 to say they could do a better job.
In this case (I'm guessing from experience now) 1 guy built the box up and got fired. A new guy came in and built the box in his way, then fired, and so on.
I got it shortly after; by then the box resembled used toilet paper. It had so much poorly written software on it that it barely ran with 8GB RAM; services were running all the time that were better off as "on demand" services to be launched only when you needed them. And an "email marketing" program that essentially made it easy for them to SPAM potential clients; the box was never the same after that. But then then there was the shareware...and of course the registry...
WinSBS 2008 was released and the customer wanted a migration. Not a new build (for 5 users) - a Migration: bringing the evils of the old box directly onto the new one. Some servers, once screwed, cannot be unscrewed and mostly because of the registry.
This server has been the bane of my existence since the evil spawn darkened my door a few years ago and there's nothing more than can be done about it.
Like I say, it's an extreme example but a server should be clean-able. Windows just isn't. You can gingerly go through the registry but no one can say for certain they've "cleaned" the registry all up and it's spotless. The registry is all important AND a big black slice of voodoo.
On a Linux box I've only ever had to tune it up here and there, just a bit. And I've never lost a moments sleep over it.
10 hours/month for the first 6 months: yes. It's leveled off now and is quite stable but it shouldn't have been such a headache.
