I recently scoured the Internet for information and success/trials of using Windows Server 2008 R2 Core as an SCCM distribution point. Much to my surprise, I found very little information and had to piece together and test it out for myself. According to the Prerequisites for Installing Configuration Manager, a BITS-enabled DP needs IIS, BITS, WebDAV, and RDC. Unfortunately only IIS can be installed on Server Core, and not the others.
At first glance, this seems to indicate that you wouldn’t be able to use Server Core as a DP. However, when you look closer, the prerequisites listed are only for BITS-enabled DPs. So none of IIS, BITS, WebDAV, and RDC are necessary. Granted you could miss out on the advantages that BITS provides, but it is still possible to use Core as a DP. Another possible route is to use the Server Share (setup/config similar to doing a new Server), but the disadvantage is not being able to have site status messages reported to the parent site.
Phew! It seems so simple, yet so easy to get confused. So when setting up an SCCM distribution point on a Windows Server Core OS, just be sure to not enable option “Allow client to transfer content using…BITS…”
