Windows Server Over Windows?

Of all the things my school decides to give us students for free, Windows Server 2012 is one of them, not Windows 8. I'm pretty sure that Windows Server is nearly identical to the retail operating system, but builds on server tools necessary for corporations, and enterprise, and all that. I'd just be happy to get it. Windows Server 2008 (parallel to Windows 7) didn't have dwm (Aero, animations), but Windows Server 2012 has it + metro.

Besides the added server tools bloat, I can't think of any downsides to having it. It runs on x64 only I've heard but that doesn't prove a problem to me.

Does anyone know if it's a good idea? It's available to students for some reason via Microsoft DreamSpark.

OR I COULD JUST BE COMPLETELY WRONG AND EVERYTHING I'VE BEEN TOLD THESE YEARS HAVE BEEN LIES. Seriously, that's a scary thought but very possible.

The only thing it's lacking is a good free antivirus. I paid for MalwareBytes since it's a lifetime license, and it's "okay" for what I do on that box.

If you're going to turn it into a workstation, visit Win2012Workstation (or similar sites if you go for Win2008R2) and try the utility they've got. It makes getting up and going a breeze by adding in the features of the desktop OS that get left out of server releases (hardware accelerated audio, as an example).

Wireless may be a pain if you're on a laptop, as would the functionality of sleep/hibernate and power management. Not sure if you can add those with some hacking or not, but it's really the only limitation besides the good anti-virus solution.