Forums are a great place to help your peers as well as learn quick tips/points on various Microsoft technical products.I am participating in the SQL Server 2008 R2 pre-release forums as both a moderator and a answerer. I will kick-off this post with some of the more valuable quick-tips I have come across regarding SQL Server 2008R2 in the pre-release forums, going forward I hope to keep this post current with new findings.

Note: Some of these tips may seem obvious to SQL Server experts, however for more typical users of the product these are more valuable/applicable:

1. Windows Server 2003 R2 and Windows Server 2003 sp2 are the same from a SQL Server 2008 R2 installation requirements perspective
2. You cannot backup a database from an R2 instance and restore it to a non-R2 SQL Server 2008 instance
3. SQL Server 2008 R2 Express does not ship with Management Studio Express. For those of you wanting R2 Management Studio Express I would imagine it will be in beta/ctp form prior to the products launch but it is not available at this time with the August CTP (to my knowledge :) ). If you want Management Studio support for the CTP you should install the full Enterprise Evaluation version.