What Is a VDI - Virtual Desktop Infrastructure and How Can It Help My Business?

VDI Virtual Desktop – Nowadays, the biggest challenge IT departments in many organisations face is to centralise all the different IT solutions in a new technological model. IaaS (Infrastructure-as-a-Service), desktop and application virtualisation, private and public cloud, and VDI are phrases we hear often.

This blog gives a brief introduction to virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) and also explains what it is, in what scenarios it could be used, and how it could contribute to your company.

The purpose of VDI is to execute and distribute user desktop sessions from a centralised infrastructure—in one or many data centres—which can be either on-premise or in a cloud system. In a typical VDI setup, you will have a central server called hypervisor, or a farm of servers on which the virtualisation software runs, where virtual machines are created for users to use.

Elasticity

When it comes to VDI, organisations have the ability to deploy a corporate desktop to multiple users simultaneously and quickly. In addition to this, the IT department can make system and application changes much faster than with traditional desktops. This not only enables the accelerated deployment of new desktops and applications, but also gives IT the ability to roll back any undesired changes quickly and easily. Organisations that have already invested in server virtualisation strategies can make use of the security and disaster processes to support VDI deployments.

Good to know: Understanding the user and application environment is key to effective desktop image management strategy. It is critical to run VDI deployments on reliable infrastructure, as multiple users will be affected if the VDI environment is not available.

Going green

Thin client technology consumes only one tenth of the power drawn by traditional desktops, something that is critical in today's heightened environmental and cost awareness, and radiates far less heat due to less moving parts. This especially enables environments with a large grouping of users, like call centres for example, to save on electricity and cooling costs. Furthermore, fewer devices need to be recycled, and VDI also empowers users to work from home securely, thereby eliminating the need to commute to a workplace.

Good to know: Going green is normally more focused on saving costs than preserving the environment, but VDI presents the opportunity for both.

Advantages and Benefits of VDI: Centralising Workstations

The benefits of using VDI are multi-fold, with the most significant being:

• It allows users to work as if they were connected to your company’s local network from anywhere, anytime, and on practically any device with an Internet connection.
• It enables you to centralise device maintenance. Update devices (both operating system and application updates) in a fast and easy way without having to go on-site to physical facilities or having to transfer big-size data throughout the network.
• Desktop horizontal scaling (expansion as well as reduction) is quick and simple, allowing you to adapt to your company’s needs in every moment. This also enables an optimal exploitation of the physical resources, and avoids extra energy costs of unused items.
• Secure your environment. Choose who does each task at every moment, prevent or provide workstation personalisation, or guarantee a new corporate image in each user logon.
• Choose different deployment models to meet your needs
• Deliver Windows apps on any device: Windows, Mac, iOS, Android
• Scale up or down to meet dynamic business needs by delivering apps from the cloud
• Provide a rich remote user experience similar to applications running on a local PC
• Maintain data compliance by keeping sensitive corporate resources off user devices

The VpsCity VDI Solution

VpsCity has a VDI solution that allows you to manage several different hypervisors to centralise, automate, and reduce the overhead costs of desktop management. With our solution, you will be able to deploy the number of desktops your company needs in a fast and flexible way. Desktops can be parameterised depending on your company’s necessities.

Client Example

We leveraged the Microsoft Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI), powered by a Windows Server operating system, to deploy remote desktop services that provided employees at Carpet Court the flexibility to access their corporate Windows 2012 R2 desktop and application environment running in the data centre on thin clients. We decided to explore the use of thin clients rather than traditional computers at Carpet Court for a couple of reasons. The majority of the users perform support services and development tasks for Carpet Court. For data security reasons, all computing was going to take place on fixed workstations within all the branches across New Zealand. It was a compelling use case for server-based desktops.

Features of VDI thin clients at Carpet Court

For users at Carpet Court, all the virtual desktops are centrally located, making it easier to control access to confidential data. In addition, the office environment is strictly controlled and standardised. Users enjoy the reliability, data protection, and disaster recovery capabilities provided through the server applications. Shared memory is used to store and backup all desktop data.

Through user state virtualisation and application virtualisation, users can easily create an office desktop environment connected to user accounts and stored. By deploying enterprise applications and information security to the virtual machines (VMs), VDI technology helps to ensure that confidential information stays within the VM.

Take Advantage of VDI (Virtual Desktop Infrastructure)

The success of today’s workforce depends on the ability of employees to securely access their office desktop from any device, in any location. Employees need the agility to grab a device and have access to everything they need to do their jobs, whether they are in the office, on a business trip or working from home. Top quality remote access solutions that embody the above attributes are changing the way businesses work by allowing them to extract value from mobility and mobile workforces. If you have decided to take a step toward a centralised solution for desktop distribution, VpsCity offers you a perfect, simple, and flexible solution that allows your desktop farm to always be readily available and updated.