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Technology Optimisation: Desktop Virtualisation
Improve business agility and cost control with desktop virtualisation

By centrally hosting user data and applications on a virtualised desktop environment, organisations can simplify IT management, minimise their carbon footprint and reduce risk.

Why is desktop virtualisation important?

To meet changing customer, business and legislative demands, organisations need to remain flexible. This flexibility must therefore also extend to an organisation’s core IT applications and devices - particularly those used by the end user community.

Desktop virtualisation breaks down the physical limitations that exist within a traditional client environment to provide a more agile infrastructure that can scale and evolve with an organisation and its users.

With a more agile desktop environment, organisations can support flexible working practices, including hot-desking and home-working, as well as enable better collaboration, such as providing access to third parties.

As well as increasing agility, desktop virtualisation can also help to:

• Reduce support costs and complexity
• Minimise power consumption and therefore environmental impact
• Strengthen security and reduce risk
• Business information is assured to remain in the datacentre

These business benefits are helping to accelerate the adoption of virtual desktop technologies. According to Gartner*, there will be 49 million hosted virtual desktop devices by 2013.

How does it work?

With a virtualised desktop, users no longer access their data or applications locally. Instead these resources are hosted centrally on a server and are delivered to either a dedicated client device or a shared workstation based on a user’s identity.

Organisations have been creating server-based desktop environments for more than 10 years using Microsoft Windows Terminal Services, Citrix XenApp (formerly Citrix Presentation Server) and thin client devices. This approach enables multiple users in disparate locations to access a common desktop image held on a central server, and can be highly cost-effective for fixed desk locations such as contact centres, bank branches and retail outlets.

In the last couple of years, this approach and the associated technologies have evolved, and organisations now have a second option: creating a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI). The core difference of VDI is that it is based on personalised desktop images for each user rather than a shared image. As a result, VDI offers greater flexibility both for individual users and businesses as a whole. For example, users can be granted extended access rights that enable them to modify their working environment according to their individual needs.

VDI also enables more applications to be accessed via a virtualised environment; whereas the shared approach is not compatible with all enterprise software packages.

What are the core technologies involved?

Implementing the right software and hardware foundations is essential. There is a lot of hype around virtual desktops, and vendors and their offerings are constantly evolving

Citrix has a proven track record in developing software that enables desktop environments to be delivered on-demand to users and client devices. Its core offerings are XenApp for enabling shared virtual desktops and XenDesktop, which forms the basis of the personalised VDI approach. VMware View is also a core platform for enabling VDI, and also includes VMware ThinApp for implementing application virtualisation. Microsoft is the leading supplier of Application Virtualisation technology through the App-V product. Application Virtualisation is always recommended as part of a desktop virtualisation transformation to reduce testing time and provide a flexible platform for users with differing application needs.

Although not a prerequisite for desktop virtualisation, deploying thin client devices will unlock greater financial savings and energy efficiencies. For example, HP’s new thin client device t5145 requires 14 watts of power compared with an average PC’s power requirement of between 60 and 180 watts. The t5145 also comes complete with pre-loaded brokers for VMware View and XenDesktop.

What are the first steps towards desktop virtualisation?

There is no ‘one-size-fits-all approach’ when implementing virtual desktops and some applications, user groups and peripherals are simply not suited to this model. It is therefore important to evaluate the organisation’s specific drivers, estimated transformation costs and anticipated benefits.

Computacenter has developed a suite of tools that help organisations make just such an evaluation and determine return on investment (ROI) before any commitment has been made.

Once the decision to implement desktop virtualisation has been made, organisations must also assess and address data storage requirements, user access controls and directory services as part of their project plan.

With extensive virtualisation experience – Computacenter was the first company in the UK to be certified on the latest VMware and Citrix technologies – we can assist with these decisions as well as technology supply, testing, implementation and ongoing support. A virtual desktop implementation can be a major undertaking requiring extensive project management, training and engineering resources to ensure the transformation is a success.

We have helped hundreds of organisations deploy virtual desktop environments. For example, we helped Speedy Hire deploy a Citrix-based virtual desktop infrastructure for its 500-plus depots and enabled Virgin Media to implement a thin client environment that will eventually provide up to 6,000 users with access to 750 applications via thin clients.

What are the business benefits?

	A virtual desktop infrastructure is easier and therefore cheaper to manage. Annual support savings are estimated at 20 percent, although the payback is not always immediate. By deploying thin client devices, organisations can also break free from the continuous desktop refresh cycle, which will reduce capital expenditure and unlock more financial savings. According to a study by Gartner** the overall total cost of ownership for a thin client is nearly half that of its PC counterpart.
	Security, regulatory compliance and disaster recovery can all be enhanced with desktop virtualisation. With data held centrally rather than on individual devices, there is less risk of sensitive information being lost or exploited. This is key both for an organisation’s reputation and compliance with legislation, such as the Data Protection Act. This centralised approach also makes it easier for organisations to keep security patches up to date and capture all user data as part of standard backup routines.
	Desktop virtualisation increases the flexibility of individual users and the organisation as a whole, which is essential for responding to change. Hot-desking, remote working and home-working are all more achievable with a virtual environment, which helps to increase productivity and customer service levels. New desktops can be quickly and easily provisioned, which is key to enabling growth and simplifying mergers and acquisitions. Users can also be given access to more than one virtual desktop post-merger until applications are consolidated.
	Thin client devices are less power-hungry than a traditional desktop, which means companies can significantly reduce their energy consumption. Desktop virtualisation also reduces the need for desk-side engineering visits, which helps to minimise the need for travel. A company’s carbon footprint can be further reduced by using desktop virtualisation to facilitate home-working.

Further information
To find out more about how Computacenter can assist with desktop virtualisation, log on to www.computacenter.com/virtualisation or email virtualisation@computacenter.com.

* Gartner report credit to be confirmed by CC IR
** TCO Comparison of PCs with Server-Based Computing, June 2006