Cost Pros and Cons for VDI in DataCenter
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I was just asked to provide proposals for a small company to evaluate; one for replace the in-house server and continue the cycle of replacing PCs, and one to go VDI with the Host in a data center.
Do any of you ( @scottalanmiller ) have a bullet point list that covers the pros and cons of VDI v. Traditional compute environments?
I'm going to write it all up for them, but I don't want to miss any of the hidden costs and benefits.
Thanks.
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@JasGot said in Cost Pros and Cons for VDI in DataCenter:
one for replace the in-house server and continue the cycle of replacing PCs, and one to go VDI with the Host in a data center.
VDI still requires the PCs. How do they plan to access their VDI without them?
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What will the users use to access those VDI's? Thin clients can typically still cost just as much as typical desktops ( $400-$1000+). Granted they should be a lot easier to manage, and they aren't that great for offline access or remote access (though I know in the past vendors made laptop like thin clients).
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@JasGot said in Cost Pros and Cons for VDI in DataCenter:
Do any of you ( @scottalanmiller ) have a bullet point list that covers the pros and cons of VDI v. Traditional compute environments?
Don't think so, but I'll look.
VDI is focused on reduction in the cost of managing desktops while incurring lots of server-side complexity. Easy answer is... no SMB will get an advantage from it. Should be a foregone "never consider this" situation. No SMB has the scale or desktop complexity to make VDI viable. VDI has so much cost and complexity, and does solves a problem so trivial, that until the scale is massive, it just is absolutely nutty to talk about.
At a minimum, you need more server resources, server software, specialized skills and knowledge and IT time to make VDI work.
Then you need all the same PCs and support that you needed before on top of it. You move from common knowledge to special knowledge, from common software to special software. And you introduce all kinds of performance and reliability risks.
Replacing and managing PCs is dirt cheap. VDI is asinine expensive.
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NTG uses VDI. And here is why it works for us....
- We don't run Windows. So the huge licensing cost and CPU costs of Windows doesn't exist.
- We already have PCs, so the VDI is just an extra tool on top.
- We already have the datacenter and server resources. We are just using spare cycles, not paying for more.
- We justify the VDI for security reasons and the specific workflows of an MSP.
- The high cost expertise for it is already in-house, we aren't paying extra for that.
- Our server infrastructure is high availability already.
Normal companies have none of those factors, all of which are needed for us to make VDI plausible.
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@scottalanmiller All-In-One Thin Clients.
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Thanks. This will be good to make sure I don't miss any high points to demonstrate why it is a bad idea for this particular business.
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@JasGot said in Cost Pros and Cons for VDI in DataCenter:
@scottalanmiller All-In-One Thin Clients.
That likely makes things even worse. All in ones are super expensive. So this would likely raise the cost over PCs, rather than lowering.
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@JasGot said in Cost Pros and Cons for VDI in DataCenter:
Thanks. This will be good to make sure I don't miss any high points to demonstrate why it is a bad idea for this particular business.
The main "bad" is the complete lack of any benefits.
That's the real crux... absolutely zero reason to even consider it. Tons and tons of negatives, and what seems like no positives.
