mark bowker
Senior Analyst

VDI is Not Desktop Virtualization

Opinion
Feb 12, 20101 min

It's one of many deployment models

I just read Harry Labana’s blog VDI alone is not Desktop Virtualization, WAKE UP! Harry is currently VP and CTO, XenApp Product group and has plenty of real world experience to lean on. VDI may be the right fit for certain scenarios, but successful desktop virtualization implementations view VDI as one of many deployment models. There are three main drivers of desktop virtualization:

  • Security
  • Cost optimization – Support/management reduction
  • Improved user experience

A few things to remember: you can’t just buy desktop virtualization. It requires multiple components that are oftentimes assembled from multiple vendors and they must all work together. Concerns about desktop virtualization mostly center on not disrupting users’ routines, application latency, printing, and stability. The challenge is bolting all the pieces together while meeting the needs of the end-user. Most importantly, business objectives outweigh any concerns over increased data center infrastructure costs. Sophisticated ROI analysis is rare. Desktop virtualization is being deployed because “I didn’t have to build a new data center” or “Billable hours increased.” These are real business drivers driven by CIO and senior IT management as shown in the below figure.

mark bowker

Senior Analyst Mark Bowker focuses on all things related to virtualization and cloud computing. Mark researches cloud and virtualization technologies and evaluates the impact the solutions have (or will have) on IT strategy and the broader marketplace. His other research areas include data center management, application workload deployment in next-generation data centers, and the external influences driving adoption of data center technologies. Prior to joining ESG, Mark ran the IT organization for a business consulting and technology services company.

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