Microsoft Windows Virtual Desktop Azure DaaS Offering Now GA Worldwide
… it significantly decreases storage and makes it easier for the admin to manage and update the apps, while creating a seamless experience for the user,” Anderson and Numoto noted.
It isn’t clear when Microsoft will release App Attach, but several partners anticipate the company will reveal more on its plans for adding App Attach to WVD at next month’s Microsoft Ignite conference in Orlando.
Great Expectations for WVD
Partners anticipate that WVD will drive Azure consumption and provide a significant boost to the burgeoning cloud-based DaaS market because it introduces an economically attractive virtual Windows-as-a-service offering.
“We’re really excited about WVD and believe Microsoft is going to create a lot of energy into the cloud desktop space,” said Brian Barnes, CTO of Coretek Services, an early airlift tester of WVD.
In addition to providing an optimized virtual Windows 10 desktop and apps DaaS offering, WVD will provide one of the few options to extend the life of Windows 7 desktops beyond the January deadline when Microsoft has said it will end mainstream support and updates for the operating system. WVD includes Microsoft’s Extended Security Update (ESU) service for Windows 7 until January 2023 at no additional charge.
Since Microsoft released the WVD technical preview in March, thousands of customers and partners have tested it, according to Anderson.
“The interest is literally off the charts,” Anderson told Channel Futures, during an interview in late May during the Citrix Synergy conference, where the two longtime alliance partners announced integration of WVD with Citrix Cloud.
A key reason for the optimism about WVD is because the license is included with qualifying Windows 10, Microsoft 365 licenses. It also provides an inexpensive and technically appealing alternative to existing VDI desktops delivered by Windows Server Remote Desktop Services (RDS). The Windows Server RDS client access licenses (CAL) are transferable to WVD, which also is included with various commercial editions of Windows 10, including Windows 10 Enterprise and the Microsoft 365 bundle.
Partners who have tested it believe WVD could broaden the use of virtual Windows desktops and apps beyond the narrow VDI market.
“I believe that because of Microsoft’s WVD initiative that we will see net-new seats of Windows virtualization,” said Jason Smith, VP of products at Liquidware Labs, which is working with Microsoft and various systems integrators and resellers to onboard shared customers.
Liquidware is among several alliance partners rolling out services to extend WVD. Others include CloudJumper, Igel, Lakeside Software, Nerdio, ThinPrint, ControlUp and Workspot. Microsoft singled out its largest partner, Citrix, as having worldwide availability. VMware, which announced plans to support WVD in its Horizon Cloud, will offer a technical preview by the end of the year.
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