
Ask HN: Technical choices shopping for desktop virtualization solutions? - xtiansimon
My experience with remote hosting services is limited to headless server hosting--managed,unmanaged, shared, dedicated--services. Either you&#x27;re providing a service, or you need hosting for your firm. In this case my firm is the consumer.<p>Looking for virtual workstations for (variably) 5-10 simultaneous users for 6-months or longer. Software requirements are minimal basic business apps: Microsoft Windows OS, Miscrosoft Office 365, Chrome&#x2F;Firefox web browsers, Windows-based accounting software, Python (Anaconda), and printing. Our current solution uses LogMeIn&#x2F;ConnectWise to access worker&#x27;s remote machines--that&#x27;s the baseline user experience.<p>- installation of required Windows-capable software--what are the sorts of restrictions?<p>- user experience as compared desktop (What is persistent virtual desktop? Would you have file-tree that&#x27;s not persistent?? Can I have dual-head?)<p>- printing capability<p>- We also need a dedicated server--is it common to bundle all these services on one machine or with one provider?<p>The Wikipedia article on Desktop Virtualization [1] describes:<p>- VDI service provides individual desktop operating system instances (e.g., Windows..10) for each user,<p>- Remote Desktop Services sessions run in a single shared-server operating system (e.g., Windows Server...).<p>- Desktop as a service ... Private cloud implementations...referred to as &quot;managed VDI&quot;.<p>Are there performance downsides for simultaneous users? 
I assume I should choose a provider close to my side of the country, but only some disclose where their &#x27;data centers&#x27; are located--others do not.<p>I&#x27;ve already sat through one sales pitch and conference call thinking I was reviewing one product, but understand now they were selling me something with a different user experience than our baseline (Please disclose if this is your business.)<p>[1]: https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Desktop_virtualization
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tannerbrockwell
You can use Amazon WorkSpaces [1] to provision either Windows or Linux
desktops in just a few minutes and quickly scale. I have used this for
accessing applications that are latency bound when traveling. You can choose
the specs, including GPUs which would make some applications and tasks easy to
implement.

There are also apps to access your virtual desktop from your iPad.

For my needs, the costs were nominal (monthly fee + per minute) and allowed me
to get work done.

[1]: [https://aws.amazon.com/workspaces/](https://aws.amazon.com/workspaces/)

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xtiansimon
Thanks for sharing your experience. That's a clear use case--virtualizing to
all manner of devices, and services available nationwide. I see from the link
Amazon's service is self-titled as Desktop-as-a-Service (DaaS). Did you
customize the virtualization with commercial software you own?

