Microsoft Azure Thin Client
From Channel Futures Sep 27 — When adopting or adjusting virtual desktop solutions and services, many managed service providers seek advice on what brands, and types of clients, to invest in to accompany deployments. And given the evolution of desktop-as-a-service (DaaS) and the recent general availability of Windows 365, a new set of criteria have emerged when it comes to selecting the right hardware to efficiently operate virtual desktop environments.
In Brief
- It will need to support AVD (Azure Virtual Desktop)
- No known zero clients support AVD or Windows 365
- Pros and Cons of a Zero Client are listed
- Thin Client typically boot into Windows 10 IoT environment
- Thin client more expensive but more flexible
- Windows or Linux? Do you use MS Teams?
- The linux vendors are very creative and resourceful though
- Recommendations – Igel, 10ZiG and NComputing, to name a few
Excerpt:
Choosing between a Windows and a Linux thin client also has its implications. If you want the latest and greatest features that the Microsoft Remote Desktop client has to offer, picking a Windows-based thin client could be a wise choice. As of this writing, only Windows-based thin clients support Microsoft Teams video and audio optimization when making video or voice calls. This offloads the audio and video to be processed by the thin client, taking a heavy load off the AVD/Windows 365 virtual machine and gives the end user a great experience. This technique is also supported when using Zoom virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) – a Zoom client optimized for use with Azure Virtual Desktop and Windows 365. Microsoft also announced in public preview a Chromium-based browser extension called Multimedia Redirection that offloads video to be processed on the local thin client as well, which allows you to fit a higher user density per session host.
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