Microsoft’s Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD) offering is now available on-premises, marking a significant shift in the company’s cloud-first approach to most workloads. This move is expected to provide customers with more flexibility and control over their desktop virtualization (VDI) environments.
AVD was initially launched as a cloud-based offering, but due to customer demand and the need for hybrid cloud capabilities, Microsoft has made it available on-premises through the formal release of version 23H2 of Azure Stack HCI. This hyperconverged offering brings a subset of Azure services to customers’ bit barns, typically running on clusters of a handful of servers.
The on-premises availability of AVD is expected to benefit customers with data residency requirements, latency-sensitive workloads, or those with a need for remote desktops in edge locations such as remote and branch offices. This move represents a departure from Microsoft’s previous cloud-first approach to most workloads, and acknowledges the reality that VDI requires fine-tuning to run well on-premises.
Azure Virtual Desktop on-premises offers several benefits to customers, including:
1. Greater control and flexibility over VDI environments, allowing customers to tailor the solution to their specific needs.
2. Improved performance and reduced latency for users, particularly in remote locations where cloud connectivity may be limited.
3. Enhanced security and data residency, as customer data remains on-premises and is not transmitted to the cloud.
4. The ability to run VDI workloads in edge locations such as remote and branch offices, ensuring that users have access to the resources they need, even when connectivity is limited.
The on-premises version of AVD is part of Azure Stack HCI 23H2, which also includes several other features such as support for Linux and Windows containers, command line tweaks for deploying Kubernetes clusters, and the ability to deploy the platform from the cloud. Additionally, there is a preview of tools that migrate Hyper-V VMs to Azure Stack HCI.
The move by Microsoft to bring AVD on-premises reflects a shift in the market for VDI solutions. Traditional VDI offerings have been criticized for their complexity and the need for specialized expertise to deploy and manage them. In contrast, AVD offers a simpler and more streamlined approach to VDI, making it more accessible to a wider range of customers.
Furthermore, with Microsoft’s Azure Virtual Desktop now available on-premises, users have plenty of reasons to rethink their commitments to Citrix, which has historically been closely tied to Microsoft but has recently made changes that may impact its relationship with the software giant. Citrix has put its VDI portfolio up for sale, and has also killed perpetual licenses in favor of subscription-based models.
In conclusion, the on-premises availability of Azure Virtual Desktop represents a significant shift in Microsoft’s approach to desktop virtualization, and provides customers with more flexibility and control over their VDI environments. This move is expected to benefit customers with data residency requirements, latency-sensitive workloads, or those with a need for remote desktops in edge locations. As the market for VDI solutions continues to evolve, it remains to be seen how this development will impact the landscape for desktop virtualization and cloud computing.