Zero Clients and Virtual Desktops in Academic Environments Franz Agas Systems Analyst University of Michigan School of Information

Overview of UMSI Graduate School - 369 Master's students - 50 Ph.D students - 61 Faculty Our faculty and students work to develop an integrated understanding of human needs as they relate to information systems and social structures, connecting people, information, and technology in valuable ways.  SI pioneers the development and application of principles of information management. 

Sample Virtual Desktop Infrastructure Overview Server Hardware Hypervisor: VMWare Infrastructure 4 Microsoft Windows 7 Virtual Desktops Directory Services: Microsoft Active Directory, Novell eDirectory, Open LDAP Connection Broker: Pano Logic Manager or VMWare view Clients: Zero, Thin, Thick

Clients Overview: How users interface with Virtual Desktops

Thick Clients Local Processing Local Data Storage Installed Operating System IT Maintenance Needed Essentially a computer connected to a Network

Thin Clients Limited CPU/RAM Limited Data Storage Embedded Operating System IT Maintenance Needed

Zero Clients No CPU/RAM No Data Storage, No OS or Firmware No Maintenance needed

Features We Looked For Cost Savings Scalability Integration within our existing Infrastructure: Virtualization, Networking, Desktop management Ease of Management for two locations Power Savings – Green IT Energy Savings Initiative Reduce time required for Lab and Research Desktop deployment Student/Faculty/Staff access both offsite and onsite

Infrastructure Prior to Rollout 150 Ph.D/Staff/Faculty Windows PCs on Active Directory and Campus Network, equal amount of Apple OSX machines. User and Research data stored on central servers. -Primarily Dell PC’s: Dual Core/2GB of RAM Several Ph.D students and faculty using remote desktop to PCs on their desks Two Computer Labs: -30 Seat Masters Student Lab -30 Seat Economics Lab Servers already virtualized with VMWare ESXi

Initial Pano VDI Rollout 2008 Desktop Client: 15 Pano Logic Zero Clients, Keyboard/Mice, Monitor Hypervisor: VMWare ESXi 3.5 Connection Broker: - Pano Logic Manager In The Datacenter: Dell Poweredge Server: Dual Intel Quad Core (8 core) 32GB Ram ,Windows XP Virtual Desktops

Current VDI Offering Desktop Client: Hypervisor: Connection Broker: 50 Pano Logic Clients, Keyboard/Mice, Monitor 80 Windows 7 Virtual Desktops (Persistent/Non-Persistent mix) Plan to replace 30 PC Lab with 30 Pano Logic clients Hypervisor: VMWare ESXi 4, VMWare virtual center Connection Broker: - Pano Logic Manager In The Datacenter: 3 x Dell Poweredge AMD R815 Servers: 48 Cores/128GB of RAM

Advantages to VDI Cost Savings: 30% increasing year after year Time Savings: Quick deployment of Virtual Desktops Energy Savings: 4 Watts for Pano Client w/Keyboard compared to 100 watts for a PC Convenience of secure remote access for faculty, students and staff.

Advantages to VDI (Continued) Increased Security: No data is stored on the endpoints. Strong 128-bit encryption between endpoint and virtual desktop. Increased Security: Controlled computing environment for student/faculty research. Administrative access can be given to users with reduced IT overhead compared to regular workstations.

User Perspective Easy Transition to Virtual Desktops More CPU/RAM Resources for Jobs than PC Issues with Audio/Video – Zero Clients not for Multimedia Use Since Faculty and Students were already used to Authenticating to Active Directory and storing their data on central servers, the transition to virtual desktops was fairly easy. The computing environment was essentially the same as physical pc’s. Processing power for data large jobs were better on Virtual Desktops then PC’s, since we could allocate additional resources to user virtual desktops on our multi core servers on request. Initially we had issues with Audio and Video on the clients, most of them have been resolved with recent Pano driver updates on the virtual desktops. While it is possible to watch Hulu on the Pano Devices since it is the only zero client that support flash, our goal was not multimedia. For a true multimedia experiences, a PC is still unmatched.

Long Term Benefits Lengthening Technology Replacement Cycle Hardware upgrades result in significant cost benefits due to the increased number of Virtual Desktops per server Instead of the typical 3 year PC replacement, we can make less expensive incremental upgrades over time Enhancing the existing servers with more processors and memory Adding additional servers to the cluster Increasing storage Improvements in software, both Pano and VMWare, should also enhance the end user experience We have found that the long term benefits outweigh any potential short term loss during our initial rollout. Hardware upgrades result in significant cost benefits year after year due to increased number of Virtual Desktops per server. Instead of replacing PC’s in 3 years, we can make less expensive incremental upgrades over time such as upgrading server memory or adding additional servers. Virtualization technology is changing, and improvements on both the hypervisor and client end will enhance the end user experience.

When it makes sense to deploy VDI Leveraging existing Infrastructure: Servers already Virtualized in the datacenter Existing Network Infrastructure: DHCP/DNS, 1gb backbone, 100 mb to switch Existing Directory Infrastructure: Active Directory, Open LDAP Existing Desktop Management: Desktop Images, Unidesk, Active Directory Group Policy, SCCM, VMWare vCenter update manager Existing Data Storage Infrastructure: Storage Area Networks, Managed Local Storage

Thank you! Questions? agas@umich.edu