Tizen Developers

With AVD, the infrastructure and management components of a traditional on-premises Virtual Desktop Windows 10 disappear into the cloud—just like a dinosaur-shaped cloud merges back into indescribable formations on the backdrop of the beautiful blue sky on a sunny day. (Read my post on Windows Server/SQL Server end life for more dinosaur metaphors.) Thanks to this merging, Microsoft is taking back critical components of a traditional VDI—such as brokering, load-balancing, compute, storage, and diagnostics—from your plate, which will let your precious IT talent focus on other strategic areas with growth potential.

Hosting your desktops on Azure also means you get Azure’s state-of-the-art security features. I believe Azure is considered the most secure public cloud platform, and AVD provides the best DaaS security model for customers. With AVD, users can only access their virtual machines (VMs) by going through the Azure Active Directory authentication system. This means companies can use multifactor authentication and conditional access according to their needs and depending on the employee profile. Also, Azure uses reverse connect technology that lets you run a VM without keeping any inbound ports open. This means that the VMs on AVD are not exposed to the Internet directly.

Windows 10 Multisession
Unlike the traditional RDI, Azure Virtual Desktop allows multiple sessions on a Windows 10 VM. This means that an organization can have multiple users access the same virtual machine while reducing the cost of maintaining multiple VM licenses. Also, these sessions are isolated from each other, which gives higher security and privacy.

FSLogix Profile Containers
The FSLogix piece solidifies my above point about the superior Windows 10 and Office experience on AVD. Microsoft acquired FSLogix a few years back and integrated its profile container technology into its Azure and Microsoft 365 ecosystems. With FSLogix profile container technology integrated to AVD, Microsoft has revolutionized the way the end-user experience works in non-persistent virtual machine sessions. An AVD user profile will follow a user even if they do not use the same virtual machine session every time they access AVD virtual machines.

The integration of FSLogix containers also significantly impacts how your Microsoft Apps (formerly Office 365 ProPlus) and OneDrive experience work with AVD. FSLogix with AVD can provide you the most productive Microsoft 365 Apps experience. The FSLogix technology on AVD also allows OneDrive to sync when the user roams through non-persistent sessions.

Access AVD from Any Operating System
Another reason why Cloud PC Services is a win for the end user is the flexibility that Microsoft offers for AVD across diverse operating systems. A user can access AVD in Windows, macOS, iOS, or Android. The client OS flexibility of this sort goes a long way to BYOD scenarios that companies may want to use while they extend their remote work footprint.

The growth drivers for Microsoft products are not just based on better technology; they include how Microsoft makes it easier for existing customers to adopt those technologies and how they use their partner ecosystem to help customers solve business problems using those technologies. In AVD, Microsoft makes the adoption easier for you by making the AVD license free with most Microsoft 365 licenses and Windows 10 Enterprise licenses. The cost savings alone can be a significant driver for companies—with a Microsoft software ecosystem—to adopt AVD. Not to mention, Windows 7 EOL customers get free Extended Security Updates on AVD.