A Quick Dive into Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD)
SHARE THE BLOG
Overview
It’s been nearly two years since the COVID-19 crisis, and organizations have found new ways to address challenges to quickly find safe remote working solutions for their employees and contractors. Although the buzz word “work from home” gained a lot of support and traction, it is a matter of concern as work is happening on shared and unmanaged devices, over unsecured networks, and in unauthorized or incompatible applications.
To address this challenge, Microsoft has introduced Azure Virtual Desktop (formerly Windows Virtual Desktop) which is a cloud-based solution based on Azure for delivering desktop as a service that offers full desktop virtualization with Windows 10 multi-session and Remote application virtualization. In recent months, Azure Virtual Desktop has become an increasingly popular option for employers to ensure that employees and contractors can work effectively from anywhere and on any device.
Why Azure Virtual Desktop?
Azure Virtual Desktop comes with a lot of benefits for both employers and employees.
- New admin management experience: New AVD Portal has recently been launched that provides centralized management from a single interface and help administrators govern their AVD environment more effectively.
- Easy set-up and manage: It allows IT Admins to deploy and configure simple remote working solution in a matter of few hours.
- Full control and personalisation: Deliver a bespoke Windows 10 desktop experience to employees on any device, pre-configured exactly how you want it.
- Security and control: Apply security policies and restriction to ensure that your data is safe while providing a great experience for their end-users.
- Work from anywhere and on any device: Employees stay as productive with a virtualized experience on a PC, phone, tablet, or browser as they are with a physical PC sitting right in front of them to improve your business resiliency.
- Elastic workforce: Supports your business with an increasingly flexible workforce for successful company Mergers from an IT infrastructure perspective. Additionally, companies that have short-term employees and contractors will find their business needs met as they have the option to provide their part-time employees with the needed access and services in a smooth and cost-effective way.
- Compliance with Industry Regulations: Microsoft Azure globally works with governments and regulators to deliver more than 35 compliance offerings specific to the needs of key industries with security and regulation like defense, government, healthcare, Banking, or finance organizations.
- IT Cost-saving: Entities that are looking to save money by not relying on expensive devices/licensing and software should opt for AVD, especially if you already have one of the supported M365 License, then you only pay for compute, storage, and network consumption.
- Flexible Environment and Auto Scaling: AVD offers auto-scaling to spin down unused VDI sessions and is based on consumption in the cloud versus the always-on infrastructure model.
- Heavy Workers: Remote workers who need powerful systems – such as CAD designers or producers or who are looking to work from home can easily finalize their duties and don’t have to depend on high-powered workstations. AVD offers many options for powerful Azure virtual machines with GPU cards that fit different heavy users’ needs.
Explore AVD Licensing for Windows 10
If you have one of the following Microsoft licenses, you are eligible to benefit from Windows 10 single and multi-session on Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD):
- Microsoft 365 E3/E5
- Microsoft 365 A3/A5/Student Use Benefits
- Microsoft 365 F3
- Microsoft 365 Business
- Windows 10 Enterprise E3/E5
- Windows 10 Education A3/A5
- Windows 10 VDA per user
Get up to 30% discount
Are you new to AVD? Do you know that you can get up to 30 percent off* on Azure Virtual Desktop computing costs for specific Azure VM series (D-series and Bs-series)?
*Offer valid up to 90 days when using the native Microsoft AVD solution.
Get in touch to find out how you can take advantage of this exclusive offer before December 31, 2021.
Want to know more?
We are offering you a FREE Live Session to take you through the features and functionalities of Azure Virtual Desktop.