Thin client

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As per fricking usual with I.T. directors they hear a term like thin client coupled with reduced TCO and they put a phone call through to my boss, who mutters profanity to himself then realises he can hand this crap to one of his minions.

This is where I come in

We've already given him a brief overview of what it is and what it involves. Pros and cons. Even with our extensive list of cons he's keen to pursue so anyway

As if I dont have enough on my plate I now have to compare current Thin client solutions for him to mull over

Never used thin client although we do have Citrix though its only used as a portal for remote desktop. We put it in place off the back of needing remote access in the even of swine flu. I know we could have achieved the same thing with MS tech that we already pay for but they're very odd here and use the server technology to its minimum

So my question is. If an organisation wished to explore thin client where should they start looking

What options are there?

Who are the main players?

Any info welcome. just need a shove in the right direction. Will bump question if no responses as I appreciate its Friday so serious questions not that welcome. As a thanks for reading on a friday heres a picture of a kitten

 

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Sweet kitten.

Sorry no idea about thin clients.

 

ANything with XPe or Windows Embeded is good by me

[added]
sorry that should have been Windows Embeded Standard(not CE versions)

 

Wyse seem to make good ones, we deploy wyse thin clients at our branch offices, if you get the ones with wyseOS instead of XPe or linux you can set up FTP and a small txt file to automatically add desktop icons and settings to the thinclients (even new ones, you just dump them on the desk, connect nic and its straight away the same as all the others). So it means you can add new apps or make global changes very simlply by altering a txt file.

Another pro is no more random plugging in usb or cd's from home!

 

Does server 08 have anything to offer? Not looked at it properly yet

 

you could just use your existing internal citrix infrastructure to support thin clients, if you publish apps instead of desktops internally that should not put too much load on the farm (depending on how many of these things you want to get of course).

 

Microsoft have a lot of Buzz around its Virtual Desktop Infrastructure products at the moment.

I have also heard the latest Citrix products are amazing especially its newest versions of its protocols.

 

Wyse make some goodish thin clients, then it's just a case of a simple configuration onto the terminal server running Windows. Pretty easy. Does it take the hassle out of it? yes and no, you just replacing one thing with another and a completely different set of issues.

But yea, WYSE and Remote Desktop Services or Terminal Services, there are probably better solutions out there, Citrix though.

 

Citrix Xen Desktop seems to be one of the better offerings around at the moment.

Depending upon your needs though MS Terminal Services may be able to give you just as valuable a service.

I think that what you need to do it to speak to your boss to see where they want this technology implementing, what sort of money they are proposing to make available, etc. Its only when you have a better picture that you can start better looking into solutions.

 

Hi
Thanks for the responses guys. A shove in the right direction. I just needed to know some options and now have a few so great I'll get reporting

We have citrix and over 120 systems on our esx farm but they're all servers or service orientated. We're a publishing house and have lots of designers so a lot of custom builds and no real standard image so thinclient IS NOT for us. Still need to dissuade the guy who makes the decisions though