Book Image

Optimizing Citrix?? XenDesktop?? for High Performance

By : Craig Thomas Ellrod
Book Image

Optimizing Citrix?? XenDesktop?? for High Performance

By: Craig Thomas Ellrod

Overview of this book

Citrix XenDesktop is a suite of desktop virtualization tools designed to provide users with fast and convenient access to their Windows desktops and applications through any device. Virtual desktops mean that rather than setting up hundreds or thousands of individual computers in an enterprise, companies can instead opt to create servers with large amounts of memory, disk, and processing resources, and use virtualization to offer these resources to end users. The result of this is that users are provided with an experience that appears to be identical to having an individual desktop PC. Each user has some disk space, processor time, and memory allocated to them, as though it is present on their own physical machine, when in reality, the resources are physically present on a centralized server. This book starts by answering the basic questions you need to ask when considering XenDesktop, followed by methods of how you can properly size your server infrastructure for XenDesktop. You’ll discover how to optimize the virtual machines used in XenDesktop, how to optimize your network for XenDesktop, and how to optimize the hypervisor and the cloud. You’ll also learn how to monitor XenDesktop to maximize performance. By the end of the book, you will be able to plan, design, build, and deploy high performance XenDesktop Virtualization systems in enterprises. You will also know how to monitor and maintain your systems to ensure smooth operation.
Table of Contents (18 chapters)
Optimizing Citrix XenDesktop for High Performance
Notice
Credits
About the Author
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
Index

Thin clients


As covered in my companion book, Getting Started with XenDesktop® 7.x, Packt Publishing, many thin client vendors are integrating with Citrix Receiver to provide a seamless experience with virtual desktops delivered by XenDesktop. Some thin client models have a thin OS, usually a flavor of Linux, with the Citrix Receiver code built in, so that it can connect to the virtual desktop quickly and automatically. Other models have the Windows operating system running with Citrix Receiver.

They key to performance when using thin clients is to make sure they have enough power. Many thin client vendors really ratchet down the cost of the bill Of materials (BOM) by using low end components and processors. Lower cost means lower performance.

If you are considering using thin clients to run the virtual desktop for your users, do yourself a favor and read the reviews. More importantly, do a proof of concept with as many thin clients as you can, because the proof is in the actual performance...