64-bit Terminal Services anyone?

[Netman]

@ Netman: "Citrix licence costs suck"

I've been told that the first year is expensive (i think you buy the licence) then after that you pay an upgrade protection subscription which is about a a third of the price. Is this the case?

Cheers.

Yep, that's what I've been told...
All with an 'ish' attached, but here's what I understand....
Citrix basic £110 per client up to £180 for the platinum stuff, then around a third of that ongoing yearly maintnenence cost.
Sun is around the £35-£50 per client mark, not sure of ongoing costs yet...
TS2008 would obviously just be the TS CAL which you have to still buy with the rest anyway... cheap under my school agreement!

Bearing in mind I'd like to sort out my servers on the back of this project - if I pay less for licensing, then I will have more for hardware, virtualisation and a nice SAN.

I am sure that Citrix is a great product, but it's looking as if it would be overkill in my case.
I'm having a thorough look at the options at the moment and will post more when I've finished the trial.

[CyberNerd]

....
TS2008 would obviously just be the TS CAL which you have to still buy with the rest anyway... cheap under my school agreement!

The costs of citrix can often be offset against the hardware requirements and the fact that the hardware lasts longer. With 2008 TS, MS now require an XPSP3 client to use published applications - this means you need an XP license, a TS license and 'modern' hardware. Over time, I still believe that citrix would be cost effective with linux clients.

[cookie_monster]

I've also been informed that Citrix will scale much better than TS (even 2008) so TS can start out a good option but once you start talking multiple servers and >150 clients you need Citrix (or alternative???)

Also apparently for native TS you really need a Windows clients on the TC box rather than Linux (so i've been told) this means approx £100 extra for each thin client which starts to make Citrix with Linux thin boxes look more reasonable.

I'm only going on what i've been told as we are only looking at options at the moment.

[CyberNerd]

Also apparently for native TS you really need a Windows clients on the TC box rather than Linux (so i've been told) this means approx £100 extra for each thin client which starts to make Citrix with Linux thin boxes look more reasonable.

yes, with 2008 server you need windows thin clients, - MS were loosing market share to linux with 2003/TS so they stopped it from working in 2008 (and put the price up for everyone). Full linux thin clients would only work when educational apps are VLE/web based and are written to be independent of platform, of course it can't happen because if educational resource creators get backhanders for being MS partners.

[Geoff]

yes, with 2008 server you need windows thin clients, - MS were loosing market share to linux with 2003/TS so they stopped it from working in 2008 (and put the price up for everyone). Full linux thin clients would only work when educational apps are VLE/web based and are written to be independent of platform, of course it can't happen because if educational resource creators get backhanders for being MS partners.

This only works up and until the open source devs reverse engineer the new RDP v6 protocol. Additionally MS may have to publish the specs anyway under the EU settlement deal.

[cookie_monster]

This only works up and until the open source devs reverse engineer the new RDP v6 protocol.

That's exactly what i suspected.

Thanks.

[Ric_]

Without going too much further OT... is it not better to have manufacturer support for the client - Citrix support Windows, Linux, BSD, Mac and more as clients.

[cookie_monster]

but using a Linux based thin client to access a Windows 2008 terminal server is still an issue right?

[localzuk]

No. You can turn off the usage of the problematic TS stuff in 2008. It is all to do with authenticating before you are presented with a TS session. Old RDP did it via the TS session itself, v6 can do it before.

So, it still works quite happily with Linux and OS X clients. (I RDP into our 2008 server from my mac every day).

[CyberNerd]

... but no published apps, even with citrix.

[localzuk]

... but no published apps, even with citrix.

I'll have to have a look at that. I've not looked into it yet.

[Geoff]

Got published apps just fine here on my Linux desktop coming from my Citrix server farm...

[cookie_monster]

I'm thinking about all of the new 2008 features including remote apps.

[CyberNerd]

Got published apps just fine here on my Linux desktop coming from my Citrix server farm...

Citrix supports 2008 now?

[Geoff]

Yep, you want the 'XenApp' or 'XenDesktop' Product depending on what your trying to do.

Citrix Systems » Introducing Citrix XenApp - Secure Application Virtualization
Citrix Systems » Citrix XenDesktop
Citrix Systems » Citrix Virtualization Infrastructure to Support Microsoft Windows Server 2008

You can download the XenDesktop Beta from here if you wish to play about.

Citrix Systems » Products » XenDesktop » Try it Now!