Sanity check - VMware Horizon and RDS CALS

[CAWJames]

Evening all,

 

We are going VDI with Horizon shortly, and just need to check we don't need RDS cals? I was under the impression we won't as we don't have any RDS technologies in use(or do we?), but as usual the internet has 5 different answers for every question!

 

Also as long as we are using our old PC's with an OEM sticker to access the VDesktops, we don't need VDA licences either? Obviously if we swap out PC's for thin devices, we would need a VDA for each one, I think!

 

Good old MS licencing!

 

Thanks

 

James

[kmount]

Hi James,

 

IANAL but you're right, no need for RDS CALs on Horizon - you'd need them with RDS VDI with Hyper-V though if you went that route.

 

Also no need for VDA if you have SA(Software Assurance) on your endpoints as this includes virtual desktop access rights. If you don't have SA you need to look at the licensing.

 

It is also possible to license SA/VDA on a per user basis as well as device basis depending upon your needs.

 

Worth a read of - https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/licensing/product-licensing/windows10.aspx

 

Also worth explaining your needs to a MS licensing expert partner to see how your edu agreements can help.

 

VDA licensing is an absolute killer and is why a lot of people go with a server based OS like 2012R2/2016 and strip it down to look and feel like the desktop counterpart to do this with RDS licensing instead of VDA. (still giving users a 1:1 relationship with the desktop but the virtual desktop OS isn't a desktop SKU)

[CAWJames]

Thanks for that, it is as I thought!

 

We licence the enterprise desktop pack on our OVS-ES plan, so that gives us SA rights on all owned desktops with an OEM sticker, so all good

 

The only difference will be a new office with around 20 10zig zero clients, that will need VDA. Do you know if VDA is a per user/device or can it be FTE based, as a lot of the OVS-ES licenses?

 

James

[kmount]

Hi James,

 

Good stuff, that works well in your case.

 

VDA is only mentioned once within SA in the EES Licensing Guide but it basically implies "depending upon what you purchase" you can be covered with the FTE approach - https://download.microsoft.com/download/F/6/6/F6611596-992F-498A-A8EE-B0B39A6A4D0A/Enrollment_for_Education_Solutions_Licensing_Guide.pdf

 

Worth a call to your MS reseller just to confirm what todays MS licensing rules are around this but I suspect you're probably good.