Azure as a solution ?

[rlculver]

Hi,

 

I have a friend who is starting a new business.

 

His requirements are for 5 - 6 people to RDP into a solution to get there email / Word, Excel & Powerpoint.

 

Would Azure be a solution or would a requirement of a physical Server running Windows server 2019 be best?

 

All workers will be remote and not necessary have a desktop machine in the office.

 

Please advise.

 

Thanks

 

Robert

[HPlum78]

If its greenfield then you should try to stick with a cloud only approach. Not sure that there is a requirement for any servers on prem or in cloud based on the above.

[rlculver]

Thanks for your reply.

 

What would your recommendation be ?

 

Thanks

Edited June 25, 2019 by rlculver

[TechMonkey]

I'm not sure the cost for a business but it sounds perfect for Azure AD, Office 365, Intune and Autopilot. The laptops would authenticate against Azure AD, be managed and controlled by Intune, Autopilot would do the setup, and Office 365 would cover Office Suite, storage and shared files.

 

RDP sounds, to me, like it would be trying to force an old school solution on to new Infrastructure.

[Oaktech]

I'd only bother with an RDP in this instance if you had BYOD and the users didn't want the company interfering in personal devices. Otherwise, as above...

[localzuk]

If your friend is insistent on RDP, you could implement it in Azure for about £160pm (1 DC, 1 VM for RD Gateway/Web, 1 VM for connection broker/licensing, then 1 VM for session hosts). That's the MS recommended set up anyway - you can scale it by adding more RDSH hosts if you need them in the future.

That'd be pay as you go with standard support. If you go for 1 year reserved, it knocks £60 off the price per month. 3 years reserved brings it down to about £70pm.

 

Add the cost of Office on top of that - I'd go with Office 365 anyway, and use OneDrive as the storage for your users.

 

Your other option would be to use Windows VDI in Azure instead. That way you spin up individual VMs for end users on demand, though that's still in preview and not a released product yet.

Edited June 25, 2019 by localzuk

[HPlum78]

As @TechMonkey has outlined, if you can absolutely avoid adding Domain Controllers as VMs in Azure I would, IaaS is where the costs are going to bite and is a bug bear when it comes to cloud consumption... If RDP to desktop is really a requirement then take a look here https://docs.microsoft.com/en-gb/azure/active-directory-domain-services/overview

 

Also I think there is a azure windows desktop service (could still be in preview) look it up as from memory it cuts out some of the IaaS dependencies.

[sted]

sounds like a good case as others have said for just Microsoft 365 (not office 365 as iirc that dosent come with intune or windows lics and you may want pro/ent rather than home on laptops)

 

it sounds pretty similar to a test setup i created. tbh id get some crummy old laptops to test with and set up a trial Microsoft 365 account and have a play. i see no reason in that scenario for rdp just an unneeded complication imo (just be aware costs for a business are quite a bit higher than in edu

[jimbobTech]

For the RDP part keep an eye on "Bastion" in Azure which is in preview at the moment; https://azure.microsoft.com/en-gb/updates/azure-bastion-now-available-for-preview/

 

"Azure Bastion is a new managed PaaS service that provides secure and seamless RDP/SSH connectivity to your virtual machines directly in the Azure portal over SSL and without any public IP on your virtual machines"

[dhicks]

If your friend is insistent on RDP, you could implement it in Azure for about £160pm (1 DC, 1 VM for RD Gateway/Web, 1 VM for connection broker/licensing, then 1 VM for session hosts). That's the MS recommended set up anyway - you can scale it by adding more RDSH hosts if you need them in the future.

 

Does that cost include RDS session CALs, or would those be extra per user? I'm looking at something similar to the original poster, although my project involves running an older bit of software via a web-based RDP session. I can rent a whole dedicated server for around £60 a month, I just need to figure out what Microsoft licensing I need to allow users to log on to that server.

[Steve21]

Does that cost include RDS session CALs, or would those be extra per user? I'm looking at something similar to the original poster, although my project involves running an older bit of software via a web-based RDP session. I can rent a whole dedicated server for around £60 a month, I just need to figure out what Microsoft licensing I need to allow users to log on to that server.

 

I'd doubt it if you are talking business wise, rather than edu (Bearing in mind edu get a lot more covered within their licensing)

 

Taking in mind business costs, when you add in the RDS CAL, Server CAL, and (if you need it too) Office CAL/License (Yes for RDP you need an Office license per user too) per user it's going to be expensive, and another reason to try to avoid it if you can

 

Steve

[chaplic]

Windows Virtual Destop is the azure-based answer to that problem, but I'd echo others saying that it's a specific use case that may be frustrating for general end user computing.

[rlculver]

Thanks for the comments.

 

If you were setting up a new server today, how would you go about it (no requirement for RDP). Would you used azure based DC or use a physical server on-site.

 

Thanks