Citrix DaaS (formerly Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops, or XenDesktop) is a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) and application virtualization solution from Citrix.
$375
VMware Fusion
Score 7.8 out of 10
N/A
Vmware Fusion is a virtual user session software built to run Windows applications on Macintosh to run any Windows applications.
DaaS is ideal in large-scale environments that require centralized, secure management. Remote workforces at large organizations. Highly regulated industries like finance. It allows for easy security and monitoring over one aspect instead of multiple remote machines. DaaS is not ideal for organizations with small budgets due to the pricing and organizations with lousy network connectivity. This would make the end-user experience terrible.
VMWare Fusion is perfectly suited for an application developer because it allows the dev to create cross-platform applications across the entire spectrum of operating systems without changing devices. An example of where it is less appropriate would be an environment where users are not required or have no need, to use multiple operating systems.
All Management resources can now be installed on a single server. Reducing the overhead required to maintain a citrix environment.
Granularity of the Delivery groups allow you to define allowing a remote user to connect to a random XenDesktop VM or individually assigning VMs to users.
HDX RealTime Optimization Pack has stabilized some of the issues of utilizing all of the features of Skype for Business in a ZenDesktop VM.
Running isolated software development environments. Setting up environment variables and installing the right software versions for a given project can be time consuming and fragile. By doing all of this within a virtual disk image, we can easily switch between software environments without risk of breaking anything.
Running Windows-only programs on a Mac is invaluable. We use MacBook Pro laptops for our primary development environment. There are simply some programs we cannot run on OS X. Having VMWare Fusion is an invaluable asset for running Windows apps on Mac laptops on the go.
It is very rare for this to happen, but sometimes the Windows environment loses the internet connection while the Mac environment still has it. Rebooting the Windows environment in VMware Fusion fixes it.
It does not always recognize printers that are set up through the Mac, particularly if they are connected via WiFi instead of hardwired.
For Apple workstations VMware Fusion is the virtualization software to use. No other application (free or paid) can do what Fusion can. The features and constant updates make Fusion an application that cant be beat.
From an end-user perspective, Citrix DaaS is ideal. No matter the device that the user connects with, the end user's experience is always the same. Desktop icons are there, along with the files. As a big name, Citrix allows for SAML authentication or a local account. End users do not need a beefy laptop to have a good experience in DaaS.
I made an 8 because it's good in almost every aspect. As I said if you are on macos and you need both windows and linux I think is the best options out there. Otherwise if you need only windows there is a competitor that could be better for performance and integration.
The performance of XenDesktop is the best in the industry because of the fine-tuned protocol and years of updating. Overall, I don't think there is a better performer on the market. The question is if the added complexity of running XenDesktop is really worth the performance gain. While the latest version of XenDesktop is the easiest to deploy so far, it is still more challenging than the competitors.
The support is great when you get an engineer that knows what they are doing but getting that individual sometimes takes a while. Overall, they are professional and polite and competent in their knowledge. Sometimes the cases are open for an extended period of time which becomes very frustrating when dealing with critical issues.
It does what it says, and it does it well. AND...the technical support is second to none. Within an hour, I'm getting a phone call back from a COMPETENT ENGINEER that knows what he/she is talking about. For the less than 6 times I've had to call, I NEVER had to be escalated to another tech support person. BRAVO!!!
Take it slow and read the directions each step of the way. If you are not familiar with Citrix products, use a reseller or other experienced engineer to assist you in the setup of your environment
Citrix Virtual Apps & Desktops is platform agnostic (we can use any underlying hypervisor technology) and really flexible for any use case. Using a golden image and provisioning it (with Machine Creation Services or Provisioning Services) is powerful and really straightforward, compared to the complexity in Microsoft RDS of maintaining a coherent farm, or the limitation of VMware Horizon to run on VMware Products.
As mentioned previously, perpetual licensing was the #1 reason. The interface is also cleaner, simpler, and less bloat. Parallels also seem to run a bit slower. Fusion was also more stable and significantly faster in both raw performance and graphics compared to Virtualbox. Virtualbox also had a tendency to random freezings on some of our Linux instances on occasion.
Being able to easily add new use cases with minimal "re-work" to existing workspace delivered by the solution has been a great ROI value.
The Security features that are built-in have made the solution a go-to for any remote access or vendor access requests the business has needed to continue projects and expedite digital initiatives.
While the overall environment stability is excellent there is an increase in support team and end user training required which can "steal" time from admin and engineers.
Users using a VM often don't need something as "fancy" as VMware Fusion, and instead can use a free option like Virtual Box, so we waste money on using an extra amount of VMware Fusion licenses.
Developers using and IT admins using VMware Fusion for testing saves us time and money. Simply, we know mistakes would take time and money to fix, but VMware is powerful, allows for proper and fast testing.
