Citrix DaaS (formerly Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops, or XenDesktop) is a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) and application virtualization solution from Citrix.
$375
Parallels RAS
Score6.8 out of 10
N/A
Parallels Remote Application Server (Parallels RAS, formerly 2X RAS), is application virtualization technology, billed as a solution to extend the life of legacy OS (like Windows XP) with its virtual desktop for any device.
Maltese company 2X Software developed the technology, but was acquired by Parallels (in Seattle, WA) in February, 2015 to extend their cross-platform support solutions.
Citrix has more bells and whistles within their product line, but we've actually been pleasantly surprised with the performance of Parallels Remote Application Server (Parallels RAS) vs our Citrix implementation. Citrix Netscaler has way more functionality than the Parallels …
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Verified User
Chose Parallels RAS
Citrix is a great products but very expensive. That's why we choose Parallels Remote Application Server (Parallels RAS). Citrix is a great products but very expensive. That's why we choose Parallels Remote Application Server (Parallels RAS). Citrix is a great products but very …
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Verified User
Chose Parallels RAS
We evaluated Citrix as well as Parallels when we undertook this project, and our research concluded that not only was Parallels much easier to set up and use, but it was much more cost-effective.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Verified User
Chose Parallels RAS
Cost-effectiveness; Technical and Service Support.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Verified User
Chose Parallels RAS
The cost of the two products is significantly different. Though Citrix has many advantages and features, the cost was a primary factor that helped us make that choice.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Verified User
Chose Parallels RAS
Parallels Remote Application Server is a cost-effective solution for Citrix and VMware products. It is also less complex to configure and manage. Offers similar connectivity options and integrates easily with 2FA authentication, for example from Google which is a free option.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Verified User
Chose Parallels RAS
faster, leaner and more comfortable at the same time cheaper than Citrix, and in relation to the benefits to native RDS good price/performance ratio
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Verified User
Chose Parallels RAS
For the time we've used Parallels, we've found Parallels much easier to set up and manage over Citrix.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Verified User
Chose Parallels RAS
The least prerequisites for RAS server compare to other solutions. Server configuration is totally based on user load. Licensing model is impressive. The most important factor for us was the support. Parallels Remote Application Server support is more than expected and all …
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Director Of Technical Services in Information Technology at IDT Support Solutions Ltd (Computer & Network Security, 1-10 employees)
Chose Parallels RAS
I think it's a pretty easy comparison of the two. Citrix is more expensive and more complicated compared to Parallels Remote Application Server; however, Parallels Remote Application Server misses the nice audio plugins that Citrix has for teams, etc. Parallels Remote …
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Verified User
Chose Parallels RAS
Parallel RAS is so much easier to install than Citrix. Doesn't require a NetScaler for external access. The customizing for the login page is so much simpler they anything we have used. The single console helps our helpdesk staff manage clients much easier.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Information Technology Director in Information Technology at Continuum of Care (Non-profit Organization Management, 501-1000 employees)
Chose Parallels RAS
Parallels Remote Application Server competes against Citrix on a one-for-one feature setlist. It provides many of the same services and capabilities. It is, overall, a simpler product to use and configure. It does not compete perfectly in the VDI space, as the Citrix offering …
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Director in Corporate at GCT mbH (Computer Networking, 11-50 employees)
Chose Parallels RAS
Setting up and managing Parallels RAS is extremely quick and easy. Support in the form of manufacturer support is better. In general, support for resellers is better at Parallels and easier for resellers.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Verified User
Chose Parallels RAS
We use Citrix and RAS both, and RAS is a cheaper, simplified solution compare to Citrix.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Verified User
Chose Parallels RAS
Parallels RAS combines almost all features in one product.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Support/Tech Manager in Research & Development at Inventory2 ApS (Information Technology & Services, 1-10 employees)
Chose Parallels RAS
10 years ago we selected what was called 2X at that time, and is now Parallels, because it was much cheaper and easier to handle than Citrix Desktop. We have used it every day since although I believe the pricing nowadays is about the same. But we can't see any reason to change …
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Director of IT in Information Technology at RealTime Services (Financial Services, 11-50 employees)
Chose Parallels RAS
Citrix Virtual Apps is quite complicated and requires about 8-10 servers, almost all redundant and duplicated. It seems to also require someone that is certified to be on your staff in order just to understand the setup, install, monitoring, and use. Citrix does have great …
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
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.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Scenarios where time is a factor in having a solution in place and up and running safely and securely. Where there are older devices that ordinarily wouldn't be up to the task of running modern apps and services. Where users need to work away from the network, and security is a concern.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
The printing driver is quite excellent, both in the Parallels Client and on the HTML5 client.
Setup is incredibly easy; the default setup is very functional, and adding features is a breeze.
Speed is very acceptable in general for end-users, the clients adapt quite well to the amount of bandwidth available, and features are available to adjust further.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Parallels Remote Application Server (Parallels RAS) continually improves the product but has broken some features recently. For example the web management portal lost the ability to manage user sessions after a major update. That issue was fixed in a later release
Multi-monitor support beyond 4 monitors (It does handle up to 4 -1080 monitors well)
More options around connection security and MFA. current options are sufficient but limited
We've noticed some performance issues with Windows Server 2019 and 2022. I'd like to see more robust support for remote applications running from those platforms.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
We have been using Parallels since it was called 2X - it is a major part of how we do business. It is fairly simple to use and maintain - staff like it, we like it. It is a product that makes a promise - and it keeps it. As Parallels evolves, and clean bandwidth becomes more readily available everywhere - it just makes sense to continue to use Parallels in our environment
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
Getting the environment setup took me three months of off and on work, with 3 complete rebuilds of the environment. Utilizing the WebUI to access the environment had presented so many random issues that we had to require end users to use the Citrix Reciever App. As it was the only stable solution. Aside from that, it hasn't required much admin intervention since the stand-up was completed.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Parallels RAS was easy to setup, with great admin guides and resources. We especially liked the included Visio templates which made diagramming much easier. The reference deployment diagrams also simplified our deployment process. Our end users love Parallels RAS. Apps launch faster than Citrix, and the Parallels RAS client is far more reliable than Workspace.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
If there are any issues with Parallels - they are usually more about the server operating systems than Parallels itself. It would be rare for us to have any reason to take Parallels offline - we schedule a reboot on the servers at 3am to keep the O/S itself fresh, but again - it is not a Parallels issue. If individual users have any issues we ask them to completely log out of parallels - which ends their session - and then back in - and that typically resolves the issue right away.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
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.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
I am giving Parallels 9/10 on this one because the only application that sometimes seems slow or has issues - is Microsoft Outlook. It is sometimes the result of a pop-up that may not show up in the published application (vs full desktop). Other than that - pages load very quickly - and it does not seem to slow down other applications that are running at the same time. Most of our users run Outlook, softphone and Teams locally - and published applications for everything else. When they do that - it is very solid.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
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.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Good support in place if required, very helpful when it comes to upgrades or any issues faced. The support team is knowledgeable, friendly, and quick to respond to issues The company also provides a range of online resources, including a knowledge base, documentation, and forums, which can be helpful before raising a ticket
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
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
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Overall, it was pretty simple compared to most other projects. Again, we had a strong familarity with the product so there was not much of a learning curve. Our 'biggest' issue is the end-user understanding of a 'local' application and a published application. For example - Online meetings need to run locally for camera/video to work smoothly so opening a link to a meeting from a published application continues to be an occasional issue.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
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.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Parallels Remote Application Server (Parallels RAS) provides the finest end user experience while being cost-effective and reducing administrative and support man hours. Parallels Remote Application Server (Parallels RAS) is platform agnostic; it works with various kinds of devices (computers, phones, tablets) and several operating systems (Windows, Linux, Apple, etc.), allowing users to access it on gadgets of their choice.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
We added our Integrated Services Staff to parallels, with filtered, published applications - in a single afternoon. We added licensing and installed the desktop client software on multiple platforms both in the office and at remote sites all on the same day - and got remote users that had never used the product up and running - very quickly.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. TR verified that a representative sample of customers was invited. More Info
XenApp has allowed us to continue support of legacy applications and all access of those applications to users across the globe with any device.
XenApp can also manage software licenses by restricting number of users, number of concurrent sessions, or combination of both to required specification.
While initial investment in XenApp can be costly, continuing support and upgrade are very cost effective and product stability is excellent.
While there are competing products from Microsoft and VMware, when it comes to remote application access, XenApp is the best of breed.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info
Our customers have had dramatic cost decreases due to no longer needing IT departments to work with our software.
We've been able to charge more for our hosting services due to our customers saving money in the long run. Parallels Remote Application Server has more than paid for itself, and the increased income has gone right back into the business.
Both our customers and our company have benefited from this transition.
A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info