[Thinstation-general] Thinstation 2.2: production use feedback

[Beaumont, K. <kev...@pr...>]

Hello folks

Disclaimer: these are my views, not necessarily those of my company.

So, we've had just under 20 Thinstation 2.2 RC4 systems running at a remote
factory in the UK for 30 days now as a new installation.  They use rdesktop
to deliver a modern Windows 2003 desktop.  All management is remote. I just
wanted to report back on how well it has worked.

They have a brand new 2mbit leased line, dedicated to RDP.  There's 1 local
server on site (a Windows TFTP server).  All email & file data is hosted at
our core data center, which also has our Windows Server 2003 farm.  We also
use VMware Server (free) to deliver various 'niche' applications to user
desktops (eg DOS applications) - we just give the users VMware Console to
access the virtual machines.

A majority of the desktops are really old - like, 8 years old.  Everything
is PXE boot to Thinstation.  We have compression and persistent cache
options enabled in rdesktop.

Network: bandwidth usage has been averaging at 1.5kbytes/sec per
workstation.  From the 2mbit line, we are using less than a quarter
capacity.  Citrix boasts an average of 2.0kbytes/sec for sessions using
their technology, so we are out performing Citrix.

User feedback: Has been good.  Systems are very fast.

Cost: Little.  We have paid for Windows licenses as required.  Obviously,
user support and on going desktop maintenance is almost nothing as it's all
centralised.  Additionally, all data being in a core data center means we
can ensure it is backed up, and removing the extra local servers reduces
energy & maintenance costs.

Printing: Local USB and parallel printing has overall worked well.  We have
some issues with larger documents printing to USB causing rdesktop to crash,
but otherwise it's okay.

Overall: A massive success for Thinstation.  Quick deployment, no big
issues, performance excellent & cost - obviously - can't be beaten.

Kev


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