Virtual desktops are a valuable tool for your business to improve the security, speed, and availability of your IT. Desktop-as-a-Service (DaaS) takes this further to provide even more benefits with added convenience, support, and security. Let’s take a look at what DaaS is, how it works, and the benefits it can provide your organization.
What is DaaS?
With a virtual desktop, your operating system, apps, data, and anything else you might store on your work computer is hosted in a data center. Instead of being confined to your work computer to perform your tasks, you can access your virtual desktop from anywhere and on any device.
DaaS provides this resource as a service in which a DaaS provider sets up, manages, maintains, supports, and hosts your workforce’s virtual desktops. This gives you all the benefits of virtual desktops without the hassles of setting up and maintaining the system yourself, which can involve new hardware purchases and your IT staff handling its maintenance. If you’ve looked at virtual desktops before but found them to be too complex, expensive, and/or resource-intensive, then DaaS is ideal for you.
How does it work?
DaaS is delivered to users in two ways: persistent desktops and non-persistent desktops.
Persistent desktops
This kind of service is for heavy users and caters to their need for high customizability and seamless experiences. Persistent desktop users can customize and save applications, and the next time they log in, everything will be there just as they left it, enabling efficient and smooth work from anywhere. This kind of DaaS has higher storage and computing demands, however, so it is typically more expensive.
Non-persistent desktops
With this DaaS type, users can work with the apps installed on the virtual desktop, collaborate with others, and save work to the organization’s cloud storage. But when the user logs out, settings, alterations to apps, and cookies are erased. This prevents alterations to the DaaS computing environment, which is ideal for temporary workers or those with less intense computing requirements.
Typically, DaaS providers offer both kinds of virtual desktops, and you can mix and match as needed, providing persistent desktops to some employees and non-persistent ones to others.
What are the advantages of DaaS?
Even if you are already operating virtual desktops that you have set up and hosted yourself, DaaS provides a wealth of advantages that benefit multiple facets of your business and IT.
- More predictable IT costs: DaaS is delivered on a subscription basis, so you always know what you are paying each month for your virtual desktops. Furthermore, since you are no longer responsible for maintenance or troubleshooting, you don’t need to worry about spikes in support costs.
- Better productivity for your IT team: As mentioned above, the DaaS provider handles all the maintenance, management, support, and updating of your virtual desktops. This frees your IT department from these burdens and allows them to focus on more important work.
- Simple scalability: DaaS lets you add or subtract users at the drop of a hat, ensuring you can scale with demand easily and ensure new hires are productive from day one.
- High availability: Because your desktops are hosted at the DaaS provider’s data center, you receive maximum uptime, thanks to their massive resources. And should their data center go down, your desktops can be quickly distributed to alternate data centers so you don’t miss a beat.
- Reduced need for high-performance hardware: If your workforce operates resource-intensive apps such as 3D modeling or video editing software, you no longer need expensive, high-performance computers. These apps are hosted and streamed from the data center, which has vast computing resources that are shared amongst your workforce.
These are just a few of the many benefits of DaaS that could help you enhance your IT environment. To learn more about the ins and outs of DaaS, contact the experts at Liberty Center One. Our specialists will leverage our 15 years of experience in the data center space to show you how DaaS can meet your business’s unique needs and improve operations. Call us or leave us a message.