Microsoft offers new Vista enterprise licenses
By Ruben Francia
Microsoft announced today the availability of licensing for two new centralized architectures based on Windows Vista Enterprise Edition called the diskless PCs Windows Vista license and the Windows Vista Enterprise Centralized Desktops.
These two new options will enable our customers to begin testing centralized desktops and diskless PCs in their production environments alongside their existing deployment model and determine which combination provides the right mix of centralized IT control and end-user flexibility for their respective businesses, Microsoft said.
The first gives enterprise users the ability to run the Windows Vista Enterprise client on a diskless computer, said Scott Woodgate, director of the Microsoft Windows product group.
A diskless PC is a machine with no hard drive. Instead, the hard drive is stored on the network, and an image of the operating system is streamed from there into the memory and CPU of the computer, Woodgate said.
To run Windows Vista Enterprise on diskless PCs, customers need to use third-party diskless boot software. This software enables the PC to find a copy of Windows on the network and to stream that software back onto the local machine, Woodgate said.
The diskless PC option is available today at no extra charge for customers that already have licensed Windows Vista Enterprise, said Mike Burk, a Microsoft Windows product manager.
The second option, Vista Enterprise Centralized Desktop, allows companies to host Windows Vista or applications in virtual machines on centrally-managed servers that can be can be accessed from a thin or rich client. This way, a business can run one copy of Windows Vista Enterprise on a server and access the operating system in multiple virtual machines, according to Woodgate.
The Vista Enterprise Centralized Desktop license will be available to customers that have Microsoft’s Software Assurance subscription service for an additional fee beginning in July. Microsoft is not disclosing how much more customers will pay for the license because fees for Software Assurance vary per customer, Burk said.
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