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Virtual Bridges, a provider of desktop and enterprise virtualization solutions for business, announced today the release of a major upgrade to its Virtual Desktop Server product. Virtual Desktop Server, Virtual Bridges’ Educational/SMB and enterprise product, allows an organization to deploy multiple Windows desktop sessions to PCs, Workstations and thin clients from a non-Windows server such as Linux and Solaris.
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AUSTIN, TX -- Virtual Bridges, a provider of desktop and enterprise virtualization solutions for business, announced today the release of a major upgrade to its Virtual Desktop Server product.
Virtual Desktop Server, Virtual Bridges’ Educational/SMB and enterprise product, allows an organization to deploy multiple Windows desktop sessions to PCs, Workstations and thin clients from a non-Windows server such as Linux and Solaris.
Virtual Desktop Server (VDS) is perfect for the organization looking to lower costs and improve security through centralization of desktop computing resources. Typically, these organizations are looking for alternatives to the expensive, complicated offerings from VMware or Microsoft. By running Windows desktop sessions on Linux or Solaris servers, organizations benefit from the reliability and cost-effectiveness of the base platform but also from the ability to re-host their existing Windows licenses on the server for further cost savings.
Desktop virtualization and consolidation is becoming increasingly popular as a way to rein in desktop management costs. Virtual Desktop Server is the most flexible and effective way to accomplish the rationalization of resources sought after a move to consolidated virtual desktop environments.
Through Virtual Bridges’ work on virtual desktop computing with hundreds of thousands of users, the company has crafted a product that delivers all of the core features a typical organization would require to accomplish their IT goals. Features like automatic local printing, one-click Windows installation, the ability to integrate with Active Directory, availability of web display or third-party display options, use of write-protected Windows system images for true malware resistance, and integration of RDP support, are just some of the features that combine to put VDS in the lead of the desktop virtualization and consolidation field.
Not only is VDS a great end-to-end solution appealing to industry segments like education, retail and healthcare, but it also integrates well with large vendor and community offerings such Sun Ray and Secure Global Desktop from Sun Microsystems, Workplace, Symphony and Open Client from IBM as well as with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 from Novell and the popular LTSP community project.
Features of Virtual Desktop Server Products include:
• Integrated Virtual Machine hosting of Windows desktop sessions on Linux and Solaris servers
• Centralized management and provisioning of users
• Malware resistance through "Renewable" windows architecture
• Display either a single application or an entire Windows desktop.
• Automatic local printing from the server to the local attached printer
• Consistent user access to personal desktop environment from home, office and other network connected locations
Support for multiple remote display choices - Win4Lin client, Sun Ray, RDP, NoMachine, LTSP, VNC, X, as well as Web browser access
Tight integration with LTSP and Sun Ray for advanced multi-media capabilities
Cut and paste between Windows and Linux and Solaris
Headless startup
Full Bridged networking support allowing access to printers and Active Directory
Full integration between the Linux and Solaris Desktops and the Windows file systems for user documents and settings
"IBM is committed to an enterprise software strategy based on open standards such as J2EE, Linux and others, using tools like Eclipse and Rational," said Jeff Smith, Vice President, Open Source & Linux Middleware, IBM Software Group. "Products like Win4Lin Virtual Desktop Server provide a bridge for hard-to-replace legacy desktop applications as customers fully transition towards an open standards based application environment."
"As more and more enterprises look to the advantages of Linux on the desktop, they need to provide a seamless way of bringing legacy Windows applications to Linux," said Roger Levy, vice president and general manager of Open Platform Solutions for Novell. "Win4Lin Virtual Desktop Server is a natural complement to Novell's SUSE Linux Enterprise platform, as Win4Lin allows customers to fully leverage an end-to-end Linux infrastructure without giving up access to their legacy Windows applications."
"With support for Ubuntu in this latest release of Virtual Desktop Server, our customers and users can benefit from the partnership with class leading solutions,” said Malcolm Yates, ISV and Partner Manager at Canonical. “By maintaining existing applications and moving to Ubuntu for their new operating system base, our users can significantly reduce migration effort”
"This is an important step forward for Virtual Bridges in both its usability and performance allowing the enterprise to embrace Linux but continue to provide access to Windows applications. Choosing Win4Lin makes sense for organizations who want to move off Windows to Linux, but have trepidation about the new environment. Along with the connectivity of NoMachine, users can finally experience fast and easy access to Windows on the Linux desktop, making the migration to Linux smoother", said Sarah Dryell, NoMachine Business Development Manager.
“Virtual Desktop Server is a key piece in our health industry offerings bringing the desire for low cost together with the need to maintain business continuity and investment in legacy applications,” said Jordan Rosen, CEO of Lille Corp. “The ability to serve Windows applications from Linux servers in a thin client architecture is the key to marrying cost savings with business efficiencies.”
"Virtual Desktop Server offers not only the traditional value proposition of Citrix and remote access computing, but it also opens up the world of Windows to the Linux, BSD and Solaris community", said Jim Curtin, president and CEO of Virtual Bridges. "VDS is even more exciting for including single app display, web browser access and our unique renewable Windows architecture. Whether complementing an existing desktop choice, or improving the cost of ownership equation by serving Windows desktops from Linux, Sun Solaris or BSD, VDS is the ideal solution."
"VDS not only delivers a significant improvement in stability, ease-of-use and performance but also sets the stage for utilizing next generation architectures like Intel VT technology and the new KVM complement to QEMU", said Leo Reiter, CTO and VP of Engineering. "VDS 4.0 should appeal to any organization looking to streamline the costs and complexity of provisioning and managing Windows desktop environments."
Virtual Desktop Server allows organizations to standardize the application environment to users regardless of desktop hardware and operating system - Windows, UNIX, or Linux can be used on the client, but a common application profile can be created and served from Linux server configurations such as blade servers, rack arrays or large multi-way machines.
Virtual Desktop Server is very popular in the retail, education and health services industries due to its ease in supporting legacy Windows applications for industries that are looking to preserve their application investment while migrating to lower cost operating system infrastructure.
Pricing and Availability
Virtual Desktop Server 4.5 for Win4Lin and Win4Solaris is available immediately. Virtual Desktop Server for Win4BSD will be available during Q4 2007.
Virtual Desktop Server is priced at $125 per user with a minimum configuration of 25 seats. The 25-seat configuration is specially priced at US$2500. Please contact Virtual Bridges for volume pricing and educational discounts.
For more information and to purchase, please send email to sales@vbridges.com.
Virtual Bridges Product Family
Virtual Bridges (VB) develops software that offers users of open source platforms the ability to run Microsoft Windows applications in addition to the wealth of Open Source applications available to them. Virtual Bridges’ Win4 brand professional-grade virtualization products help businesses extend their Open Source desktops without additional hardware costs.
Virtual Bridges’ desktop products include Win4Lin for running Windows on various Linux desktops, Win4BSD for running Windows applications on FreeBSD and PC-BSD and Win4Solaris for running Windows applications on Sun Solaris.
Virtual Bridges’ Educational/SMB and enterprise product, Virtual Desktop Server, allows an organization to deploy multiple Windows desktops to lightweight PCs and Thin-clients from a single Open Source-based server.
For more information about Win4 brand products, please visit http://www.win4lin.com/. For more information about Virtual Bridges, Inc., please visit http://www.vbridges.com/.
About Virtual Bridges
Virtual Bridges, Inc. develops SMB and enterprise virtualization solutions for business. Virtual Bridges’ products are multi-platform and are aimed at businesses that want to use virtualization solutions to create sustainable business advantage.
Win4, Win4Lin, Win4Lin Pro, Win4BSD Pro Desktop, Win4Solaris Pro Desktop, Win4Lin Virtual Desktop Server and Win4Solaris Virtual Desktop Server are trademarks or registered trademarks of Virtual Bridges, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
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