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Remote Desktop Services vs. Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Remote Desktop Services

    Score7.7 out of 10
    N/ARemote Desktop Services from Microsoft is virtual desktop and remote user session technology.N/A

    Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure

    Score9 out of 10
    N/ANutanix in San Jose, California offers their software-defined Enterprise Cloud as a hyper-converged infrastructure solution. The Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure solution combines the Nutanix Acropolis virtualization solution, Nutanix AHV hypervisor (though Acropolis works with other hypervisors), Prism cluster manager, Nutanix Calm and Nutanix Flow server management, and is available on the Nutanix NX series of server hardware appliances, as well as third-party OEM appliances.N/A
    Pricing
    Remote Desktop ServicesNutanix Cloud Infrastructure
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Remote Desktop ServicesNutanix Cloud Infrastructure
    Free Trial
    NoNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Remote Desktop ServicesNutanix Cloud Infrastructure
    Considered Both Products
    Microsoft
    No answer on this topic
    Nutanix
    No answer on this topic
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    100%
    Would buy again
    8 Answers
    94%
    Would buy again
    17 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    8 Answers
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    15 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    88%
    Happy with the feature set
    7 Answers
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    18 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    6 Answers
    100%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    12 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    88%
    Implementation went as expected
    7 Answers
    94%
    Implementation went as expected
    15 Answers
    Features
    Remote Desktop ServicesNutanix Cloud Infrastructure
    Remote Administration
    Comparison of Remote Administration features of Remote Desktop Services and Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure
    Feature
    Remote Desktop Services
    4.6
    5 Ratings
    53% below category average
    Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure
    -
    Ratings
    Screen sharing8.25 Ratings00 Ratings
    File transfer4.65 Ratings00 Ratings
    Instant message1.01 Ratings00 Ratings
    Secure remote access with Smart Card authentication6.02 Ratings00 Ratings
    Access to sleeping/powered-off computers1.12 Ratings00 Ratings
    Over-the-Internet remote session6.85 Ratings00 Ratings
    Initiate remote control from mobile3.64 Ratings00 Ratings
    Remote management of servers & workstations8.24 Ratings00 Ratings
    Remote Active Directory® management8.64 Ratings00 Ratings
    Centralized management dashboard2.23 Ratings00 Ratings
    Session record2.23 Ratings00 Ratings
    Monitoring and Alerts3.13 Ratings00 Ratings
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    Remote Desktop ServicesNutanix Cloud Infrastructure
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    Score8.6 out of 10
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    Score9.6 out of 10
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    Score8.6 out of 10
    Enterprises
    BeyondTrust Privileged Remote Access
    Score9.1 out of 10
    VMware vSAN
    Score8.4 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Remote Desktop ServicesNutanix Cloud Infrastructure
    Likelihood to Recommend
    7.8
    (20 ratings)
    9.0
    (77 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    6.0
    (1 ratings)
    8.2
    (6 ratings)
    Usability
    8.4
    (5 ratings)
    9.3
    (9 ratings)
    Availability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.6
    (2 ratings)
    Performance
    5.0
    (1 ratings)
    8.5
    (51 ratings)
    Support Rating
    3.0
    (1 ratings)
    9.7
    (54 ratings)
    In-Person Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.6
    (2 ratings)
    Online Training
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.1
    (3 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.1
    (2 ratings)
    Configurability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.6
    (2 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    5.0
    (1 ratings)
    5.2
    (2 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.1
    (2 ratings)
    Vendor post-sale
    -
    (0 ratings)
    5.2
    (2 ratings)
    Vendor pre-sale
    -
    (0 ratings)
    5.2
    (2 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Remote Desktop ServicesNutanix Cloud Infrastructure
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Microsoft
    This is well-suited if you need to log in to a remote machine on occasion to make updates or change configurations. It is also good for a production environment or for environments where people need to log in to use common applications, so you don't need to install the application on each individual client.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Nutanix
    For an organization that requires top-notch performance HCI, Nutanix is the best. You may start with 3 nodes and expand the cluster as required. The management through Nutanix Prism Central and Element was so easy that even a Junior Engineer was able to handle it. The Nutanix platform is not suitable for organizations with a small budget and fewer requirements for high-performance infrastructure, as the Nutanix solution itself is suited for enterprises.
    Incentivized
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    Pros
    Microsoft
    • When you connect with RDS, everything looks and feels (and is) exactly like you're sitting at that desktop. This is great for us and for users.
    • You can sign in with RDS and the desktop will be the same as when you left it (if you choose to set it up that way).
    • Although they take some setup, RemoteApps are a very handy way to let users access a program without requiring them to actually connect to a remote desktop on the server.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Nutanix
    • One-click upgrades; whether it's hypervisor, firmware, disk or other updates. This feature has drastically decreased complexity and administration time.
    • Data Locality. Not all hyperconverged technology is created equal. When I first purchased Nutanix they were the only vendor (and as far as I know, still are) that made sure the storage a VM used was on the same host that VM was running on. Given a normal operating state, the [storage] network is literally only used for replication data.
    • They got rid of traditional RAID. Nutanix uses software to determine where a VM's storage should be written and replicated to. This dramatically decreases I/O when changing the number of nodes in a cluster, be it on purpose or during a failure scenario. Ex. adding a new node: If one uses RAID arrays then enough space has to be set aside to create a new array that includes the new node, then all the information has to be copied over, and the old array destroyed. RAID arrays do not grow and shrink gracefully so Nutanix has designed a better solution.
    • The Nutanix management interface was built on HTML5. No more flash headaches!
    Incentivized
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    Cons
    Microsoft
    • Remote Desktop Services currently does not support multiple monitors on the terminal server. Unlike other applications such as Teamviewer, there's no feature to toggle between multiple screens even if they were connected to the terminal server.
    • Remote Desktop Services should provide an option to scale up or down the screen size after a connection is established. Currently you can only adjust the screen size prior to a connection is established. So you'll have to take a best guess at what display screen resolution will fit best on your screen.
    • Remote Desktop Services should offer some kind of menu to send special key strokes like Ctrl+Alt+Del to the terminal server. Currently the substitute for that particular combination is Ctrl+Alt+End. But I have yet to discover a replacement for other combination keystrokes such as Alt+PrintScrn.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Nutanix
    • Can be priced high at times.
    • The one downside I have working with Nutanix is the sales team. They seem to try to add in extra goodies to sales quotes or push for extras that you don't really need and you have to tell them to take them out. Don't be afraid to push back on them.
    • Need to analyze sizing with sales team to ensure right sizing.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Microsoft
    No answers on this topic
    Nutanix
    AOS definitely make our dev/test virtual environment management much easier than before. And the consolidation the test/dev environment from Azure and Cisco UCS, we have less need to transfer large amount of data between different hardware platforms which was very big challenge. To expand the capacity is very easy to archive as well.
    Incentivized
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    Usability
    Microsoft
    The initial setup for Remote Desktop Services is complex, and licensing is costly. Each user connects to their virtual desktop hosted by a single server or group of servers, so a change or issue with servers quickly impacts every single user at the same time. Aside from that, users appreciate seeing their same personal desktop from any device or geographical location.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Nutanix
    It's not out of the box easy, but once you get the fundamentals the steep learning curve flattens out and the processes to get things done and how it works becomes very apparent. It's wrapping the slight change in workflow from prior VM management methods took time to unbox and apply the Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure way
    Incentivized
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    Reliability and Availability
    Microsoft
    No answers on this topic
    Nutanix
    So far no issue on availability during no issue on network or power outage
    Incentivized
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    Performance
    Microsoft
    There are some third party tools available that allow you to manage multiple connections.
    Incentivized
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    Nutanix
    The performance is nothing short of amazing. This is an HCI solution, and as any all-flash HCI solution is amazingly fast, Nutanix AOS fills local IO requests until its local IO is saturated before reaching out over the network. This lowers latency substantially compared to vSAN.
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Microsoft
    As with any Microsoft Server product, support for Remote Desktop Services requires a paid support package. These are license-based and very costly, on top of the already costly product licensing. Microsoft's licensing is complicated to begin with, so setting up licensing alone essentially requires a licensing expert's counsel. There is community documentation and support available on Microsoft websites, as well as community websites.
    Incentivized
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    Nutanix
    Our implementation team were great and worked with us and got the program up and running very easily. Every time we called post implementation we immediately talked to an Engineer, which is so unusual in dealing with companies. Everything they have promised they have full filled. I think their support is top notch.
    Incentivized
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    In-Person Training
    Microsoft
    No answers on this topic
    Nutanix
    We requested more training than typical which was very in depth
    Incentivized
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    Online Training
    Microsoft
    No answers on this topic
    Nutanix
    A lot of online training courses, most of them are free.
    Incentivized
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    Implementation Rating
    Microsoft
    No answers on this topic
    Nutanix
    IPv6 is needed for link local discovery. We do not have IPv6 configured on our network so the easiest way to get our nodes configured and discovered by foundation was to configure the IPv4 addressing within the node prior to trying to discover with foundation.
    Incentivized
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    Alternatives Considered
    Microsoft
    We selected Remote Desktop Services based upon price alone. Other solutions on the market are significantly more expensive, but if your company can foot the bill you should seriously consider products that have been on the market for longer. The lack of an ability to easily upgrade farm servers has been a challenge for us - although it is still faster than updating an application on 2000+ machines. The lack of a centralized management console in 2008 R2 is also challenging, but you get by with the tools available to you. If you don't have the money to spend on Citrix or VMWare Horizon, Remote Desktop Services is a decent replacement.
    Incentivized
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    Nutanix
    Nutanix integrates very well with Rubrik for backup and protection of the environment. Nutanix gave us simplicity and scalability compared to VMware and allowed us to extend our infrastructure into the cloud using EC2. One unified management pane for all our workloads, unlike VMWare.
    Incentivized
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    Scalability
    Microsoft
    No answers on this topic
    Nutanix
    We have scaled our products over the years and continue to do so very easily.
    Incentivized
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    Return on Investment
    Microsoft
    • Allowed remote users access from home
    • Shared file access for multipolar users from a centralized location
    • Cost to add additional users when maxed out
    • Purchase multiple licenses for programs to run in virtual machines. Or unable to run on a virtual machine
    Incentivized
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    Nutanix
    • We find that return on investment is probably a better metric in most cases.
    • ROI analysis is more than an exercise. Companies must outline what their future looks like, even if it’s vastly different from what they’re used to and comfortable with.
    • As good as your financial analysis might be, displacing status quo infrastructure has a lot of emotions tied to it.
    Incentivized
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    ScreenShots