Tell me about Microsoft XP Licensing costs in VDI

[MrBiscuit]

Hello Chaps and Chapesses,

I'm having a rather unreasonable amount of difficulty finding a UK reseller with sufficient mastery of Microsoft licensing to give me even indicative costs on purchasing appropriate licensing for a fresh VDI implementation.

By fresh I mean that there is no upgrade path from the previous environment, there is currently no select agreement or anything like this, we simply have a need to achieve a few hundred desktops or desktop-like-environments and are trying to work out a capex cost comparison against both physicals (buying a few hundred new desktops) and Citrix (implementing presentation server on Vmware). There are currently enough machines capable of running a connection client awaiting to connect to this environment ( they were running windows95! )

Now I know how to do all the above things, I have my costs on a connection broker, extending the current ESX environment, do my POC for sizing etc etc.

Can someone PLEASE either give me the benefit of their experience with per user or per 100 users pricing for Microsoft XP, and how they arranged their VECD or whathaveyou, or contact me because they represent an awesome microsoft reseller and this sort of licensing is cake for them

[rjb2]

here is a thread that should help - http://communities.vmware.com/thread/121903?tstart=0&start=0

[MrBiscuit]

here is a thread that should help -

Thanks for linking that thread, I had read it previously but on reading it again I get a better understanding of the type[/i] of licensing required.

This comment concerns me: If you purchase a FPP copy of Vista Business, install it on a VM on ESX, and want to access it using a thin client, you still need to add sa and the VECD license for thin clients.

It makes me think that not only would I need to pay UncleBill 250 quid for my Desktop OS license, I'll also need to add another 100 for the priviledge of accessing it remotely (VECD) and a currently unspecified amount for SA to enable all these features.

Have I got that more or less correct?

[MrBiscuit]

Actually, let me rephrase.

For each XP VM I intend to create in a VDI scenario I would need to purchase: 1 license of Vista Business with XP Downgrade, SA and VECD. I would further need to be purchasing at least 250 units to be allowed to have the appropriate agreement. Is this correct? and do you have a round figure of what this would cost?

And also the licensing cost changes depending on whether I'm connecting from a Windows Desktop or a Thin client, so I could not deploy VDI centrally and have my users RDP in from their current outdated Windows 95 machines, and then replace those with thin clients as they fail without going through a relicensing excercise.

There appears to be a white elephant in the room...

[rjb2]

I'll try to summarize according to my understanding.

The VECD licensing, which gives the rights for virtualized XP/Vista can be applied in two different ways

1. On top of XP/Vista licenses that are under SA. This runs about $23 per year per device

2. On top of a client device not capable of running a "Windows Client OS" (ex. thin clients, including those running XPe or CE). I don't know whether Windows 95 is still considered a "Windows Client OS" in this scenario and I would bet that the machines are not capable of running Vista, so you might consider asking MSFT if they would let you apply the thin client option to your old workstations. This runs $100+ per year per device, but I believe it also frees you to upgrade the OS under SA (ex. two years from now we can upgrade to the post-Vista OS and just pay the annual tariff).

The above assumes that you are licensing 250+ desktops, which I think is the minimum.

We are looking at buying new hardware with OEM licensing, adding the SA, and then paying the $23 per year tariff (option 1) for users that need a PC for some local apps, but otherwise using thin devices and paying the annual tariff.

FRP licensing seems complex from a management perspective and the licensing rights might be more gray, but I've heard that it is an option for smaller shops.

[MrBiscuit]

That seems more logically laid out than I had previously understood - I was informed by the Microsoft Licensing Helpline (or whatever they call it now) that my old OEM desktops would only 'count' if they were under an SA agreement, which they certainly are not.

I think the problem is going to be that it is not cost effective to pay for SA when the desktops are clearly not upgraded reguarly (we're still productively using win95 desktops, 2-3 year upgrade cycle is beyond silly). I feel it would turn out that we'd have to pay the 100ish annual fee which I could never get past management, they are more of the fire-and-forget licensing types. The entire desktop fleet is several thousand strong so gaining a select agreement shouldn't be an issue, these units are simply the oldest still in use.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't it be significantly more expensive to not only purchase replacement desktop hardware, but then also install a centralised desktop solution to go with it? I can see the flexibility the solution allows, and so I must assume that the cost of a full desktop is much closer to that of a thin terminal these days than I had thought - would you be able to share some details of your cost calculations?

[azn2kew · Accepted solution]

The only way Microsoft allows you to run virtual desktops on a virtual server is using an annual subscription license called Vista Enterprise Centralized Desktops (VECD), and VECD is only available if you buy Software Assurance. Read more details.

If you found this information useful, please consider awarding points for "Correct" or "Helpful". Thanks!!!

Regards,

Stefan Nguyen

iGeek Systems LLC.

VMware, Citrix, Microsoft Consultant

[MrBiscuit]

Well I've finally satisfied myself in how all this Microsoft licensing works for VDI, at least until it changes again. It's not so much complicated as it is highly dependant on your circumstances, so I do thoroughly recommend that you get in touch with a consultant that has done it before (as I now have) or a Microsoft licensing specialist.

Another string to my bow I guess ; if you are in the UK and would like to go through it you can contact me through my profile, I can not only give you advice on how it hangs together but I also now have a Microsoft reseller who is processing the new batch of Microsoft agreements which was a large part of the problem. I'd post it all out here but having read other peoples' attempts to do so I suspect that not having an answer tailored to your specific situation would be more confusing than not.

Thanks to the other posters for providing valuable insight Points have been awarded.

[Crazy88]

Hi there.

I'm in the UK and would like to take up your offer for advice on Microsoft VECD licensing.

Ok heres a scenario: Brand new VDI installation. Connecting via 200 thin-clients for 1 year.

We need just:-

1)200 VECD for thin-client yearly subscription

2)Enterprise Agreement with Microsoft

I take it we don't also need to purchase the software (Vista/XP) as well.

Any decent resellers that you know of that are helpful in creating a quote?

Cheers.

[patrickrouse]

I wrote this blog post to explain the VECD Licensing and to provide the actual MSFT SKUs required:

http://blogs.inside.quest.com/provision/2008/05/29/microsoft-licensing-for-desktop-virtualization/

Patrick Rouse

Microsoft MVP - Terminal Server

Sr. Sales Engineer, Western USA & Canada

Quest Software, Provision Networks Division

Virtual Client Solutions

(619) 994-5507

http://www.provisionnetworks.com

http://blogs.inside.quest.com/provision

[MrBiscuit]

Hi Crazy88,

You are correct in that you only need pay for the subscrion for VECD - as for the Enterprise Agreement, that is simple the cheapest way to access the subscription, I am advised that there are Open Value options as well depending on your status with Microsoft licensing. You are certainly approaching VDI down the most straight forward of licensing paths.

Whether the base SKU's are the same for the various Select and Open Value agreements I am unsure, but I have PM'd you the details of a company I have had great success with on this topic and I'm sure they can help you out.

[crar]

Hey, I just wanted to say "Thanks" to you and the rest of the people that have chimed in on this post. This licensing of MS in VDI has been painful to say the least. I'm glad to finally get this under control. You all have been a big help and your blog link with the SKU's was excellent.

Keep up the good work everyone !!

[lusid]

MS just makes this stuff up as they go to slow you down. Don't worry about them so much. Last year it was "you need 16 copies of everything to run it in an ESX cluster" and "we license hardware, not instances", this year its "if you want to do this virtual desktop thingie you need our fancy new VECD 'cause we license instances". Next year it will be some other ultra-confusing license bolt on you need to do something else they hadn't realized you could already do (maybe an MS Cloud something-or-other license)

It helps if you have a test lab showing off ubuntu/openoffice VDI sessions when your MS reps come to visit. Demonstrating your ability to replace them tends to keep them in line.