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from the if-you-can-game-remotely,-why-not-work-that-way,-too? dept.
Microsoft is Working on an Azure-Powered Cloud PC service:
Microsoft is building a new desktop-as-a-service offering built on top of Windows Virtual Desktop that could launch as soon as 2021.
Microsoft is currently calling the coming virtualization service "Cloud PC." Cloud PC won't replace locally installed Windows (and Office) -- for the foreseeable future, anyway. It will be an option for customers who want to use their own Windows PCs made by Microsoft and/or other PC makers basically like thin clients, with Windows, Office and potentially other software delivered virtually by Microsoft.
[...] "Microsoft Cloud PC is a strategic, new offering that is built on top of Windows Virtual Desktop to delivering Desktop as a Service. At its core, Cloud PC provides business customers a modern, elastic, cloud-based Windows experience and will allow organizations to stay current in a more simplistic and scalable manner," the job description says.
Microsoft is planning to make Cloud PC a Microsoft-365-powered experience that is managed by Microsoft and sold for a flat per user price, the job description says. This pricing piece is key. Windows Virtual Desktop pricing revolves around Azure consumption. Cloud PC sounds like it will be available for a set subscription fee.
Microsoft had dropped a few hints recently that it was looking to create some kind of virtualized PC management experience. In February, Scott Manchester, who had been Group Program Manager for Windows Virtual Desktop, took on a new role as Group Program Manager for "Cloud Managed Desktops." I'm guessing that this team, along with Windows engineering, are the ones honing the Cloud PC vision and deliverables.
[...] Microsoft also currently offers a service called the Microsoft Managed Desktop (MMD), which is a subscription offering under which Microsoft sets up, updates and manages business users' Windows 10 PCs for a fee. MMD includes Microsoft 365 (specifically, Windows 10 Enterprise E3 and Office 365 ProPlus); Windows Autopilot; and select Windows 10 hardware. Microsoft does the device configuration, security monitoring and remediation, app deployment, update management, desktop analytics and 24-by-7 end-user support. This is a service that is only used by certain large enterprise customers at this time.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday July 28 2020, @04:23AM (10 children)
It wasn't bad enough that "Windows is licensed, not sold". Not bad enough that all the applications in Windows are being marketed as cloud services. Now, your Windows installation won't even be installed - you're just going to rent Windows in the cloud.
So, what do you have sitting on your desk? Just a bit of scrap metal, and plastic, and some silicone. It can't even BOOT to anything! Thin client, you say? A thin client is nothing at all. Can't even really call it a gateway.
And, people will willingly PAY for this? Yes, I know they will. People don't learn. Despite routine notices of major players being hacked and compromised, we just don't learn.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Ethanol-fueled on Tuesday July 28 2020, @04:28AM
Just as the Blacks fought for integration only to want to walk backwards into segregation, computing fought for independence only to go back into the dark ages of dumb-terminals. Sheeeeitttt.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 28 2020, @04:30AM
nothing is going to replace a local OS for all use cases, but I can certainly see a few good cases for this, such as letting WFH users access a virtual work computer from their personal devices.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by petecox on Tuesday July 28 2020, @04:36AM (2 children)
Bring your own device - Chromebook, macos, XFCE, Android.
Covid - No one cares what client you connect from home in your underpants as long as it speaks RDP over VPN.
Windows in the cloud is a progression to Windows Nowhere. :)
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Tuesday July 28 2020, @03:05PM
I could see it replacing server installations, if they play their cards right.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 28 2020, @11:32PM
We already do this.
In-house on local hardware using VMWare.
It works.
It's nice for a second, third fourth etc throwaway machine. Especially when corporate lock down desktops.
I had to use mine as a primary machine for a few months. No. Desktop all the way. Using this will drive you nuts eventually.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 28 2020, @05:23AM (1 child)
A computer you bought for Microsoft with your own money, which they permit you to use so long as it's only for things they approve of. In short, the fulfillment of the vision begun with Windows 10 (and probably earlier).
Why people seem to think Microsoft suddenly got better is something I find baffling. They've actively gotten even worse than they were in the 90s. Chances are their agenda includes lobbying to make privately-owned, independent PCs illegal for "security reasons" in a few years, quite possibly resulting in people going to jail for 5 years for every Raspberry Pi they own.
As a note: none of the rest of Big Tech has any better plans for you.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 28 2020, @05:48PM
"Why people seem to think Microsoft suddenly got better is something I find baffling."
do people really think that? the Normals i know are just completely oblivious to all things tech, especially in regards to "freedom" which now means "servitude" in new speak. The vast majority of people are brainwashed slaves who think and do what they are told. Microsoft is big so they are therefore an authority: on "this tech stuff" to most people.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 28 2020, @07:57AM
Well you have to admit that it's a lot more convenient for Microsoft to track everything you do on their servers, as opposed to tracking everything you do on your home machine.
Also, once you're identified as one of those nogoodniks who have doubleplusungood thoughts, it'll be much easier to inject the child porn into your virtual desktop, rather than having the forensic investigators put it on your home computer after it's physically seized. The courts will appreciate having the case, and you, just handed to them.
Just another advance in efficiency in our glorious new future, citizen!
(Score: 2) by looorg on Tuesday July 28 2020, @10:06AM
It is the natural conclusion of things tho isnt it? They start with some services as subscription or online, then they move more and more things there, eventually it reach the top of the line with Office 365 so now there was only one step left, at least for them, to just move the entire operating system to the cloud as a service to.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 28 2020, @04:34PM
Any business that uses ms windows will look at how much keeping that ms stack sort of functional costs them, and if this cloud based windows costs less and means that someone else has to deal with keeping the ms house of cards running, then adoption will be high.
The problem is that these folks can't fathom just dumping ms windows.
I work for a school that went from a single lab of chromebooks where it was eventually noticed that none of the techs had to touch them since initial setup--, to many hundreds of chromebooks (they now slightly outnumber windows machines). The chromebooks have zero admin cost while the windows side requires several full-time people to maintain.
The same could be achieved with a bunch of e.g., debian clients with unattended-upgrades enabled.