Dedicated Desktop Delivery

The Full Clone:

A full clone is an independent copy of a virtual machine that shares nothing with the parent virtual machine after the cloning operation. Ongoing operation of a full clone is entirely separate from the parent virtual machine. If the disk space is not a concern then higher performance can be achieved using full clones.
The Linked Clone:

A linked clone is a copy of a virtual machine that shares virtual disks with the parent virtual machine in an ongoing manner. This conserves disk space, and allows multiple virtual machines to use the same software installation.

Q6. Can we create linked clone with SCVMM as connector? Which version?

Ans: Yes, SCVMM 2016.

Q7. Explain the core concept behind linked cloning in SCVMM?

Ans: Linked cloning in SCVMM is based on differential disks. The linked clone disk uses reference to a parent disk which is a replica of actual source image. As the linked clone disk is initially not having any data hence the size is very small comparing to full clone which takes exactly same disk space as source VM disk.

Q8. Customer requires virtual desktops deployed which should get released on user logout and all changes done should get reverted. What kind of desktop pool will be deployed?

Ans: Floating non-persistent virtual desktop - Dynamic provisioning.

Q9. Customer needs to deploy desktop pool for a group of developers, what kind of pool should be deployed?

Ans: Personal Persistent Desktop pool - Dynamic provisioning.

Q10. Customer is having pre-existing desktops in hypervisor. What kind of desktop pool should be deployed?

Ans: Personal Virtual Desktop Pool without dynamic provisioning.

Q11. How does automatic assignment works in HyWorks for floating desktop pools? Give the bucketing order?

Ans: HyWorks keeps on assigning desktop VMs to end-users based on below priority order until the count becomes zero. See priority order below for reference:

P1 - Desktops VMs, which are in powered on state and has an IP address as well as desktop agent as responding.

P2 - Desktop VMs, which are in powered on state and has an IP address, but agent is not responding.

P3 - Desktop VMs, which are in powered-on state, but do not have the IP address.

P4 - Desktops in either powered off or suspended state.

Q12. We have 3 desktops in desktop pools - powered on with IP and desktop agent as responding.
User-1 logs-in and gets assigned with desktop-1
User-2 logs-in and gets assigned with desktop-2
User-1 logs out and desktop-1 is released
User-3 logs in, which desktop will be assigned?

Ans: Desktop-3, HyWorks give priority to free VM which is not used earlier.

Q13. User are having full tunnel VPN client on their virtual desktops. As soon as they connect to VPN client on desktop, it gets unreachable in local network. What kind of feature in HyWorks can be used to serve such desktops?

Ans: VMConnect Feature.

Q14. How to configure VM connect feature? Which hypervisor or Connector supports it?

Ans: From Desktop Pool wizard -> Advanced Settings -> Enable VMConnect. Only Hyper-V supports VMConnect feature.

Q15. How can you configure all desktops to be powered on before specified time in HyWorks?

Ans: Desktop Pool wizard -> Advanced Settings -> Keep desktops powered-on -> All desktop at specified time.

Q16. I have recently created a VM on VMware vCenter server. When I try to create a desktop pool in HyWorks, I am not able to see the newly created VM. What is the problem? How can I solve it?

Ans: HyWorks refreshes its VM cache every hour (configurable).

Manually update the connector.

Q17. Default RDP port to which connection is made to access?

Ans: 3389.

Q18. All my VMs are using non-default RDP port. Where can I specify RDP port in HyWorks?

Ans: Go to Management Console -> VDI -> Session Servers -> Servers -> Add/ Edit Server screen.

Q19. I have 3 provisioned or non-provisioned desktop pool configured from VMware vCenter connector. IP of vCenter server has changed. What should I do? Do I need to re-configure my existing desktop pools?

Ans: Just update the connector configuration with new IP. No need to reconfigure desktop pools.

Q20. My gold image was running with Windows 10 1708. Microsoft has released new patches. I want to deploy them on my deployed desktops. How can I do that? What could be the consequences?

Ans: Update Gold image with new patches. Initiate "Recompose" on desktop pools. Any data kept on local disk of desktops will be lost.

Q21. HyWorks supports customization of cloned images, what are the two methods supported?

Ans: Hyprep and Sysprep.

Q22. What kind of problems can be over come using Hyprep? Hyprep is faster, requires less number of system restart.

Ans: Sysprep failures due to installed windows apps can be avoided, very common issue with Windows 10 image.

Q23. What is the difference between On-connect and On-login floating desktop pools?

Ans: On -login: Desktop gets assigned on user login.

On-connect: Desktop gets assigned on connect request from user.

Q24. Personal desktops are deployed in HyWorks using Dynamic provisioning. The desktop pool is now being deleted. Will it delete the desktops from respective hypervisor as well?

Ans: Option is provided during delete operation. If administrator wants to use desktops, option to delete from provider should not be chosen.

Q25. Difference between an inactive desktop pool or desktop pool in maintenance mode. For an inactive desktop pool, HyWorks does not process any requests in backend.

Ans: In maintenance mode, HyWorks processes background requests. In both modes, end-users are not given assignment from respective session provider.

Q26. How does HyWorks gets IP address of VM from hypervisor?

Ans: HyWorks requests for network information of desktop from provider and uses IP.

Q27. Facing some issues with desktop provider, where it intermittently display blank IP for VM, thus HyWorks also looses IP of desktop. How can we overcome this?

Ans: Select option Use last known IP address in desktop pool wizard -> Advanced settings. It does not refreshes last known IP, even if receives blank IP from provider.

Q28. My datacenter has a vCenter Server having two or more ESXi servers. HyWorks is configured with vCenter Server having two-three desktop pools deployed. vCenter server has gone down. Will my end-users stop getting desktops? What could be affected?

Ans: HyWorks will continue to serve desktops using cached information, and will try to keep end-users less affected. This is called failsafe policy. Any power state change or network change information will not be updated in HyWorks and thus result in failure.

Q29. I want to disable failsafe policy. How can I do that?

Ans: Go to Management Console -> Settings -> General -> Advanced settings-> Session Provider Failsafe Policy -> Make it false.

Q30. Explain fixed and on-demand deployment of desktops in HyWorks? Fixed deployment, deploys all desktops on pool creation or updation.

Ans: On-demand deployment: Deploys minimum specified desktops and keep desktops in spare. As soon as spare desktops are reduced it provisions new desktops up to limit of maximum specified desktop count.