Enterprise Azure Virtual Desktop Architecture and Security Overview

Azure Virtual Desktop is built on top of Windows 10 and Windows 11, providing a highly scalable and secure solution for enterprise desktop virtualization.

The architecture is designed to support a wide range of workloads, from simple to complex, and can be easily integrated with existing enterprise systems.

A key benefit of Azure Virtual Desktop is its ability to provide a consistent user experience across multiple devices and locations, thanks to its support for Windows 10 and Windows 11.

This consistency is achieved through the use of a centralized management platform, which allows administrators to easily manage and configure user sessions, applications, and desktops.

Microsoft Azure Virtual Desktop, or AVD for short, is a Microsoft Azure-based virtual desktop operating system that securely hosts desktops and applications in the cloud. It's compatible with a range of devices, including Windows, Mac, iOS, and Android.

AVD enables users to access their desktops and applications from anywhere, at any time, without needing them to be installed on the device. This is a game-changer for remote work and flexibility.

AVD license costs are already included in many Microsoft 365 subscriptions, such as Microsoft 365 Business Premium or Microsoft 365 E3.

Azure Virtual Desktop offers a range of benefits for enterprise organizations, including improved security, efficiency, and affordability.

With Azure Virtual Desktop, you can access virtualized Windows 11 and Windows 10 desktops and apps with the security and reliability of Azure. This allows organizations to meet employee needs while maintaining control over configuration and management.

Azure Virtual Desktop also optimizes costs with multi-session capabilities, enabling you to pay for only what you use. You can learn more about Azure Virtual Desktop pricing here.

By combining Azure Virtual Desktop with Nerdio, modern businesses can simplify their deployments and address the complexities and expenses associated with traditional VDI. Nerdio's automated deployment and configuration tools streamline setup and reduce administrative overhead.

With Nerdio, you can automatically deploy a complete virtual desktop environment in a couple of hours or connect to an existing environment in 10 minutes. Admins can manage all users from one intuitive management platform and save up to 75% on Azure compute and storage costs with Nerdio's Auto-scaling feature.

Nerdio's intuitive interface allows organizations to easily provision virtual desktop environments with minimal manual intervention, saving time and resources. This automated approach ensures consistency and reliability across deployments, mitigating the risk of errors and ensuring a seamless user experience.

Azure Virtual Desktop also provides increased accessibility, allowing multiple sessions on a Windows 10 or 11 VM. This reduces the cost of maintaining multiple VM licenses and creates better security and privacy.

Here are some key capabilities of Azure Virtual Desktop:

Azure Virtual Desktop allows you to deploy and manage virtual desktops and applications using the Azure portal, Azure CLI, PowerShell, and REST API. You can also publish a full desktop or individual applications from a single host pool, create individual application groups for different sets of users, or even assign users to multiple application groups to reduce the number of images.

The architecture of Azure Virtual Desktop is a robust system, and it's worth noting that a more in-depth breakdown of the technical architecture can be found elsewhere.

To get a quick summary, a graphic is provided, but it's essential to understand that Azure Virtual Desktop is built on a scalable and secure foundation.

The graphic, although brief, gives a glimpse into the complexity of the system, and it's clear that a deep dive is necessary to fully comprehend its workings.

The architecture of Azure Virtual Desktop is a crucial aspect to consider when setting it up.

You can read a more in-depth breakdown of the complete Microsoft Azure Virtual Desktop technical architecture here, but for now, let's focus on the key points.

Azure Virtual Desktop architecture is summarized in a graphic that provides a quick overview of the system.

To create a host pool with a session host configuration, you'll need to use Azure PowerShell. You can create a host pool with a session host configuration using the New-AzWvdHostPool cmdlet.

First, you need to specify the properties of your host pool, including the name, resource group, and management type. The management type is currently required to be 'Automated' and can't be changed after the host pool is created. This property is planned to be deprecated during the preview, but host pools created with it will continue to work after it's deprecated.

You can specify other properties such as the host pool type, preferred application group type, load balancer type, and maximum session limit. For example, you can use the breadth-first load-balancing algorithm and set Desktop as the preferred application group type.

Here are the required parameters for creating a host pool:

Once you've specified the properties, you can create the host pool using the New-AzWvdHostPool cmdlet.