It looks like 2010 could be the year most organisations kick start a desktop refresh. I suspect many held off on upgrading to Vista so for many it’s a Windows XP to Windows 7 upgrade path. I wanted to revisit some of the old challenges in these projects and look at some of the new options on tackling them.
First up is a need for clarity on what you want to achieve which will steer subsequent migration questions:
- Will you standardise on 64 bit, stick on 32 or have a hybrid of both?
- Will you attempt to in place upgrade the desktops and laptops or rebuild them?
- Will you replace some desktops with thin terminals and a VDI solution?
- Will you repackage applications to be deployed onto Windows 7 or will you virtualise them using something like App-V?
- Will you focus on a unified user experience both in and out of the office using Direct Access?
- Will you strip away some of the excess logic in logon scripts and implement new technologies such as NAP to protect your network from machines that are not running at corporate standard?
- Will you revisit the structure of the network and the Active Directory to avoid complex management of firewalls and Identity?
- Will you look at the help desk history and look for trends that can be fixed going forward? Will this lead to a tightening of group policy and a refresh of the user profile or will you attempt to use the old roaming profile on the new machine?
What would I do?
- I would certainly attempt to drive towards 64bit but be practical about it, a large scale hybrid community is not ideal. Establish an exception process and a short timeline for a swing to 64bit for all.
- If you are mainly a 32bit estate then the drive to 64bit rules out upgrade which is good news in my opinion. XP to Windows 7 is not a supported upgrade path either.
- I would certainly consider replacing hardware that is not up to Windows 7 with thin terminals and offer Virtualised Windows 7, other options include Terminal Services to the Thin device (now Remote Desktop Services) and also Virtualised applications installed on Windows 7 with the likes of App-V.
- If you have applications that will not run on Windows 7 then App-V may be a consideration. App-V essentially bundles the application into a bubble along with the OS components it needs (these can be from XP or Vista). So to the user the application runs on Windows 7 but in reality it’s running inside a XP or Vista bubble.
- I would absolutely bring Direct Access into play for Laptop users.
- I would also look to strip down old logon scripts in favour of Group Policies and tie up security policy checks using something like NAP.
- I would take a close look at any environment that segregates users within the same domain with a firewall and think again. Firewalls between domains are a pain but sometimes unavoidable.
- A desktop refresh is sometimes an opportunity to consolidate the Active Directory (but be careful of scope creep as that can drive changes to back end applications and data structures also). Re-challenge why you might have multiple Domains within an Active Directory.
- On user profile in line with upgrade supportability I would look to start afresh and tighten group policy so that user profiles do not get bloated. Modern technologies will drive more and more adoption of certificates and going forward having support staff delete user profiles should be avoided.
