How Many Users Can I Host Per Server With RemoteFX for Hyper-V and What Is The Cost Per User?

This is the question that is one everyone’s mind since SP1 was released. Let’s take a look at some of the answers to this question.

The key question capacity planning efforts try to answer is: “How many users will this server be able to host?” Other variations of the question could also be: “How much hardware is required to properly host all my users?” or “What kind of server is required to host <N> users?” In the case of RemoteFX, the key to how many users are supported is also defined by the experience for each user. For RemoteFX, the key question implies the following additional requirement: the user experience should allow for acceptable experience in the deployment. “Experience” and “acceptable” are relatively subjective terms and will vary based on deployment load, but in this document we will attempt to define what can be reasonably considered a good experience for a typical knowledge worker.

The conclusion of the scalability tests was that 2 GPUs, with a video memory of 2048 MB each, were capable of scaling to up to 32 virtual machines. A single GPU, supports up to 16 virtual machines @1280 x 1024. Our testing shows a linear scale as GPUs are added. tests The tests were run on the ATI v7800p GPU card. These go for $610 on Amazon.com. A quick calculation shows that this boils down to $40 per user, which is pretty nice. Of course there is more to it than just this because you need to make sure you have an RD CAL (did you know that?) and there’s the additional memory you need on both the Hyper-V host and the guest but still pretty nice.

The network bandwidth recommendation is 10Mbps per user (i.e. per VM).

In our tests running the knowledge worker + multimedia scenario, we found the network bandwidth usage to be far lower, at 2-3 Mbps per user.

Network bandwidth usage ranges from 0.5Mb/s to 9.5Mb/s, and depends on the application. In tests running the knowledge worker scenario, bandwidth consumption per user is lower.

This document focuses on preliminary guidance and data around capacity planning for servers running RemoteFX for Remote Desktop Virtualization Hosts, but also briefly summarizes the facts that are equally applicable to Remote Desktop Session Hosts in Remote Desktop Services deployments. For a more complete understanding of all the considerations and guidelines, it is highly recommended that you read the two architectural white papers from Microsoft on RemoteFX for RD Virtualization Host and RemoteFX for RD Session Host. The results presented in this document are based on a few scenarios that use Microsoft® Office applications. The document also provides basic guidance on the hardware and software parameters that can have a significant impact on the number of virtual machines that a server can support effectively.  Make sure you read the entire document here: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=679193cb-9b74-4590-a2be-00bde429c990

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