Time To Upgrade Your Old PCoIP Zero Client?
The Tera1100 Processors will no longer support future VMware Horizon Releases after 5.3
After founding and developing PCoIP Technology behind closed doors for three years, Teradici publicly launched the protocol in 2007 with their first gen Tera1 processors and Remote Workstation products. The new protocol offered consolidation of IT resources, encrypted transmissions (alleviating the risks associated with transmitting data across networks), and high-end performance (CAD/CAM) at any desktop, anywhere. Seen as one of the most exciting start-up companies in the industry, PCoIP was quickly integrated into VMware’s offering, culminating in the release of VMware View 4.0 featuring PCoIP in 2009. Following this, the 10ZiG V9000 Tera1 PCoIP Zero Client became the first choice of many 10ZiG VMware customers.
Moving forwards to 2012, and following continued success in the VDI space, Teradici announced the successor to the Tera1 with the introduction of the Tera2 processor, as seen powering the 10ZiG V1200-P Zero Client. The Tera2 provided five times the VDI pixel performance of the Tera1, halved the typical consumption to just 6W and also introduced support for quad display, as seen in the 10ZiG V1200-QP Zero Client.
Following the Tera2’s release, VMware continued, and still continue to provide Tera1 support for new releases of Horizon with View, however Teradici have announced that the Tera1 Zero Clients will not support any Horizon releases after 6.0.1.
Tera1-based products have enjoyed an eight (8)-year-long service life in Remote Workstation or VMware Horizon deployments. The Tera1 processor and firmware has reached the end of its Product Life Cycle due to insufficient storage capacity to take on new features. This also prevents Tera1 PCoIP Zero Clients from achieving VMware Ready certification for VMware Horizon 6 or higher.
Tera1 firmware releases will not include any new platform version support or feature development in firmware releases for Tera1 products. The only development that may occur will be to address issues deemed critical by Teradici against supported platforms.
For those with a live Teradici log-in, please see link snapshot of Teradici’s Zero Client Compatibility with VMware Horizon View the direct link HERE. Also, please see the VMware Reference Notes* links at the bottom of this article.
Directly below is an important listing of key support milestones for the remainder of the Tera1 lifecycle.
VMware recommends not upgrading beyond Version 5.3 of Horizon View for optimum support and compatibility. Only the Tera2 based zero clients will be certified VMware Ready for the latest and future versions of VMware Horizon, meaning Tera1. Whilst Teradici continues to support Tera1 zero clients with VMware Horizon up to and including version 6.0.1.,
As well as future upgrade of VMware Horizon and the previously slated support implications of using Tera1 zero clients in a VMware environment, there are also some specification differences between Tera1 and Tera2 zero clients which make the upgrade potential all the more enticing. These differences in specification could provide for greater user experience not just for future VMware Horizon upgrade consideration, but also current versions as explained below.
The most prominent differences include the number of pixels per second that the zero client can process. This is important since it’s the way in which the client decodes the PCoIP packets as pixels in hardware, which ultimately determine the user experience. A Tera1 zero client can process between 10-100Mpps (Mega-pixel-per-second) whilst a Tera2 zero client can process between 50-300Mpps. Compare this to a typical thin client which averages approx. 5Mpps. It’s considered the ‘norm’ these days that a user is equipped with dual ‘Full HD’ resolution monitors. It’s these types of use cases where a Tera2 zero client will really stand out in a VMware Horizon environment, due to the additional number of Mpps its hardware can decode and process.
Other prominent feature changes include improvements in USB speed and performance when switching from Tera1 zero clients to Tera2 zero clients. Again common place for users of VMware Horizon where a wide mix of USB peripherals, which speed hungry demands such as Mass Storage/Scanners/Webcams, etc. Additionally VMware Horizon View 5 onwards has supported client-side image caching, which delivers significant bandwidth savings as well as greater user experience for LAN & WAN users scrolling operations. This feature is only available for Tera2 zero client users, which specification supports the RAM requirements for client-side image caching.
Finally Teradici have continued to incorporate new VMware Horizon features into Tera Zero Client in the form of firmware updates. Most recently, adding support for Horizon (RDS) Published Applications in firmware 4.8.0. Unlocking such future potential will only be possible when using Tera2 zero clients in conjunction with VMware Horizon 6.0.1 and future versions.
“How can 10ZiG help us if we need to upgrade to Tera2?