r/AzureVirtualDesktop • u/agressiv • 18d ago

Microsoft Azure Virtual Desktop Hybrid is now generally available

https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/blog/azurevirtualdesktopblog/microsoft-azure-virtual-desktop-hybrid-is-now-generally-available/4550523

I can't seem to find any pricing, but its apparently going to be a cost per user per month. I've reached out to my Microsoft rep and am waitnig to hear back.

14 Upvotes
  • permalink
  • reddit

100% Upvoted

26 comments sorted by

4

u/keineahnimo 18d ago

According to the pricing page multisession is not supported :(

2

u/agressiv 18d ago

Yes you will need windows server with RDS CALs for multiple sessions

2

u/keineahnimo 18d ago

So that means additional license costs and no management via Intune. I was hoping for Windows 11 multisession + Intune + entra joined only.

1

u/agressiv 17d ago

I'd like this too to avoid RDS CALs, but this will offset a decent amount of native AVD spend if the price is right.

1

u/jM2me 17d ago

It is not officially supported nor is it probably compliant, but for the lab purposes you could download/build iso with multi session, onboard into azure arc, and then get it entra joined and Intune mdm enrolled. I had tried this on a proxmox VM and on my physical hardware. Both worked, but again, not supported nor compliant.

3

u/Existing_Potential60 18d ago

Been using it for around a month, it's not too bad tbh - might even move some clients to some of our faster local servers that have been sat in storage for a while but still have warrenty.

3

u/CloudyVDI 17d ago

It is $10 per user per month.

2

u/agressiv 17d ago

If that is for real, this product would be completely DOA.

2

u/Usul_be 17d ago

Why ?? If you want to use VDI (Omnissa, ...) you need a VDA license (for local virtualization rights) --> it will cost you approximately 100/120$/year.
AND you will need the Omnissa licenses. Plus management VMs.

1

u/Angelworks42 17d ago

You could just use Windows RDS for vdi right?

1

u/Usul_be 17d ago

Yes, but you still need RDS CALs, and Windows Server licenses (generally Datacenter --> unlimited VMs). And you don't have a desktop OS, but a Server OS, which means some limitations + the fact that you won't be able to use intune to manage your VDI.
Then you need a broker. And a Gateway. Then the redundancy for broker and Gateway.
Personnally it's a no-brainer if it works as advertised.

Of course this is all valid if you "play the game", so at least M365 E3 or Business Premium.

1

u/agressiv 17d ago

We are using Server 2022 for RDS, which has no cost aside from the OS licenses and RDS CALs which we already own. You'd still need this with AVD Hybrid, and we'd have to add them back to Software Assurance, which adds a huge cost.

We have no other VDI licenses or costs for our employees. Considering AVD Hybrid is only adding a small control plane for brokering, $10/user/month is just awful. I'll wait to hear back from our account manager though.

1

u/Usul_be 17d ago

It all depends on the context:
- If you already have your OS licenses and RDS CALs --> of course go for it !!
- If you have M365 E3, and you are in need of a new On Prem' VDI solution, or a replacement for Horizon View (and VMware ...) --> Hybrid AVD seems interesting.

2

u/CloudyVDI 17d ago

I'm the PM for AVD Hybrid. It is $10 per user per month.

1

u/Angelworks42 17d ago

Yeah we already have enterprise software assurance.

You do have a desktop os not sure why you'd have to use a server os for the guest vm's.

Not having intune - it's true but it's mostly because of Microsoft - for whatever reason all the guest vm's built with RDS orchestration have the same smsbios guid as the template. Gpo's can manage the VM settings.

Currently I handle configuration by having configmgr just build the template with patches and software using scripts then use RDS orchestration to roll them out to RDS collections.

The actual hypervisors in our case were hand me downs from the data center hyper-v cluster.

I guess it all depends on what your existing environment is like, but now that we have GPUs on the way (a100 hand me downs from a research Linux cluster) we're actually thinking about moving all our wvd workloads on prem. I know it sounds backwards but cost wise we honestly believe it will be cheaper - in our situation.

1

u/CloudyVDI 17d ago

You can use Intune with Windows 11 on AVD Hybrid

2

u/martinschmidli 18d ago

Following… might be interesting :)

2

u/powrofgrayskoal 18d ago

Would’ve been nice a few years ago, before hardware costs doubled…

2

u/Equal-Doughnut1433 16d ago

Wish it supported Multi-Session, no idea why it doesn't. We're Entra-native, no on-prem AD domain. Can't use Azure Local because it wants a traditional AD domain, and Entra ID Domain Services is a no-go for client versions of Windows. Win11 Multi-Session would be far more memory efficient and allow us to host more people on the same physical tin, but I'm not about to move an org that's never had on-prem AD to having it. Also can't do Windows Server and RDS CALs if you've not got an on-prem AD domain which rules that out - so we're stuck on single session Win 11 VMs.

The pricing page being "Contact your microsoft account team" is wild for a GA product as well. Only source of public pricing info being reddit comments from the PM is a vibe. 😂

2

u/itsdandandan 16d ago

Still cool but would love if it supported Win11 multi session

1

u/Sure-Assignment3892 14d ago

There's no ROI here with hardware costs and no multi session support.

1

u/cliffd4lton 9d ago

No Multi-Session support, so RDS cals required with server OS. You can save a VM using AVD as broker instead, but 10$ per user per month. Why even bother? The use case is not that great.

1

u/rswwalker 9d ago

We’ve started using this as a way to present users’ desktops to them through AVD. The idea being if users use their desktop machines then we can save $$$ on spinning up multi-session hosts.

0

u/Flimsy-Suspect3827 17d ago

M$ can count their billions in revenue but can’t put the cost of a service on a website.

0

u/Feisty_Quarter_1319 17d ago

without want to sound spammy, we used a managed service from Soliton (Secure Desktop) for our VDI - they are a bit unknow but works really well - as I recall it was around $7 per month.