With Remote Desktop Services (RDS), one of the core virtualization technologies available in Windows Server 2008 R2, Microsoft is progressing in its vision to provide the best virtualization platform for accelerating and extending desktop and application deployments from the data center to any device. In addition to the traditional session virtualization scenario (formerly known as “Terminal Services”), Remote Desktop Services is expanding its role to provide an extensible platform for a Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI).

Remote Desktop Services’ RemoteApp virtualizes a processing environment and isolates the processing from the graphics and I/O, making it possible to run an application in one location but have it be controlled in another.

Remote Desktop Services makes it possible to remotely run an application in one location but have it be controlled and managed in another. Microsoft has evolved this concept considerably in Windows Server 2008 R2, and renamed Terminal Services to Remote Desktop Services (RDS) to better reflect these new features and capabilities. The goal of RDS is to provide both users and administrators with both the features and the flexibility necessary to build the most robust access experience in any deployment scenario.

To expand the Remote Desktop Services feature set, Microsoft has been investing in the Virtual Desktop Infrastructure, also known as VDI, in collaboration with our partners, which include Citrix, Unisys, HP, Quest, Ericom and several others. VDI is a centralized desktop delivery architecture, which allows customers to centralize the storage, execution and management of a Windows desktop in the data center. It enables Windows and other desktop environments to run and be managed in virtual machines on a centralized server.