Citrix DaaS (formerly Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops service) Reviews

In the beginning, the Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops was designed for our COVID-19 business continuity plan. We use a lot of Citrix Desktops (for around 600 people). The desktop was built for out of office work, whitelisting clients, for all work done with a personal computer, and for the business continuity in a white room with dedicated computers. Today, we have changed the total design using enterprise laptops for everybody, so the desktop is gone and we only publish applications for end users.

The profile between the Citrix published applications and the broker profile on the laptop is permitted to use the same profile and the same settings for the user in Citrix and the laptop. It is a mix of both environments.

We are deployed in two parts: Belgium and Luxembourg. In Belgium, we have around 20 sessions concurrently, which are 100 percent deployed on-premise. In Luxemburg, we have around 400 sessions concurrently.

Today, we use only Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops. In the past, we also used Citrix Gateway to bring Citrix on a government forum or working with a personal computer, though this part is totally void today.

While we use it on-premise, we are using it more and more for cloud applications and infrastructure. Workers run applications on-prem to segregate correctly the access rights. All our tasks are on-premise, which is a positive for our security and the regulatory authority.

There was a scenario where a user built very small films for internal communication on his laptop via the VPN using the NAS file system. It's not the best solution. This takes around 45 minutes. With this use case, we installed all the tools on Citrix. Now, the user can build his film in a maximum of two minutes. It was an incredible improvement for the user. Today, this is the best case of Citrix usage for end user experience, using the full capabilities of the server in the data center.

Our organization supports Zero Trust as a security strategy. However, the Zero Trust strategy in the bank is done via the VPN. Also, all laptops connected out of the bank are via VPN. We don't use the full Citrix landscape to do this today.

For all applications in the bank, we set up Active Directory groups to have access rights. All users can access a lot of applications, but the rights are given one by one for each application. Therefore, it's very centralized at the Active Directory level.

The business continuity plan was 100 percent based on Citrix and the client. Today, it is a little different because everybody has a laptop, but the main applications are still available on Citrix. This offers the more flexible possibilities of managing business continuity plans and performance everywhere for end users.

In Luxembourg, a user can use business applications with Citrix inside the building. Then, outside the building, that user cannot use the business applications because we cut the usage of Citrix.

We can provide tons of applications with different settings, behaviors, and operating systems. It is the same way for the user. Then, we are totally transparent for the user to use a lot of totally different applications, which is the most important part of Citrix today.

Remotely, the user can use his personal computer with a VPN to the bank, as there is not always WiFi. We have seen very low boundaries in some cases. With the Citrix application, we provide very beautiful applications. We are running without a lot of resources in the data center and the user doesn't see it. It's totally transparent for them.

In the bank, a major part of all our applications is Microsoft App-V. If App-V is at end of life, then we need a new technology to replace it. As of today, I haven't seen in Citrix Studio that there is a new technology embedded directly in it to replace App-V.

We have been using Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops for more than 10 years. We started with a full complement of Citrix features, but today we only use a small portion of it. This changed over the years. 

The stability of the solution is great. It is not evident to me whether the lack of stability is linked with the new data center, due to a Citrix issue or new component in the new data center. However, in the past, Citrix was very stable. 

In the beginning, we had more than 70 users with only one reboot per week. I have heard that some companies rebooted every day at night. For us, that was not mandatory. The solution has been very stable with the condition that our applications are packaged correctly.

We plan to migrate to the latest LTSR version next year.

The scalability of Citrix is incredible because we use the Provisioning Services (PVS) solution. With this technology, the same image can be streamed to all servers. With this technology, I don't need to install, reinstall, nor repackage it. 

Globally, we have 600 to 700 users with Citrix access in the company. Their roles of Citrix users are private banker, operations, and sales. 

There is not so much support because the solution is very stable. However, we use Citrix ShareFile, and for this, all calls are solved within five hours. Citrix is very good for our usage today, and we haven't had a big issue.

We have been using Citrix for a long time. Building and first implementing Citrix was a little complex. We have a lot of components. However, when you manage all of them correctly, then it's easy. 

The first time, it was a little complicated to build the first images. Today, with versions, this is easy. We built a new image in four hours, which is incredible. Over time, we have improved the function and management of Citrix.

Implementation in the bank was in three steps: 

1. We implemented it in a test environment, like a beta environment, with a beta tester and system engineer to improve the solution and application, then checked everything was working. 
2. In the acceptance environment, we set up all the same settings as production. We asked key users to validate everything: applications and behaviors. 
3. We copied-pasted this environment (if everything was okay) into production for end users and key users. It had totally the same environment with the same behavior. Then, we validated all the environments from acceptance to production directly on the same Citrix environment. 

Acceptance and production are only one big environment where acceptance and production workers cohabit in separate tools and where all users can go into the acceptance or production environments by default. When we validate a new disk or function in a new application, we go to acceptance with just an Active Directory group to validate the solution. This is really great.

In the beginning, we used a partner as an integrator to help us design the Citrix and implement the first part. We have been using a partner for maintenance and upgrades because we don't have the knowledge at this moment about the newest version of Citrix. 

As partners, we used Acidos to build our first version, then we used SecureLink. However, I don't think the Citrix partner aspect of SecureLink's company exists anymore.

We deployed the first bit with our partner. We did this with seven or eight system engineers to build and go through tests. That was the first version. Today, for Belgium and Luxembourg, we have only three system engineers to maintain and publish new applications.

With Citrix, we saved a lot in the past for the business continuity plan. Today, it is not so much, but we still make money because the performance is there.

If you look at cost, then you must look at the number of users that you are covering. If you are only using it for some users, then it is very expensive. However, if you have a massive amount of users, then it begins to be interesting to use Citrix. Because once you are managing thousands of servers with one guy, your maintenance costs decrease per user.

Another major cost is Microsoft because Microsoft Windows costs them. We also need a license for SQL server, Windows Server, and Citrix Remote PC. These are extra costs for the solution that are not covered by the license.

We haven't evaluated similar solutions. We don't have any other solutions for replacing the Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktop. Therefore, I think we will stay with Citrix for a long time.

We use other tools for analysis, not the Citrix tools and analytics. We don't use the Citrix tools because all our firewalls are not Citrix Firewalls.

All our detection and monitoring are not done via the Citrix environment because we have other tools for that.

There has been a lot of improvement in the application. We use the application for so many different things and areas of security. It is incredible what we can do with Citrix. It provides total transparency for us.

Today, it does not provide the flexibility of being used on any device because we use it on enterprise laptops. However, in the past, users could use their personal computer. It covered a lot of models and brands, and it was totally transparent for us. We only asked, "Please install Citrix receivers," then the rest is transparent for the system engineer. 

It is not clear for this moment if we will increase the usage of Citrix, because we don't know where the user will be working going forward (at the office, home, or another country).

I would rate it an eight out of 10. It's not only Virtual Apps and Desktops. Also, other products that I see from Citrix on the market are good. They look for the best performance solution for the end user.

Our clients use the solution to access the virtual machines in their organization. We don't give laptops to the employees. Everyone comes to the office. We have a virtual machine ready for them. Everything, including files and file sharing, is done in the virtual environment. Even the machines they access for work are in the virtual environment.

The Citrix Workspace application is very good. We can use it across multiple platforms, like iPads and other devices. The interface is seemingly easy to use. It feels like a PC. The functions that we get along with it, the ability to switch to the keyboard, and the gestures are perfect. It is easier to troubleshoot. If we have any issues, we just have to reset Citrix to fix the problem. It has really great applications.

The product has a lot of background processes running. Citrix duplicates multiple processes. We can see multiple instances of Citrix running in the task manager. We don't get that problem when we use a remote desktop. Sometimes, when the user launches VDI, they click it multiple times if it is a bit slow. So, multiple instances appear. It’ll be great if Citrix can eliminate that.

I have been using the solution for about three years.

The tool is stable. I rate the stability a ten out of ten. Our users do not face any problems. Either they get a connection, or they don't. If they don't get a connection, it's always because multiple instances are running in the background.

The tool is highly scalable. The only problem is cost. Everything else is perfect. I rate the scalability a ten out of ten. Our clients are enterprise businesses.

The technical support team is efficient. The quality of support depends on the organization that is providing the support.

Positive

I rate the ease of setup a ten out of ten. The deployment is quick and straightforward. It takes half an hour.

The tool is expensive. A license costs $1000. If we want the best solution, we must pay for it.

It's pretty easy to handle and train employees. It's quite good. People can easily learn the product. Troubleshooting Citrix is pretty straightforward. People who want to use the solution must plan the budgeting properly. They must plan how many people will use Citrix because there shouldn’t be any unused licenses. The licenses are really expensive. If we plan it incorrectly, we will have a financial crisis. Overall, I rate the solution a ten out of ten.

I use Citrix DaaS to connect to devices.

Citrix DaaS is pretty slow. In Citrix DaaS, I have to connect to the computer in another form and always have to keep waiting. Sometimes, I click on Microsoft Teams or Outlook, but it doesn't work at all. We use a few PDM (product data management) software in another company, and they're pretty slow through these things. So we always have to keep waiting, and a lot of time goes wasted.

The speed and connectivity of Citrix DaaS could be improved. Most of the time, it doesn't work for any colleagues. At least one or two employees complain about the solution's speed every day.

I have been using Citrix DaaS for a month.

Citrix DaaS is not a stable solution. I rate Citrix DaaS two out of ten for stability.

I rate Citrix DaaS ten out of ten for scalability because it is scalable and it's been used in a huge form. Around 1,000 users are currently working with the solution in our organization.

The initial setup of Citrix DaaS is very easy. I rate Citrix DaaS ten out of ten for its ease of initial setup.

Getting access to Citrix DaaS took a while, but installing the solution took five to ten minutes. Just one person is enough for the solution's deployment.

I won't recommend Citrix DaaS to other users. I don't know if there are any other better solutions. However, Citrix DaaS is also a good solution if the speed issue is resolved.

Overall, I rate Citrix DaaS a four or five out of ten.

I use the solution to give my workers access to several application in the form of Citrix internal applications for the company.

We had an old software that our servers did not support. So we moved to Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops for cyber engineering in India and Mexico.

The support offered by Citrix's partner needs to improve. The partner support platform should aim to provide more technical information to users.

The solution is very expensive, including the license, and the support, of all the platforms.

For example, the solution of Microsoft, if you are partnered with Microsoft, you have access to the license, and you only need the variable servers from the virtualization with Microsoft.

I have been using the solution for six years.

It is a stable solution. We don't usually have problems with the platform, but escalating the issue is difficult.

It is a very scalable solution. In the last semester, we updated the video graphics on the virtualization and video 3D graphics for the simulation on the hardware, and it was implemented in three days. It took six to seven months to get the GUI and firewall, but that was because of the problem in the country rather than Citrix. Four thousand users are using the solution presently.

The technical support with Citrix is a nine but support with a partner is a four. So the problem with support is not with Citrix. It is more with the partner who was supposed to provide the solution.

Positive

Talking of my own experience, I have tried VMware and Microsoft Hyper- V solutions. But here in the company, Citrix is the only solution.

We recommended a partnership the first time we bought it from Citrix and Citrix. The partnership was closed several years ago, and the new partner could be better. It's not good. Now, Citrix has been bought by another company.

It's costly in the market. But it is not expensive for the company. For the company, it's relatively inexpensive because the core of the work is compensated with the price. Secondly, the price is included in the cost of the business.

Presently, we are in the process of evaluating other competitive solutions and collecting their names. I must propose an error to show why we must change or stay with Citrix.

People planning to use Citrix must take the right decision for their firm rather than evaluate the cost from the start. 

It is a robust solution. I rate it a nine out of ten.

The solution is primarily used for provisioning the desktop for the employees in the company, including different layers of employees. We have different groups using the PVS, the provisioning tool. We are provisioning different groups according to the level, according to the department, et cetera, to deliver a specific desktop for employees who are working at home.

The PVS technology itself, the provisioning, is great. It's very easy. It's very simple to alter the main image or the golden image. 

It's also very secure. 

I find Citrix is a stronger option in many other aspects since it's one of the most mature in the market. It's ancient and it's always developing itself to add new things. 

The initial setup is easy.

Scaling is straightforward. 

We have had issues with certain aspects, which is why we are looking for alternatives. For example, the firewall solution from Citrix is a bit complicated. Integration is hard. It needs a higher understanding of the network. It's not plug-and-play. When I deal with it, I always need assistance from the network team if I need to alter anything. It should be simpler to deal with. 

When I was doing comparison research, the thing that I found really interesting in Horizon is that the firewall setup is easy. It's like a wizard menu, and it's well-documented, so it's not hard to alter anything in the firewall. Maybe the feature that I want to be added to Citrix is well-written documentation and a wizard just to let me know what is going on in the firewall, how to edit things, and how to easily deploy something on the firewall. Do I initiate a rule or decline a rule? They just need to make it easier for me to troubleshoot firewall issues.

We're a company working for a certain customer and the customer has been working with the VDI since it started, so for a very long.

I've been working with it for a year.

The stability is pretty good and there are no real issues. The one concern is the firewall. If there's any error, U2 a firewall error, we were not able to easily modify it or easily solve it due to tissues with integration. You really need higher network knowledge. In the end, security issues or any issues on the firewall will affect the stability in the end. 

We are always adding new PVS machines. As an operator, we're always asked to add new PVS machines to batch them, update them, add new machines, and add new images. It has been very easy to scale and everything is a click away. There are no issues while scaling.

The organization is huge, so I cannot say exactly how many people are using the solution. The organization has around 750 servers. On each server, there may be hundreds of machines. There are lots of users. There are maybe tens of thousands of end users actually using the desktop as a service through Citrix.

We don't really deal with technical support. All errors that we face, we are able to detect ourselves as an operator. We don't open any tickets with Citrix support itself. We don't have any experience with the support that Citrix provides.

Since the start we were working on Citrix.

It is straightforward to set up and implement. 

I participated in editing something in the image itself or while provisioning. That said, the main deployment happened long ago, and we are operators, so we were not really in the middle of the actual process of the deployment. 

The errors that we had during maintenance are typically all due to the firewall and its networking of it. Other than that, things are smooth, and all the errors are detectable. If it's an error in configuration and any other aspects except, of course, the networking of the firewall, it may be difficult. Otherwise, for other aspects, everything is easy to maintain.

I'm the operator for a customer, so I'm not really aware of the licenses. They do the deal with Citrix and we just operate the infrastructure or the VDI. I don't really know how much it costs in reality.

I was comparing this product against Horizon. I wanted to compare both solutions in case we need to migrate from one solution to another.

The company wants to migrate to the cloud so that's why we are searching for an alternative - to see if we should replace Citrix or keep on working on Citrix.

We are working with Citrix VDI, and we are mainly working on the PTS for provisioning.

I'm a system integrator. I'm dealing with the latest version of the product.

It's a very well-known solution, and it's very efficient. However, you need to dig deep into the architecture of it just to understand it and grasp it well, especially how things are calling one another, how things are operating inside the APIs and all the networking inside, and how things are working in the architecture to be able to work with Citrix and actually understand everything that's going on it. 

If you face any error, you'll be able to know the cause and easily go to the root cause. However, you must first understand the architecture, understand how things are calling one another, and how the networks play. Then, start step-by-step working on it, on the application itself. If you have good knowledge, you'll find working with it very easy.

I'd rate the solution a seven out of ten based on the fact that we did rin into a lot of issues related to the firewall. Other than that, Citrix works fine. 

I primarily was in charge of implementation and support. The solution itself was primarily used for remote access.

The solution was perfect for expanding the environment to host more remote access users during the pandemic.

The ability to allow users to have remote access is the product's most valuable aspect.

The initial setup was pretty straightforward. 

The solution scales well.

For the most part, overall stability is what you would expect.

The user profiles could use some improvement. They could use more stability and more functionality as well as user profile redirection.

I've used the solution since 2002 across several organizations. I have a lot of experience with the product as I've used it for quite a while at this point. I've used the solution within the last 12 months, however, for the contract I have now, I am not using it.

The user profiles could be more stable. 

The stability in general is pretty good. It is one of the numerous virtualization applications that have the same reliability as all the others; there's nothing different.

The scalability of the product is quite good and you can expand it if you need to.

It can expand into a larger organization and into an enterprise infrastructure from on-premise to a cloud environment.

I've been in touch with Citrix technical support and I would describe them as sufficient. They are okay in terms of the level of service they provide. 

It's my understanding that the company on my last project did not use a different solution before Citrix.

The initial setup was not overly complex or difficult. It was very simple and quite straightforward. Overall, it's a solution that is easy to implement and maintain. 

The initial deployment only took a few hours and maintenance is pretty minimal in terms of the time required. 

My strategy was to implement it to the required specifications. 

We had four people who handled the last implementation I did. 

Maintenance requires tasks such as image updates, patching, and support.

We help deploy the solution to our clients. We are able to handle any implementations. We don't work directly with Citrix, however, we do work with another third-party company. The experience we had with the company, overall, was positive. 

While I was on the project, I did not see an ROI.

We had a yearly license and we did named instances which I didn't like, due to the fact that they took away the concurrent. I tend to prefer concurrent as you don't get duplications.

The purchase price was around $300,000 USD and then the maintenance fees were 20%. There are no other additional fees.

I don't have any knowledge of the company evaluating anything before choosing Citrix. 

Our organization does not have a business relationship with Citrix. 

I cannot recall the exact version number I last used. It might have been 2106, however, I'm not sure. It was likely the latest version of the product.

I would advise those considering the solution to buy a maintenance contract alongside the solution. 

What I've learned, not so much from Citrix, but all of the virtualization applications is no matter how well your system runs, somebody will ditch. You need to be prepared for that.

I'd rate the solution at an eight out of ten.

We encountered some challenges in publishing outdated applications to end users, and we initially attributed it to ZenApp. However, we were eventually able to publish these applications to a specific user group that required access. It was a straightforward situation as we were primarily hosting end-of-life applications.

The architecture I built had a robust failover mechanism for the endpoints, and the interface was user-friendly. 

We were able to successfully publish the applications we needed without much difficulty. While understanding the background processes required some reading, I was able to deploy the system without any outside assistance or consulting.

My only issue with Citrix is that they frequently rebrand their products. I'm using the app and everything is fine but after a couple of years, it's entirely different. There were an enormous number of Citrix tools readily available. My immediate concern was selecting the correct ones.

I was able to choose the tools I required, and as previously said, the products I used have now been rebranded as Citrix Workspace.

It's similar to what VMware does with its Workspace One.

Before they transitioned to a workplace, I had assembled a Citrix environment using ZenApp and desktop and expanded upon it. Although it never reached production, I received training and successfully set it up.

In my opinion, it was very robust. I enjoyed working with it. We had used it for several years, and you could see that the software itself was being updated with time. Overall, I found it to be a pleasant experience.

We didn't face any scalability issues as we had a limited number of users, around 20 to 30, who needed access to the end-of-life applications.

The scalability was a nonissue. However, we didn't get into hundreds or thousands of users. I definitely don't have the experience to tell you that.

I didn't have to contact them as I could deploy it myself. I accessed their documentation through their website and my previous experience, which enabled me to do it independently without any assistance from them.

I remember that we had some challenges with sharing printers, especially with setting up access only for the finance and legal departments. It was a bit tricky, and I think that situation would have required assistance from technical support. However, we eventually managed to figure it out and get it to work, which was important for those departments.

If I recall correctly, setting up access to a printer was quite challenging. I don't have the specifics in front of me, and it's been some time since I worked on it, so I can't provide details. However, I do remember that it was more difficult than any other task I had to do.

I found it a bit complex, especially since we started using VMware products more frequently. If I had the choice, I would have simplified the process by using VMware Workspace going forward.

I don't quite remember the specifics of what we had. I believe we had a 25-user license, and I don't recall it being overly expensive. 

It was a reasonable cost. However, if you were to scale it up to hundreds of users, the cost would undoubtedly appear significant.

This is no different from what I would expect from VMware Workspace pricing.

I would rate it around seven or eight. It was highly robust and matured in terms of its features. I was building a high-availability environment while deploying it, and I appreciated its capabilities in that regard. Overall, it was quite robust and dependable.

I was quite satisfied with that as a solution.

Because I wasn't able to take the solution further, I would rate Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops a seven out of ten.

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to thoroughly test it.

Despite not being able to conduct extensive testing, I found it to be good to work with, and it performed as advertised.

If you have a desktop, laptop, or device that can be distributed to end users, to any kind of inconsistency in the institution, we deploy the solution so that anybody can get whatever resource is required. It helps ensure access. It makes it easy for us to give storage, memory, RAM, or processor resources without anything affecting their day-to-day activity. It makes it simple and easy for our institution to provide the kind of activity to the users.

The product is ideal for sharing an application for different resources. For instance, let's say we have a Microsoft Office product and want to share the Microsoft Office product with everyone simultaneously. That can easily be done. 

With this product, everyone can have a similar kind of desktop environment. So it's a virtual environment, the desktop environment. They can do whatever they need in that environment, and different kinds of users can access different kinds of applications. 

The product is scalable. 

If there are connectivity issues, there are stability issues. 

I've been using the solution for one year.

The solution is stable and reliable. However, it depends on the network infrastructure. If we have a stable network infrastructure, then it's stable. That said, if the infrastructure is not stable, I don't recommend this product. If there is an interruption, it might not actually be available to the user, which could cause issues.

The solution is scalable. 

Right now, we have 1,100 virtual workspaces, and we are planning to add 1,500 more. 

We do not use a different type of service right now. 

In terms of handling the setup process, we need planning since it is a bit complex. We need to know the infrastructure itself. The hardware resources can also be a bit expensive, and the licensing might also depend on the number of users that the organization has. Therefore, it is a bit expensive, the initial deployment. The cost of RAM after the deployment is much less.

It needs a proper professional to deploy everything. It also requires the engagement of Citrix. Three to six months is enough to deploy it as the hardware might first actually need to be available. Still, once you have that resource, deploying Citrix also might take additional time.

While internally, it can be managed by an in-house staff, the deployment cannot. It requires proper capacity building to do even the deployment. It is a little bit challenging, so I recommend the setup be done by the consultant. 

The initial setup requires a specific supplier or consultant to handle everything. It can't be done in-house.

In January 2020 they changed the licensing scheme and they're also changing the on-prem licensing scheme to be subscription-based as well. It can be tricky. I don't know why they did that. Maybe it's the marketing strategy. I don't know. The subscription is for three years or five years. If you procure three years subscription, you can use the license, after three years, they'll block it, which can be a challenge if you aren't paying attention to when licensing renewals are due. 

We last updated about a year ago. We are on the 2021 version.

I recommend the solution, however, it depends on the organization's use case. Let's say if that organization needs to share the resource equally through the users or staff they have, then I recommend it. 

I'd rate it nine out of ten.