Parallels Remote Application Server (RAS) Reviews

It's our financial software. From the server side, we got it set up and, for the most part, it has been working. I haven't really changed the configuration in some three years.

It has allowed us to centralize the software location so we don't have to update the software client on 70 computers. It's just the one or two servers that we have, and when people connect to it, it goes from there. It allows for ease of scalability, ease of update, etc.

• Ease of use
• Ease of setup
• Stability

Those would be the three things I really like about it.

The main issue we have with all of our users is printing. Randomly, a printer will disconnect or someone won't connect to it and I will have to reset the print service and then nobody can print. That's the big headache we've had over the course of the five years, printing.

We have not generally encountered any issues with stability and, usually, it is more server-based than software-based. Generally, it's some hardware failing in the server which causes some instability. But we get that replaced and everything gets back to normal. I would say it's a stable product.

We have not noticed any issues with scalability. Generally, again, that goes back to servers. When we noticed that one server was not enough for us, we added another server. We were able to add it to the farm within the software, and it flowed pretty easily. It allowed us to scale up really easily.

The few times I have used tech support, they have been really good, quick response. They're really knowledgeable about the software and are able to find a solution and get it going for me.

We did not have a previous solution. The company I worked for before was taking over IT and we realized they were going to need this kind of solution. I don't know how the decision was made. I came into it after all the decisions had been made about the software. Because the companies were merging together, they were going to have more users. They needed a more centralized software system.

The setup was pretty straightforward. In this environment especially, it's just two or three programs that we have that a lot of people need to use, so it was just getting it set up, installed the right way, and making sure that everybody was able to get connected. We made sure everybody could get the right client software. Then, upgrading software versions, we made sure we got that taken care of on everybody's computers, and went from there.

With a different client that I had set it up for, it was a little bit more complicated but that was the nature of their environment, not so much the software.

I feel the product's pricing is of good value. We have reviewed pricing on other software products, Citrix and products like that, and we realized that for the same basic functionality, we're paying pennies on the dollar, so we do appreciate that pricing level.

In terms of licensing, I don't want to call it an "issue" but the one thing we've run into is, sometimes not having enough licenses. So you have to be on top of that, be ahead of that game. Don't wait until you've completely run out. Always stay five ahead.

We didn't really test out anything else that I know of. When I came in, the decision had already been made. We have reviewed other solutions in the past, like Citrix but, again, we felt that the functionality that we needed was in this solution. For the price point and for the service, we just want to stick with Parallels.

Make sure you have security groups set up for who's going to be using which applications. Other than that, it's stable, it's easy to set up. Once it's set up, you don't really change in a lot of things, unless you're adding to it. You don't have to worry too much. You can get alerts. You have real, in-depth control of everything, so it's a great solution.

I give this product an eight out of 10 and it just comes down to the printing. We've tried several things to get that resolved and nothing has really worked. It will work well for a little bit and then something will hiccup. We have had a lot of hassle for a while. Otherwise, it's a great product.

It is our primary remote access solution for remote desktop.

It permits us to control the applications that our users are able to get to, in a seamless manner. We're able to distribute applications to users' desktops, just like those applications are on each user's computer, but they're not.

• Easy to install
• Super stable
• Easy to manage

It's a really good product. There's not a lot that needs improving, and we're on an older version. I imagine the newer versions are better but we have not had a single need to improve anything.

No issues with stability.

No issues with scalability.

We have asked for help from tech support and their service was good.

Citrix. We switched because Citrix is complicated and expensive.

We had them assist us with the setup and I think that's important. When rolling out a product like this, the vendor should want to help implement, so it's implemented correctly. We used them to implement it, and that's the way it's been running since we started.

I think the new pricing is a little bit high. If the price was lower, we could use it for many more customers. If there was one improvement to be made to this product, it would be a small-business version, at a much lower price point.

Licensing should always, in my opinion, be on a per-user, per-month basis. I would like to be able to add one user, take one user off. That would be the ideal, to be able to supply this as a service.

Citrix and the native Microsoft Remote Desktop. The latter is very hard it is to install, and makes us mad.

Everything can be improved, so I give it an eight out of 10. It does everything we need it to do, it's stable; with the caveat that there is no perfect solution.

If you're doing a thin-client environment, where you want to publish applications, then of all the products on the market right now, this is the product to use.

To provide applications to Macs and standalone Windows machines, also Linux and Android devices from appsanywhere.

Allows our Cloudpaging applications to be delivered to non-Windows machines all via our standard portal which is appsanywhere.

Its integration with Cloudpaigng and AppsAnywhere. We use Cloudpaging to package and deploy the vast majority of our applications to our standard Windows 10 desktops. With the use of Parallels integration into Software2 AppsAnywhere hub, this means we can use the same packages to deliver Windows applications to almost any device - Windows, macOS, iOS, Android, Linux, Xbox One, PS4 - just by ticking a box. 

It needs Windows scaling on Android/iOS devices. At present, the concept of delivering apps to Android and iOS devices is appealing, but the reality is that the screen size on these devices is so small that, unless there is some scaling option, it is not really usable. 

No stability issues yet.

No scalability issues yet.

Technical support is very good..

The setup was done by the vendor and seemed straigtforward.

Run a trial and see if it meets your requirements.

Providing load balancing to our RDS infrastructure, publishing RDS applications and desktops.

Accelerates deployment of thin clients and remote desktop servers in the farm.

• Thin client management (Windows 10 client) provides an easy way to lock down client connection to the remote infrastructure.
• Policies are very helpful for preconfiguring client behavior.
• Client management is easy.

HALB is not stable in our environment. When running two HALBs we have stability problems, so we use an active one and a passive for backup.

Also, it would be nice to implement an upgrade of the environment without having to stop the servers. As it is, this must be done during off-hours.

There have been a few stability issues, mainly around configuration.

I use GPO preferences to push configuration of Windows 10 thin client parameters for Parallels. Each device can have status “managed” in Parallels, meaning that the client is managed by the administration console and policies are applied. But these thin clients were not able to be managed because we discovered that we had already installed the RAS client on the SysPrep-ed machine, and a registry setting was used by Parallels to know the client’s MAC address. This MAC address was the same for all clients and the SysPrep-ed machine, so communication between newly installed clients and the administration server was not possible.

I had to create a script to collect the client’s MAC address during login and replace the registry value with it.

No issues with scalability.

Technical support is an eight out of 10.

Native remote desktop.

The initial setup was of medium complexity. We initially purchased a RAS server to provide more advanced load balancing capabilities between our remote desktop servers. This configuration was quite simple. We added another gateway server later and that was straightforward too.

Pricing is good.

Read the manual.

We are an MSP and use Parallels RAS as the client gateway for accessing our cloud platform.

Allows staff to work from anywhere with an internet connection, on just about any connected device.

Stability and reliability. Because our clients use this as the way to access their work every day, and we use it to support them, we need to know it won't let us or them down.

We have been working with the Parallels team on some printing issues and are hopeful they will be resolved in the next patch release.

We only encountered a stability issue with version 13 but that was quickly updated and repaired.

No scalability issues so far. We have supported thousands of concurrent users.

Technical support has always been great. They will work through any issue until it is resolved and have been very knowledgeable about their product. We have seen a number of issues we have raised over the years become features or fixes in the next update.

Citrix and native RDS. Citrix was more costly for a product that was no better and RDS has had a number of limitations over the years.

Initial setup was straightforward. If you have a multi-site farm and multiple levels of redundancy, it does add complexity, but less than any other products I have used.

The pricing has always been competitive, and the new SPLA licensing model works great for our business and clients.

Citrix, MS RDS, and Ericom Blaze. We also do keep an eye on the other products in the market to make sure we are always providing the best solution for our clients.

Install a demo and give it a go. It is very quick and will generally be all you need to be converted to a user of Parallels RAS.

We have some systems in a secret zone of our network. With Parallels, it's easy to publish an app or a desktop to users.

We can publish apps and desktops on Terminal Servers and seamlessly share printers. We also combine Parallels with Deepnet Security to get two-factor authentication.

We use several gateways because access to our secret zone requires two-factor user authentication. It is a lot of hassle differentiating among users with or without two-factor. Of course, we could use two farms, but that would mean more management too.

We have encountered stability issues at times. Some updates are not good and are followed by a new update soon after.

We have had issues with scalability but we do not use a load balancer.

We have not used tech support often but it has been good in the cases where we had to use them.

It's easier to set up and use than Citrix. We also switched because Parallels was more cost-effective and supported our requirements better.

The initial setup is straightforward, but ours was more complex to meet all our needs.

I recommend testing Parallels and comparing it to your needs. Compare the prices against what you are able to do with the product and its alternatives. Parallels is not a cheap product.

Read the docs, do a test, and plan well.

Cloud-hosted desktop.

We use RAS for customer solutions.

We use RAS to publish cloud desktops to our clients. The ability to easily publish resources to a subset of users is what we find most valuable. 

The management capability from the RAS portal provides greater control than using pure MS inbuilt into RDS capabilities.

We have had significant, ongoing issues with printing. It would be great to have a best practice for dealing with printing that we can offer to our customers. 

It would be great if there were more sophisticated GPO templates/options.

From time to time, we have had issues with stability. However, this could be related to connectivity at client sites. 

We also have regular issues with printers disappearing from sessions.

We currently use Parallels side-by-side with an Azure cloud-hosted solution. This may be from a lack of product knowledge on my part, but we still need to work out the most effective way to shut down servers outside of hours, thereby reduce hosting costs. I am not entirely convinced Parallels does this well yet.

In my limited dealings with support, they have been responsive, respectful, and helpful.

We were previously using Citrix. We changed for a number of reasons: 

1. We acquired a cloud company which was already using Parallels. 
2. Cost.

The initial setup was straightforward.

Parallels is a cost effective alternative to Citrix.

We evaluated Citrix and Microsoft Remote Desktop Services (MS RDS).

Understand what you want to get out of the product.

Alternative to Windows RDS (terminal services) supporting internal staff and remote access.

Simplifies external connections with community-based organizations by allowing us to publish applications to them, accessible by current-generation HTML5 browser or OS-specific client (Windows, Android, iOS), and supporting popular single sign-on and multi-factor authentication protocols.

Comparable performance to Citrix for our use case at a significantly lower cost. Straightforward installation and capable management front-end.

Improvement is needed in performance monitoring of the client's endpoint, and automatic re-connection of the client in the event of circuit disruptions (this works well generally but can present challenges).

No issues with stability.

None so far, but we plan a major expansion toward the end of 2018.

We have not needed much technical support. We generally find what we need in the provided documentation or the user forums. When we have requested help, the response has been consistent with other vendors of this type (we are not on an expedited service plan).

I have used Citrix in previous organizations with good results but I lacked the budget to acquire Citrix for this implementation.

Setup was straightforward. Our particular use case involved an Active Directory forest involving two data centers and three domains. User authentication against Active Directory was the easiest to set up and validate of any application installed in the last three years.

Pricing is clear and there are relatively few options or other pricing considerations when compared to similar products. Just be sure not to forget the Microsoft licensing that goes along with a Parallels deployment.

Citrix, Windows RDS.

Take advantage of the trial version so that you can check out its feature set first-hand, get a sense of its performance on your hardware and over your network.