Hosted Domain Controller + Terminal Server

[AP0ll0UK]

Morning Campers

I've been speaking to a mate who's been asked to look at improving the user experience by deploying a single desktop regardless of whether the user works from their offices or remotely, and free-up some of his time so he can concentrate less on IT and focus more on his other duties.

He's spoken to a friendly company who have verbally given him one price and then formally quoted him almost double per user per month. He's also really up against it as he's just been given the word that they are moving offices within the next 4-6 weeks so he's struggling for time to go out to the market for more pricing and deliver a solution.

His current setup consists of:-

- Server 2008 [AD / File Shares / Print]
- 12 office staff who mostly laptops but do work remotely sometimes
- 2 Remote users who VPN into the office
- Office 365
- CRM Database

- DSL Max broadband

He's been quoted for the following:-

- Setup of a virtual cloud domain controller + virtual terminal server
- Server support / maintenance / patching
- Sophos server security
- Veeam backup + replication
- Server 2012 SAL + Office 2013 Standard
- £2.5k setup and £55 per month per user [14 users]
- Onsite hardware breakfix for existing kit isn't included, neither is the CRM DB

I've never had to go shopping for hosted servers but this seems a little on the expensive side. What do everything else think please?

[Hangman]

Is this hardware dedicated to your friend or a shared server as this will have an impact from a licensing perspective.

[AP0ll0UK]

The quote suggests its shared. It says that they'll provision a 2 core Xeon with 2GB and 200GB for the DC, then an additional 2 core Xeon with 8GB and 300GB for the TS.

[Hangman]

I don't think you can install office or o365 on third party shared servers, hence why they are including licenses for Office in the price.

[AP0ll0UK]

If the solution is based on VMware and the host has a mixture of guests belonging to different clients, but one guest [the terminal server] is used soley by people within my friends organisation, can you not then install and licence Office 2013 on that guest under RDS?

[Hangman]

This is from the Office 365 Pro Plus Licensing brief.

Can I use Office 365 ProPlus with a partner-hosted solution?
No. Office 365 ProPlus is not sold under our service provider hoster channel (or SPLA partners). Customers may continue to purchase Subscriber Access License (SAL) for Office hosted desktop solutions provided by Microsoft Partners.

Can I deploy Office 365 ProPlus on shared public cloud environments?
No. Office 365 ProPlus may only be deployed on network servers in your organization’s premises or outsourced servers fully dedicated to your organization. You are responsible for the use of the software regardless of the physical location of the hardware, on or off your organization premises.

You can however do it via Azure, have a look at Azure RemoteApp as an alternative - http://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/RemoteApp/

[AP0ll0UK]

Thank for the info mate.

Does this also apply to Office 2013? If it does then I wonder how this company are offering this as a solution.

[Hangman]

They are offering a SAL (Subscriber Access License) via SPLA.

Becuase this is a shared server environment this is the only way you can use office in this senerio.

If the servers were dedicated then you friend would be able to buy Office Pro or Std for each device and also install on the server for RDS access.

[AP0ll0UK]

It does say on the quote Windows 2012 SAL and Office 2013 Standard....?

What do you think of the monthly cost then, £55 per user. Do this sounds about right for this kind of setup, or a bit expensive?

[AP0ll0UK]

Going back to the first point about licensing, maybe they're just not very clear about it in terms of how they've listed it out on the quote. Is it cheaper via SAL than a Standard licence?

[Hangman]

Going back to the first point about licensing, maybe they're just not very clear about it in terms of how they've listed it out on the quote. Is it cheaper via SAL than a Standard licence?

I'm not a SPLA specialist so can't advise on the pricing but for a company of 15 users SPLA or volume licensing would be comparable.

Although if they buy themselves through volume licensing they can reuduce the monthly costs and it would be easier to move to different suppliers if they wanted to at a later date.

[AP0ll0UK]

Sorry, I meant for the price for the overall solutions, virtual servers an all....

And thanks for the advice regarding the volume license!