Choosing the Right Tool to Monitor Microsoft Windows 365 Cloud PCs

Microsoft offers a number of virtual desktop options that vary in flexibility and complexity. Despite which option customers choose, ControlUp has a solution. Whether they’re using Windows 365 Cloud PC, Azure Virtual Desktop, or Remote Desktop Session Host (RDSH) for on-premises workloads, ControlUp provides organizations with easy-to-use tools to quickly resolve IT issues, proactively prevent tickets, and minimize costs to help provide the best digital experience for users.

Flexibility versus complexity

In order to understand which ControlUp product is right for customers, it helps to understand how Microsoft virtual desktop options differ. Starting from left to right in the diagram below, Windows 365 Business Cloud PC focuses on ease-of-use but offers less freedom when it comes to the number of users, virtual machine options and management tools. However, if those limitations are too restrictive for a customer, Windows 365 Enterprise Cloud PC or Azure Virtual Desktop might be better options as they provide more management flexibility at the cost of added complexity. Finally, RDSH provides on-premises customers with the most deployment flexibility and complexity as IT is responsible for managing their physical data center infrastructure and maintaining high availability of the network infrastructure.

Figure 1: Microsoft virtual desktop offerings landscape

It’s worth noting that ControlUp has been monitoring Azure Virtual Desktop for some time now. Since we’ve added it to the list of end-user computing platforms that we support, we’ve included more granular monitoring, troubleshooting, remediation and resource optimization capabilities. You can read more about them in this blog or any other of our blogs on Azure Virtual Desktop.

Supporting Windows 365 Cloud PC

While Windows 365 Cloud PCs provide users with the convenience to access their personalized virtual Windows PC, including applications, data, and settings, from anywhere with an internet connection, lending itself to enhanced flexibility and mobility, monitoring and supporting virtual machines can be tricky. Users often complain that the current built-in self-service tools make it difficult to get a clear picture of the performance of their environments. ControlUp provides users with the visibility they need to stay ahead of IT issues and ensure they are truly reaping the benefits of choosing Windows 365 Cloud PC over other end-user computing platforms.

Let’s dive deeper into the two different flavors of Windows 365 Cloud PC, each varying in configuration and capabilities, and how ControlUp can support them. They are Windows 365 Enterprise Cloud PC and Windows 365 Business Cloud PC.

Windows 365 Enterprise Cloud PC

Windows 365 Enterprise Cloud PCs allow for more flexibility in their configuration, which requires some nuance to which ControlUp technology would be appropriate to monitor these machines. The easiest way to determine which ControlUp product to use is the presence of an Active Directory domain. If you have an Active Directory domain available in your organization and it’s being synced to an Azure Active Directory domain, Microsoft calls this configuration “Hybrid Azure Active Directory”. For this configuration, ControlUp Real-Time DX is perfect for these machines.

Real-Time DX is a cloud-hosted ControlUp product that provides automated and manual monitoring, troubleshooting and remediation capabilities to virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) and desktop-as-a-service (DaaS) environments. Read this detailed blog post to understand how to easily monitor Windows 365 Enterprise Cloud PC machines with ControlUp Real-Time DX.

Windows 365 Business Cloud PC

Windows 365 Business Cloud PCs have some limitations compared to their Enterprise counterparts. For ControlUp, the biggest limitation that defines the product choice is that these machines can only join Azure Active Directory/Entra ID domains. Azure Active Directory is Microsoft’s cloud-based domain product that utilizes cloud services for sharing files, information and other resources. ControlUp Edge DX is best suited to monitor these machines. Additionally, if your Windows 365 Enterprise Cloud PCs are purely Azure Active Directory, you’ll want to monitor them with ControlUp Edge DX.

Edge DX is a software-as-a-service (SaaS) ControlUp product for managing physical endpoint devices, regardless of where they are located or how they are connected to the internet. It allows you to manage devices that run Windows, Mac, Linux (including IGEL and HP thin clients), with features for monitoring, troubleshooting, and remediation. Read this detailed blog post to understand how to easily monitor Windows 365 Business Cloud PC’s with ControlUp Edge DX.

Maximize your Microsoft investment today!

Whether you’re using Windows 365 Cloud PC’s, Azure Virtual Desktop, or RDSH, ControlUp Real-Time DX and Edge DX provides customers with the right monitoring tools and end-to-end visibility to ensure optimal IT performance and quick remediation to maximize their virtual desktop investments. Check out our Microsoft solutions page to learn more about ControlUp solutions for Windows 365 Cloud PC and Azure Virtual Desktop.