HP today introduced a software portfolio that helps businesses transition from traditional, distributed desktop computing to a virtualized client environment while delivering an exceptional user experience.

Building on the company’s expansive client virtualization solutions, HP Virtual Client Essentials is an advanced software portfolio that includes multimedia, brokering and streaming solutions. The software is specifically designed to deliver rich user experiences in client virtualization environments such as server-based computing, HP Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI), HP Blade PCs or Workstations, and streaming client environments.

“A common concern we hear from customers about client virtualization is that there is a perceived trade-off between gaining control of a computing environment and maintaining employee productivity and satisfaction,” said Roberto Moctezuma, vice president and general manager, Desktop Solutions Organization, HP. “With HP Virtual Client Essentials, we’re helping businesses give their employees the personal, rich computing experience they expect, while making it even easier to secure and manage their client infrastructures through virtualization.”

The HP Virtual Client Essentials portfolio includes HP Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) Enhancements and HP Remote Graphics Software, two protocol options that deliver richer multimedia experiences when deploying virtual computing solutions. It also features HP Session Allocation Manager (SAM) – a session broker for remote clients that provides connectivity and advanced management capabilities – and HP Image Manager for streaming operating systems and applications.

Power-boosted protocols

HP RDP Enhancements provides easy, out-of-the box multimedia and USB device support for customers standardized on HP thin clients using the Microsoft® Remote Desktop Protocol who want to improve the end-user computing experience for employees while maximizing the number of users per server.

Available next month for all Microsoft Windows® XPe HP thin clients, HP RDP Enhancements will be pre-installed and licensed on most HP thin clients to provide users with a single-logon, full-screen virtual desktop experience for VMware View and Microsoft Terminal Services using a variety of session brokers. Users simply log in to their virtual client session to enjoy real-time, network-based multimedia content with full stereo audio – such as interactive training, demos and live webcasts – across a variety of multimedia formats. Linux-based thin client support is expected in the near future.

HP Remote Graphics Software (RGS) is HP’s recommended choice for customers needing secure, high-performance, collaborative remote desktop access to the richest multimedia and workstation-class applications. It can now run on any server or blade-hosted client in VMware data center environments and is available at flexible and affordable new license rates based on the user platform.

HP RGS codec-independent architecture automatically supports and accelerates all current and future multimedia formats and applications, including Flash and QuickTime, and now has even broader USB device support, including audio and webcam devices, to enable voice-over IP (VoIP) and desktop video conferencing for virtual client deployments.

Additionally, HP RGS provides expanded, real-time collaboration features to allow multiple professionals working from remote locations to see and share content-rich visualizations including 2-D design, 3-D solid modeling, rendering, simulation, full-motion video, heavy flash animation and intense Web 2.0 pages.

HP RGS also allows users to connect with one or many remote systems for access to high-performance applications and resources when and where they need them. This feature has been enhanced with multi-session cut, copy and paste functionality so information can be moved directly from and to applications running on independent Windows desktop machine sessions.

Seamless desktop session brokering

HP Session Allocation Manager (SAM) is administrative software that brokers network connections to seamlessly connect end users with their virtual client environments. HP SAM is optimized for customers with mixed virtual client environments, and offers support for both virtual machine resources and physical, dedicated blade clients.

With expanded support for PCs and HP thin clients running Linux, Microsoft Windows and thin client operating systems, HP SAM also features session timers that measure the users’ CPU activity and allow IT administrators to disconnect users from virtual resources after a specified period of inactivity to help maximize compute resource usage. Additionally, IT managers can take advantage of HP SAM’s new, enhanced diagnostic tools to check for common configuration or environmental issues, helping ensure installations and deployments run smoothly.

For government customers, HP SAM client also now supports secure Common Access Cards used by military personnel for single sign-on login to HP RGS and Microsoft RDP connections.

These new offerings complement the HP streaming client software solution HP Image Manager, as well as the full HP portfolio of Client Management Solutions software.

Pricing,(1) availability and support

HP RDP Enhancements will be available via download at no additional charge for HP thin clients with Microsoft Windows XP Embedded beginning in January 2009. The software is expected to be preloaded as a standard offering on most Windows and Linux-based HP thin clients in the first half of the year.

HP RGS platform-based licensing is now available, priced as follows:

•    HP RGS VDI or HP Blade PC – $35 floating license(2)
•    HP RGS Blade Workstation – $199 floating license(2)
•    HP RGS Desktop – $199 node locked; $495 floating license(2)

The new HP Session Allocation Manager is available now for download at www.hp.com/go/sam for $69 per seat.

In addition to providing customers the industry’s most robust service and support programs, HP also invites customers to visit the HP Remote PC or Thin Client User Forums to discuss, share and learn about best practices in client virtualization.