Sometimes, deciding which 2X product will best suit your needs is a little hard. You know you want to use server-based computing because of the time and money it will save you. You just aren’t sure what the difference is between 2X ApplicationServer, 2X LoadBalancer, and 2X ThinClientServer.
LoadBalancer is a little easier–the name says it all. LoadBalancer monitors your server resources against the needs of your users and assigns each person to the best server available. That’s a lot of words to say LoadBalancer is a “traffic cop” for your network. LoadBalancer simply directs your network traffic based on available resources.
But what about this ApplicationServer and ThinClientServer? What does Enterprise Edition mean? Which one is which? Do they talk to each other? Do I have to use both of them at once?
ApplicationServer and ThinClientServer provide two different services in your system.
Application Server
Our ApplicationServer “publishes” applications from your server farm out to your users. Publishing is a handy way for your IT department to make applications available to users without having to go around to each desktop PC (also known as a fat client) to install the software.
When it comes time to deploy a new application, your IT guy installs and provisions the application from the server room and uses 2X ApplicationServer to publish that application to only the users who need it.
Unfortunately, 2X ApplicationServer for Terminal Services, the full name of ApplicationServer, does not take the place of Windows Terminal Services. Rather, ApplicationServer sits on top of and works within Terminal Services.
Concept of Thin Clients
ThinClientServer is a little different. With ThinClientServer you have the ability to manage the “thin clients” in your network. If you are unfamiliar with the concept of thin clients, think back to mainframe days when you worked at a dumb terminal. All of the applications and processing happened on the mainframe and you accessed it with your keyboard and monitor. Thin clients are a lot like dumb terminals.
Thin clients can be a special piece of hardware–a small little box where you hook in your monitor, keyboard/mouse, and network connections. It only has basic RAM and a small hard drive–just enough to boot up. A thin client can also be an old desktop (using our ThinClientOS) that is no longer powerful enough to run the new applications commonly in use today.
Thin client hardware can come with an embedded Operating System (OS) or not. We provide ThinClientOS for free. It allows you to boot your thin client to begin talking to the server. Our OS allows you to turn your old computer hardware into thin clients because so little processing power is needed on the client-side. All the processing power lies with your servers.
ThinClientServer, the piece you purchase from us, allows you to manage the thin clients in your system. Particularly those using our ThinClientOS. ThinClientServer also “talks” to ApplicationServer to limit your users to published applications rather than giving them a full desktop. This is particularly cost-effective when you are using your old hardware as thin clients.
All of our products work seamlessly together to provide you with a simple and inexpensive way to administer your network. We provide free evaluations with full functionality so you can test our Server-Based Computing solutions. Also, we provide full support during your evaluation so you can be up and running quickly and easily.
