Atlantis ILIO for Citrix XenApp

Virtualized XenApp Challenges

Many businesses are in the process of virtualizing Citrix XenApp and migrating to XenApp 6.5 on Windows Server 2008 R2/2012. Virtualizing XenApp introduces new datacenter infrastructure and performance challenges, along with considerable risks to the project. Failing to properly address storage and networking bottlenecks that come with virtualized XenApp implementations will almost always result in significant cost overruns, project delays and worst of all, unhappy users and executives. Using SAN/NAS with limited storage performance for virtualized XenApp deployments reduces server density, adds risk to the deployment, and increases provisioning times, boot times, and storage costs.

Atlantis ILIO – Virtualize XenApp with No Storage or SSDs

Atlantis ILIO for XenApp is the only software solution that makes it possible to deploy virtualized XenApp with no shared storage or SSDs – using server memory as primary storage. The Atlantis ILIO software virtual machine is automatically deployed on each hypervisor running XenApp , creating a highly optimized datastore using only server RAM as the storage for the XenApp virtual machines. With Citrix Provisioning Server (PVS), the write-cache is placed on the Atlantis ILIO data store to accelerate performance, provide virtually unlimited IO, and simplify the deployment of Citrix XenApp.

Benefits

• Cuts CAPEX and OPEX costs – lowers CAPEX and OPEX by using RAM as primary storage
  
• Amazing user experience – accelerates applications, boot/logon, and provisioning times
  
• Accelerates provisioning and boot times – 4x faster boot times, 33x faster provisioning
  
• Reduces deployment risk – automates sizing, eliminates storage and network bottlenecks
  
• Scales linearly – scales linearly by just adding servers with no additional storage
  
• Increases density – increase density by 15-20% while delivering a better user experience

Absorb Storage Sizing Mistakes – Lowers Deployment Risks

XenApp is most commonly deployed using Citrix Provisioning Server (PVS), which requires storage for a write-cache that can vary in size from 1GB to more than 20GB depending on the number of user sessions, workload and applications. When using SAN/NAS or SSDs, under-sizing the write-cache even by small percentage can lead to having to re-architect storage, causing project cost overruns, delays and unhappy users. Atlantis ILIO automatically absorbs mistakes made during initial design, both from a storage capacity and IOPS standpoint.

Automated Deployment

Atlantis ILIO Center provides push-button, fully automated deployment, configuration, sizing, and datastore creation for thousands of XenApp sessions across multiple racks of servers. Atlantis ILIO virtual machines are automatically created and registered as NFS datastores that are ready to use by Citrix PVS or to complete the desktop provisioning process.