2. Personal vDisk
Citrix XenDesktop 5.6

3. Jits Langedijk Sr. Consultant Application & Desktop Delivery
@JRLangedijk
JitsLangedijk

4. Agenda Citrix XenDesktop 5.6 What is a Personal vDisk (PvD)?
What are the PvD requirements?
What does Personal vDisk do?
How to install or upgrade PvD?
What is a PvD Inventory?

5. Citrix XenDesktop 5.6 March, 9 released
Main Focus is integration of Personal vDisk (RingCube).
Features
PvD integration into core components.
Support for Microsoft SCVMM 2012 and SCCM 2012.
Updated Citrix License Server v11.10.
Desktop Director 2.1 adds support for PvD.
Fixed Issues.
*Ibiza will integrate PvD into the XD meta-installer, Desktop Studio, PvS, and Desktop Director…

6. Citrix Personal vDisk technology Complete personalization
Personalized PC experience
Departmental & user installed apps
Personalized apps, data & prefs
Efficiency and management
Single OS image management
Reduce storage by 65%
Enables pooled VDI for all

7. What is a Personal vDisk?
RingCube 5.5 user personalization technology.
VDI with PvD offers a virtual desktop & workspace.
Each user gets a workspace stored on a SAN.
Workspace contains entitlement based applications, data and settings.
Workspace contains only user changes.
Reduces storage requirements.
entitlement based applications – department-installed apps

8. VDI Desktop Models – Dedicated Desktops
User Profile & Settings Departmental Applications User Installed Applications Local Peripherals
User Profile & Settings Departmental Applications User Installed Applications Local Peripherals
User Profile & Settings Departmental Applications User Installed Applications Local Peripherals
Increased storage
High per user cost
Increased management overhead
Complex and unique base images
Highly personalized for users
Increased user acceptance
Base Image
Base Image
Base Image
Operating System
Operating System
Operating System
VM1
VM2
VM3

9. VDI Desktop Models – Pooled Desktops
No personalization
Poor user acceptance
Limited scope/user base
Reduced storage requirements
Centralized management
Uptime & predictability
Common Base Image
Operating System
BASE / PARENT VM

10. Citrix Personal vDisk – Best of both worlds
User Profile & Settings Departmental Applications User Installed Applications Local Peripherals
User Profile & Settings Departmental Applications User Installed Applications Local Peripherals
User Profile & Settings Departmental Applications User Installed Applications Local Peripherals
Enterprise scope
Highly personalized for users
Increased user acceptance
Reduced infrastructure requirements
Centralized management
Uptime & predictability
PvD 1
PvD 2
PvD 3
Common Base Image
Operating System
BASE PARENT VM

11. Personal vDisk Requirements
XenServer 5.6 SP2 or above
VMware vSphere 5.0
VMware vSphere 4.1, Update 1
Hyper-V
Citrix License Server v11.10
XenDesktop 5.6 will not work with older license servers

12. Component Requirements
Controller
VDA with PvD
VDA without PvD
Win2008, Standard or Enterprise Edition, SP2 (32- and 64-bit)
Windows XP 32-bit SP 3 or later
Windows XP 32-bit SP3 or later
Windows XP 64-bit SP2 or later
Win2008 R2, Standard or Enterprise Edition (64-bit only)
Windows Vista 32-bit or 64-bit with SP2 or later
Win2008 R2 SP1, Standard or Enterprise Edition
Windows 7 32-bit or 64-bit

13. What Does Personal vDisk Do?
PvD intercepts application I/O requests (files, registry keys, registry values) and redirects these requests.
Requests are satisfied from the base Virtual Machine or Personal vDisk.
PvD decides which layer to satisfy the request from by consulting a set of rules called the resource catalog.
PvD provides a blended view of both base Virtual Machine and the users Personal vDisk.
Pvd consists of a minifilters…like an antivirus if you will – inspecting or looking to see what to do with resource requests.
This is done realtime inside a PVD driver.
This is based on a set of rules…found in a resource catalog.
This catalog should not be edited directly…it is a binary file maintained by PVD and updated over time.
Pvd makes sure the cat is updated to show an updated view of the rules.
We will discuss more about the catalog/rules later on…
Q- Are drivers supported with PVD?
A- Yes, PvD is a boot time technology so services, drivers etc are supported. 
Pvd itself has drivers. IVM is the most important – intelligent virtual machine.
IVMs main job is to Maintain the registry catalog.
========
Pvd also has user mode services that start a little later and handles 1st time launch and any base image updates.

14. PvD Storage Architecture
Assigned Desktops
Pooled Desktops with Personal vDisk

15. MCS – ID Disk, Difference Disk, Base VM relationships
This is what the user sees as Drive C:\
This is hidden from the users view
Windows 7 Master
Virtual Desktop 1
Diff Disk
ID Disk
VHD Chain
Virtual Desktop 2
Diff Disk
ID Disk
VHD Chain
Virtual Desktop x
Diff Disk
ID Disk
VHD Chain
Storage Subsystem

16. MCS with PVD – ID Disk, Difference Disk, PVDisk
This is what the user sees as Drive C:\
This is hidden from the users view
Virtual Desktop 2
Diff Disk
ID Disk
VHD Chain
Virtual Desktop x
Windows 7 Master
Virtual Desktop 1
Diff Disk
ID Disk
VHD Chain
Storage Subsystem

17. MCS with PVD – ID Disk, Difference Disk, PVDisk
Windows 7 Master
VHD Chain
Diff Disk
ID Disk
Virtual Desktop 1
Personal vDisk
This part is seen by the user as Drive P:\
Used for USERDATA e.g. My Documents
By default user is allowed 50% of the PVDisk
This part is Drive V:\
It’s hidden from the user
Merged with the Diff Disk
Seen by user as Drive C:\
E.g. Installed apps
PVDisk is created by copying UserData.VDESK.TEMPLATE from Base VM during catalog creation
10GB by default with 50/50 split for User Data / App Data
Storage Subsystem

18. Workflow Common Base Setup User Access Image Update
Install OS, common apps and VDA in base VM
Create VM pool and entitle
User Access
Login through XenDesktop Client
PvD assigned on first login
Locally administered/User installed/streamed apps
Image Update
Update base VM without affecting any user personalization
User’s Workspace
So the workflow to get a PvD environment up and running looks like this…
We will visit a full section dedicated to PvD Architecture.
Common Base Image
Operating System

19. Citrix Confidential - Do Not Distribute
How do I install PvD?
Upgrade options exist for
XenDesktop 5, XenDesktop 5.5 and the VDA
A ‘mixed’ site is permitted
Controllers running XenDesktop 4, 5 and 5.5 can control desktops running XenDesktop 5.6 VDA’s.
Controllers running XenDesktop 5.6 can control desktops running the only the XenDesktop 5.6 VDA.
Desktop Studio from XenDesktop 5 SP1 can manage sites created with XenDesktop 5.6 unless they include desktops with PvD.
Desktop Studio from XenDesktop 5.6 can manage sites created with XenDesktop 5, 5 SP1.
Temporary ‘mixed’ site is permitted during an upgrade.
Citrix recommends limiting the time of the mixed mode by upgrading ALL components in the deployment ASAP.
Desktop Director 2.0, which was included in XenDesktop 5.5 and later, cannot monitor desktops created with XenDesktop 5.6.
Citrix Confidential - Do Not Distribute

20. Controller Installation / Upgrade
After installation/upgrade you need to configure a Site
This includes, Licensing, Database set up and Host connection
Desktop Deployment Wizard is used to configure a site
Quick Deploy Wizard cannot be used with PvD

21. XenDesktop 5.6 – Post Installation (Existing Hosts)
Add Personal vDisks to existing hosts
In Desktop Studio
Select host
Select Enable Personal vDisk
Add Personal vDisk storage
Existing:
1. In Desktop Studio, click Configuration > Hosts and select a host.
2. Click Enable Personal vDisk.
3. Click Add Personal vDisk Storage and specify the storage location.

22. XenDesktop 5.6 – Post Installation (New Hosts)
Add Personal vDisks to a new site
In Desktop Studio
Create a catalog
Pooled with Personal vDisk (MCS)
Streamed with Personal vDisk (PVS)
Number of VMs
Size (min of 3GB)
Drive letter
New Hosts:
Create a catalog and take these additional steps:
On the Machine Type page of the Create Catalog wizard in Desktop Studio, select
Pooled with personal vDisk. This is a variant of the pooled-static machine type;
machines are assigned to the first user who connects to them.
For all subsequent sessions, that user connects to the same machine, and their profile and any userinstalled
applications are stored on a dedicated disk.
***Note: The Streamed with personal vDisk catalog type is also available. This adds personal vDisks to streamed machines (which load the operating system over a network from Provisioning Services). If you want to use this catalog type, do so in the Provisioning Services Console not Desktop Studio.
On the Number of VMs page, specify the size of the personal vDisk that is used for
all desktops in the catalog, and the drive letter. Ensure that the disk is big enough
to store the user's profile and any applications they install.

23. Virtual Desktop Agent Installation
VDA can be installed in two modes:
Virtual Desktop Agent – includes the new features of XD 5.6
Virtual Desktop Agent for HDX 3D Pro
Enable Personal vDisk for VDA
PvD is always installed. You either enable or disable the drivers.
*VDA must be present on all VMs made available to users

24. PvD Disk
May be attached to any storage targets defined in the hypervisor
Thin provisioning is supported for those hypervisors that support it
Can be located on same VM, or different (IOPS split among locations)
Default size and location selected in Desktop Studio catalog creation
(or PVS XenDesktop Setup Wizard, if PVS in use)
PvD disks can be resized
So the workflow to get a PvD environment up and running looks like this…
We will visit a full section dedicated to PvD Architecture.

25. What is a PvD Inventory? The PvD inventory consists of a few things …
The resource catalog
A set of 0-byte files which track files sourced from the base VM
Essentially information about what is installed in the base VM
The inventory is created by the administrator
Start -> Citrix -> Personal vDisk -> Update Inventory
At each base VM shutdown via the shutdown tracker
These options are only available in the base VM

26. Template VHD The inventory is computed and placed in the template VHD
i.e. the resource catalog and sentry files corresponding to the base VM
The template VHD is saved for use during first time boot in Pooled VM mode
After inventory creation a snapshot is taken and the XenDesktop catalog is created
An empty, unformatted volume is attached to each virtual machine
This volume becomes the Personal vDisk for the user of that VM
Initial size and SR location are obtained from DS/PVS setup wizard

27. Pooled VM – First Time Boot
MCS / PVS starts each VM in the pool
The Personal vDisk driver detects the unformatted volume and formats it
The template VHD from the base VM is copied into the new volume.
This is a VHD inside a volume

28. Pooled VM – Subsequent Boots
On each subsequent VM boots the drivers perform the following tasks …
Detects the volume with the VHD inside
Mounts the VHD
Load the resource catalog from the VHD into the system registry
Begin interception / virtualization
PvD also will detect if the volume has been increased in size and resize the VHD if needed

29. Pooled VM – User Changes
Over time users will make changes to their environment
Add/delete/change files
Add/delete/change registry keys/values
Install/uninstall software (if rights permit)
Receive provisioned applications (eg, via SCCM)
It’s important to note that PvD captures all changes being made
These changes are redirected to the PvD VHD file
No changes to the VM image are permitted

30. Base VM – Life Cycle Base VM images can and will change over time
A new inventory will be computed and stored in the base VM
On next pooled VM boot the VM will notice that it is out-of- date with respect to the new base VM
PvD drivers will mount the VHD and merge the changes from the previous inventory with the new inventory, respecting any changes made by the user.
After this 3-way merge the VM will restart.
Note – the broker will stop user logins during image update

31. Reminders PvD is not a User Environment Management solution
Be aware of the 50/50% profile and apps split
PvD turns pooled VDI into pooled-static
Admin always wins 

32. Summary Citrix XenDesktop 5.6 What is a Personal vDisk (PvD)?
What are the PvD requirements?
What does Personal vDisk do?
How to install or upgrade PvD?
What is a PvD Inventory?

33. Thanks for your patience!