What is it like using a thin client to connect to a Windows VM?

[sonofdbn]

I'm thinking of setting up a Windows 10 VM on my unRAID server and connecting to it via a thin client. I currently have such a VM that I connect to using RDP on my Win 10 PC and that works very nicely. This second VM would just be for emails, browsing and maybe watching some YouTube; no gaming. Connection would be via Ethernet LAN.

 

Having never used a thin client before, I was wondering how this would compare to using Win 10 RDP? What happens when you boot up something like a Wyse 5070? I believe it does support RDP, so does the native OS (Thin OS?) go straight into RDP and connect automatically, or do you select from a menu? Not a big deal, but would like to know. Just to be clear, the Win 10 VM would be Pro, so it would have remote access functionality. I'm assuming that using a thin client doesn't mean that I need a Windows Server version.

 

If I go this route, I'm likely to buy a used thin client. Again, assuming it's a Wyse 5070, does the OS come embedded or do you have to install one? How difficult is this? Years ago I tried various VNC clients in Linux to connect to a Win 10 VM, but I couldn't get it to work well. Typically the problem was that I couldn't get any decent sound and I could never get an RDP client working under Linux. (It's quite possible that I didn't understand what needed to be done.) At the time, I did feel that RDP on Win 10 was a far superior experience - basically flawless. So I'd really like something that supports RDP.

[meep]

Not quite thin client, but I use these Av Access HDBaseT extenders to pipe VMs from my unRaid server to wherever I need them around the house

 

https://amzn.to/3ZIEYZt

 

The transmit up to 4K HDMI, USB and audio. On the client side I have a display, keyboard, mouse and speakers.

 

They are a wonderful solution, very stable and flexible (PoE) on one end so only need to power one of them. The only real drawback I've come across is that they don't like high bandwidth USB devices. I can get my mouse and keyboard to work, but a set of USB Harmon Kadron Soundsticks are just too much for the setup. I'm have a USB soundcard plugged in on the server side and use the audio jack on the devices and that works great.

 

I wrote up a blog post a few years ago on this. Given I'm still using the devices years later (typing on a VM now in my house from an unRAID server in another building), I'd say they are keepers.

 

 

[sonofdbn]

I took a chance and bought a used Wyse 5070, which had the bare minimum specs (Celeron J4105, 4GB RAM and 32GB eMMC). Since it was replacing a really old PC and monitor, I had a slight problem with the DisplayPort video out, but eventually repurposed another old monitor and cable. (We won't mention my attempt to hook up a VGA cable to the serial port.)

 

The unit came with Windows 10 but there wasn't a lot of room left on the eMMC. Performance was surprisingly acceptable, at least with basic browsing and email. After a huge amount of hair-pulling, mainly around the truly horrible and temperamental Dell Wyse USB Imaging Tool, I managed to get ThinOS installed and RDP'd into the Win 10 VM on my unRAID server. Performance is fine, at least for my purposes (no gaming). I still need to tidy up a few things - like trying to get into the VM automatically and waking on USB, but so far it's looking good.

 

For anyone going down this route, the Dell documentation is horrible for newbies, or at least it seems to be (quite justifiably) aimed at administrators who are managing a herd of thin clients that need centralised control.

 

(For anyone wondering, yes, I did think about leaving the original cramped Win 10 installation and using RDP from there to get into the Win 10 VM, but that seemed a bit too weird, and prone to generating much confusion.)

[sonofdbn]

I wanted to update this in case my post sends the wrong message. If you're experienced in administering corporate remote access services, you're not going to learn anything new here.

 

I, otoh, am a complete newbie to this sort of thing. All I've ever done is RDP from my Win 10 desktop into my Windows VM that's running on unRAID. I thought that a thin client was something that would simply run RDP, which is sort of quite true. What I hadn't anticipated was the struggle to get this done smoothly. My hope was that it would operate just like a desktop PC - switch on the Wyse and it would automatically launch Windows. Also, it would sleep (seems to do this OK) and wake via USB - like a shake of the mouse or hitting some keys on the keyboard (so far, no luck). Currently I have to enter an IP address every time the machine boots and click to ignore some security warning.

 

Now, I'm in no doubt that these obstacles can be overcome; it's just that there's a lot of stuff to get my head around. I've fiddled around with setting up an FTP server, looking at Windows Server, trying to export certificates, updating BIOSes and a whole lot of other stuff. There's no shortage of documentation - possible even too much, but lots of it assumes prior knowledge.

 

I do hope to make a triumphant post one day of how I got things working, but it's not going to be soon 😉