PernixData and Citrix Xendesktop

Citrix XenDesktop mobilizes and secures Windows desktops so users can access them from any device. This reduces desktop costs, while maximizing control of content.  However, Citrix XenDesktop is very sensitive to latency. The slightest delay (or variations in delay) can cause poor and/or inconsistent desktop performance.  This makes storage bottlenecks a big threat to the success of XenDesktop deployments.  PernixData FVP™ software eliminates storage bottlenecks, making it a perfect complement to Citrix XenDesktop. By moving storage intelligence into hosts where the XenDesktop VMs reside, FVP lowers VDI latency by 10x–even under peak loads. In addition, FVP provides a cost-effective way…
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SCCM 2012 Client install on Xendesktop Image

I was having an online discussion with a friend this week about the correct way of installing the Microsoft SCCM 2012 client on a Xendesktop (MCS) golden image.  After doing some research there are conflicting actions with some blogs saying  "install it and that's it",  whilst others saying you must perform some additional work before closing  your image. I was intrigued to find the answer to this debate.  So I decided to test this in my Xendesktop lab myself so I decided to install SCCM 2012. To cut a long story short what I did notice was that if you deployed desktops after just installing the client you would start to get issues with "Bad MIF"…
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Webcams not enumerated in Xendesktop Session

I have come across an issue recently whereby certain webcams are not enumerated correctly in a Xendesktop session. The issue appears to be with certain webcams and there lack of support for switching to the default resolution of 352 x 288. By modifying a certain key within the registry you can fixed the setting to a more common resolution ie 320 x 240. The registry key in question is the HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareCitrixHDXRealTime you will need to create the following values:- Name: DefaultWidth Type: REG_DWORD Data: 320 (decimal) Name:DefaultHeight Type: REG_DWORD Data: 240 (decimal) Once this is added you should see that…
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Multiple Launch Prevention in Citrix Receiver for Web

One of the frequently asked questions for Receiver for Web is multiple launch prevention. This is supported in Receiver for Web. When you click on an application or desktop icon to launch it, a spinner is displayed and any clicks on the same icon are ignored while the spinner is spinning. Hence user cannot unintentionally launch multiple instances of the same application/desktop. Out of the box, the time period for the spinner is fixed for three seconds. In StoreFront 2.5, this can be modified by a simple customization. Just insert the following code snippet into custom.script.js in the contrib folder under…
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XenDesktop Error: The hosting infrastructure could not be reached at the specified address

When trying to create a XenDesktop group that is using ESX 4/5 as the hosting infrastructure, or you've had to reinstall VMware vCentre you may receive the following error message: "The hosting infrastructure could not be reached at the specified address." or there is no virtual desktop activity i.e. power on/off as virtual desktops are being used when viewed in vCentre recent activity The reason for this is because VMWare, vSphere, and the ESX host are configured to redirect http traffic to https by default.  Because the default certificate on ESX does not match the name of the server, it…
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vSphere 5.1 GPU acceleration now supported on XenDesktop with HDX 3D Pro and XenApp with HDX 3D

VMware recently introduced GPU hardware acceleration support for its latest hypervisor release, vSphere 5.1. XenDesktop 5.6 FP1 and XenApp 6.5 FP1 have tested successfully with the new GPU acceleration capabilities on vSphere 5.1 and Citrix officially supports these configurations. vSphere 5.1 introduced two GPU acceleration methods: Direct graphics acceleration (vDGA) and Shared graphics acceleration (vSGA). vDGA is similar to XenServer’s GPU pass-through method where each graphics processor supports a single VM to enable high performance rendering for designers and engineers that require a dedicated GPU or for GPU sharing with multi-user XenApp VMs. vSGA is a light-weight implementation of GPU sharing designed for business graphics such as Microsoft Office…
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Wyse Thin client Daylight Saving issue

I had an interesting problem that appeared shortly after the GMT Daylight saving time changed on Sunday evening (31st March) with Wyse Xenith/Xenith2 thin client devices which are used to access a Citrix VDI environment delivering a Windows 7 Professional desktop to around 800 users. So what was the issue? The problem was reported that even though the clock went forward 1 hour the Windows 7 clients where reporting that the time hadn’t changed (gone forward) since the change.  People were not turning up to meeting on time and it caused mayhem. Taking a look at the time zone set on the Windows 7…
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Citrix Personal vDisk 5.6.10 released

What's New in Personal vDisk 5.6.10 The following issues have been fixed in this release: In some cases, upgrading personal vDisk from 5.6.0 to 5.6.5 or 5.6.7 may fail because some registry keys on the virtual desktop cannot be deleted. [#0353652] Configuration changes made by Internet Information Services (IIS) are not persisted after restarts. [#0353639] In some scenarios, if an application installed by a user on a personal vDisk registers a Managed Object Format (MOF) file, the image update process fails due to MOF registration issue 0x2000002F. [0353655] An administrator who creates a master image with a personal vDisk catalog…
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Citrix Xendesktop 4 with IE9 issues

I have recently come across an issue that became apparent when installing the latest VDA when IE9 is also installed. IE would completely freeze for no rhyme or reason or certain web sites with flash content would cause IE to become unresponsive.  After much analysis and late nights I have found that changing the following registry keys on the master image fixes the IE9 freezing/Unresponsive issues. Delete the following registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareCitrixCtxHookAppInit_DllsHDXMediaStreamForFlashiexplore Create the following registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareCitrixHDXMediaStreamForFlashServerPseudoserver Name: DisableInputSyncCallForSetObjectRects Type: REG_DWORD Data: 1 Since applying the above I have had no issues with IE9
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How to Configure Default Device Access Behavior of Receiver 3.x and XenDesktop

With Receiver 3.x client, administrators might want to configure the default behavior for device access when connecting to a Citrix XenDesktop environment. The Desktop Viewer client device restrictions by default are based on the Internet region and this behavior can be changed by creating the Client Selective Trust feature registry keys under the HKey_Local_Machine hive in the registry and by adjusting the required values. With the default value, one of the following dialog boxes appears when accessing local files, webcams, or microphones: (more…)
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