back to article Citrix finds new use for virtualization: Avoiding PC price hikes caused by tariffs

Citrix has found a new use for virtualization: Avoiding tariffs. “In 2025, new US tariffs have pushed IT hardware prices into uncharted territory,” Vice President of Product Philipp Benkler wrote in a Tuesday post that warns “The April 2025 tariffs are already driving cost hikes, and experts suggest further increases could …

  1. Geoff Johnson

    Does it have to be a hosted desktop?

    Can the Windows 11 hardware requirements be met by a VM running on a non-compliant host? If so, is there a thin virtualization host OS that could be used to allow windows 11 on non-compliant hardware?

    1. Ross Luker

      Re: Does it have to be a hosted desktop?

      No, at least not with VMware and Citrix. The host has to be win11 compliant or the VM won't work

      1. katrinab Silver badge
        Meh

        Re: Does it have to be a hosted desktop?

        VMWare on MacOS certainly works.

        1. O RLY

          Re: Does it have to be a hosted desktop?

          Yes, VMware Fusion 13.x allows a vTPM as virtual hardware for a guest. Win 11 runs great on Fusion.

          For host hardware, Fusion 13 needs to be able to run on MacOS 12 or later. The list of Macs that support 12 are here:

          https://support.apple.com/en-us/103260

    2. williamyf Bronze badge

      Re: Does it have to be a hosted desktop?

      Yes and no. That's why Microsoft gives you free 3 years of Win10 ESU if you buy their virtual desktops.

      you can access your VDIs from supported linux, or supported chromeOS. Or even run a virtual win11 desktop on a type 1 hypervisor (if your hardware can handleit).

      the hardware does not have to be win11 compliant, but the type 1 hypervisor, or os (+ type 2 hypervisor) must be actively supported on said hardware in order to run or access Virtual Win11

    3. ChrisElvidge Silver badge

      Re: Does it have to be a hosted desktop?

      It certainly can on my Dell E7270. VBox provides 2 processors/4Gb RAM (my limits) and TPM v2. Windows 11 installed easily - but I still don't like it.

      1. mickaroo

        Re: Does it have to be a hosted desktop?

        Same expedience here…

        My lightly aged ThinkPad sans TPM2.0 happily runs Win11 in a Virtualbox VM.

        My very aged Dell, however, doesn’t meet the CPU requirement, even with a VM.

  2. JamesTGrant Silver badge

    ‘Boot storms’ stopped reading there - total nonsense.

    1. ZenaB

      It's not nonsense, it's just a dramatic name for what happens when you overload your network and/or SAN by a (say) callcenter shift change at X o clock and 100+ VMs have to boot

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Boot storm

        for what happens when you overload your network and/or SAN by a (say) callcenter shift change at X o clock and 100+ VMs have to boot

        Back in the day when Beowulf clusters were new kids on the block I recall a network booting solution using ipv4 multicast which addressed this problem. Booting clients joined a multicast group and all sucked up the same UDP packets. The protocol's details must have been fiendishly clever.

        I don't remember its name or whether it just just replaced the usually very slow pxe tftp of the kernel and initial ram disk from the boot server or was more involved than that. Or whether it was FOSS or proprietary.

    2. that one in the corner Silver badge

      Clearly a man who did not watch "Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl" at Christmas.

    3. williamyf Bronze badge

      The term Boot strorms exist since thedays when you booted an hdd less ms-dos pc and loged to netware for your ms-dos / windows 3.1 needs. Typical of cash strapped university labs

      flapping is another quoloquial term used by us nw engineers. Noadays frequently causedby stp (stp network flapping)

      There are many more quoloquial terms like this

      1. agurney

        Upvoted for creating a new word "quoloquial" .. I've added it to my lexicon :)

        1. An_Old_Dog Silver badge

          New Word

          So would talking about the status quo be a "quoloquialism"?

        2. Roj Blake Silver badge

          It's a perfectly cromulent word.

        3. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Quoloquial

          Could derive a meaning "where spoken" from quo + loquial (loquor, loqui, locutus sum) which unexpectedly would make perfect sense in the context.

        4. williamyf Bronze badge

          Thank you for the upvote.

          If you were to say it in spanish (my mother tongue) it would be "Coloquial" and "coloquialismo" respectively. I wrote that comment on my phone, and could not be arsed to google the propper english spelling.

          Sorry memory failed.

  3. Pascal Monett Silver badge

    Billionnairs open working for billionnairs

    At last the semblance of respecting rules and democracy has been dropped.

    DOGE exists for one thing : to ensure the companies of the billionnairs who have taken part in this sham are allowed to ensure that their profits are secure.

    We've known for years that those with money will always have the means to bend things in their favor. Relations, dinners, galas, all those occasions where the cigar-smoking elite agree that the peons are not concerned by their "little" arrangements.

    Now, there is a government agency that is specifically meant to enshrine those little arrangements with the force of law.

    How convenient.

    1. CowHorseFrog Silver badge

      Re: Billionnairs open working for billionnairs

      Im surprised DOGE hasnt suggested an amnesty so americans can avoid tax and bring back earnings from overseas.

  4. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

    "a Linux-based OS that allows a PC to boot straight into a hosted virtual desktop"

    On what is the virtual desktop hosted? It's going to be real H/W so unless it's already onshore that's going to be tariffed or in Canada. Why not cut out stick with the middle man and run the desktop directly on Linux?

  5. Junglist

    Our citrix license renewal was quoted at triple the cost of our last one. No thanks.

  6. williamyf Bronze badge

    Running win11 as a VM or VDI, on non Win11 capable HW is perfectly valid. As long as the whole package is under active support.

    examples iclude ms themselves, where, if you use win10 on a non-win-11 compliant HW to access a cludy win11 machine, they give you 3 years of ESU for free.

    ditto for accessing Win11 VDIs from macos or(supported *) linux or chromeos.

    Unsupported chromeos (like flexos) not allowed, and obscure linux distros with active patching, while allowed, would be acompliance nightmare.

    dito for runninng win11 locally on atype 1 or type2 hypervisor. As long asthe underlyig HW+SW combo is supported and certified by everyone imvolved, you can run 1Win11 with emulated "whatever you need" most likely 7th gen intel with no TPM2

    1. captain veg Silver badge

      Mate, there seems to be something wrong with your Shift and space keys. Among others. Suggest a new keyboard.

      -A.

      1. williamyf Bronze badge

        Thanks for the heads-up mate.

        Difficult to repair Blackberry Keyone keyboard. Requested a spare, got lost in the mail. And even if I had it, will not replace until something more critical than space get broken.

        I already requested a Clicks for RAZR+ 20224 (and the corresponding phone), let's see how that goes...

        This post, OTOH, was written on my desktop, the Keys spacing is off by "just that much" (and layout is weird as it is a 60%), so I hit the wrong key from time to time, but better than the KeyOne.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Citrix is done

    I have supported Citrix products since Metaframe on NT4 TS edition & work at a long term Citrix partner supporting SMBs.

    Ever since the morph into Cloud Software Group, they have basically done a Broadcom. Targeted large companies and ignored everybody else, screwing over partners in the process. They have priced themselves out of almost all the companies we work with. It is a real shame. I still really like their products, but almost all our clients are dropping them when they get the license renewal quotes. You can no longer buy individual products, you have to get a subscription for the entire product set at eye watering prices. At one point during the transition you couldn't even buy licenses which dropped one of our customers into a hole when their existing subscription expired and they couldn't renew.

    Couple this with the axing of almost all the support & pre-sales people we had great relationships with. Their support now is abysmal.

    We have used Citrix internally ever since our company started, but even we have had to drop them with the partner licensing changes.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Citrix is done

      Citrix stopped doing things 15 years ago. It basically became uninteresting when the world switched to web browsers rather than local apps...

      1. Aitor 1

        Re: Citrix is done

        In good part due to the cost of citrix AND windows licenses. Had it been cheap, VDIs would be the normal thing to have in offices and homes these days, along portable devices.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Citrix is done

        Odd, because I am still using it to support multiple critical local client/server apps at numerous clients. And any that do move away from Citrix due to Citrix licensing becoming unobtainium are mainly switching to straight RDP, but still using local apps. Not everything has a web alternative and not all data can be allowed outside of your own datacentre for legal reasons.

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