VMware® Horizon Mirage™ 4 is a layered image management solution that separates the PC into logical layers which are owned and managed by either IT or the end user. Update IT-managed layers while maintaining end-user files and personalization. Snapshots and backups of layered desktop images enable quick recovery or rollback in case of failure.
Get an overview of the VMware Horizon Mirage solution, including what it is and how it works.
Key Horizon Mirage Business Use Cases
Accelerate Windows 7 Migrations
A manual Windows 7 migration can often take between 4 to 6 hours per PC. Using a data and settings migration tool can cut the time down to 2-3 hours per PC and allow for multiple machines to be migrated concurrently. However, the process still consumes IT resources to monitor and oversee the process and removes the user from his or her PC the entire time. With VMware Horizon Mirage, a single technician can concurrently handle 100 or more migrations per day from the central management console. IT does not have to touch the PC and the user downtime is typically only 30 minutes.
Mirage offers two options to fit the most common approaches to Windows 7 Migrations: upgrade an existing Windows XP device in-place to Windows 7, or migrate a user’s profile and files from their previous Windows XP device to new Windows 7 hardware (when leveraging a hardware refresh cycle to assist with the Windows 7 Migration).
In addition to that, Mirage takes a full system snapshot of the Windows XP system before the migration is attempted, so if something goes wrong you can quickly restore the end user to their previous system.
With these enhancements to the Windows 7 migration project a 5,000 person organization could easily save $600,000 in IT time and over $1,000,000 in user productivity by accelerating their Windows 7 migration with Mirage.
Simplified PC Back Up and Desktop Recovery
We have all heard the horror stories about how long it takes to get end users back to productivity after a PC failure. Whether it's re-imaging a desktop, replacing a broken hard drive, replacing a lost or damaged PC, or reverting a malfunctioning PC to a previously working snapshot, it always comes back to restoring the desktop. VMware Horizon Mirage takes snapshots of an entire PC including OS, applications, files and personalization then regularly synchronizes any changes. This makes restoring simple because Mirage restores an exact image of the user’s old PC to any replacement PC.
Easily Manage Remote and Branch Offices PCs with No New Infrastructure
Mirage was designed to excel over the WAN by leveraging deduplication both in storage and during network transfers. This gives IT a powerful new tool to manage the laptops and desktops at remote offices, for home workers, or for road warriors. Mirage centralizes exact copies of these Windows PCs over the WAN and into the data center. This allows IT to centrally manage image deployment, updates, patches, migrations, backup and recovery.
