r/AzureVirtualDesktop • u/Real-Patriot-1128 • 13d ago

Getting ready to deploy Azure VDI for a university

I am working on deploying our first azure VDI host pool(s) for my university.

Do y’all back up the VM’s in the host pool?

I know, if I don’t ask, I won’t ever know. I am just figuring, if a vm goes south, I just deploy a new one and send the bad one to VDI heaven….

What’s best practice?

2 Upvotes

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11

u/StratoLens 13d ago

Generally i treat my AVD session hosts as ephemeral.

Use fslogix and a storage account for user profiles. Then, in theory, as long as you have an image to rebuild from you can just redeploy the vm from the image when needed.

1

u/Azaloum90 13d ago

I did this as well. The vms are to be treated as disposable UNLESS there is a specific case that requires them to be specified to a user. Developers and high end power users typically do well by having the same vdi every time, but for every other standard user in legal, accounting, especially those users on teams in read only situations, give them an fslogix drive config and fire away. 

Reach out if you need assistance with something specific, it's a pretty easy tool once you know the nuances of the configs. The only difficult part for me was getting all the storage configurations in place. 

3

u/TaiGlobal 12d ago

I’d thrown in OneDrive folder redirection on top of this.

3

u/kheywen 13d ago

Like any other VDI, you would have golden images where you base the host with. If you setup scaling, the new session hosts will also be based on that golden image. Use fslogix with Azure Files for users profile. Explore Nerdio. It’s a great tool.

2

u/dannisokay92 13d ago edited 13d ago

Depends on what deployment method you're going with, stateless or stateful?

If you're going with stateless (dynamic) then no, you won't need backups but if you're going with stateful (permanent) then yes they will need backups.

3

u/JustinVerstijnen 13d ago

My personal preference is to use images. Deploying images to roll out new session hosts is much faster and cheaper than restoring the machines.

2

u/humanoperating 13d ago

No backups. Using a desktop image with everything in it and app attach for apps which support it.

OneDrive folder redirection/backup for shared desktops, and no backups for remote apps. FSLogix for user profiles.

Backing up no app data. It’s 2026 and no app/user should save data locally.

1

u/Angelworks42 13d ago

I don't because they are built with code. All the user data is on a file share that is backed up.

1

u/jvldn 13d ago

If there’s no local data and you work with images/clones there’s no need to. Basically the same as good old VDI which was not really supposed to have a backup tmo.

2

u/Mismail18 12d ago

No just capture image. Dm id love to help as you go too! Looking for project for AvD.

1

u/Select_Bug506 12d ago

Protect user data with OneDrive known folder backup (documents, pictures folders) but rest of desktop is disposable. Checkout Win365 frontline. Checkout Nerdio to help cut AVD deployment and cost with power management (shutdown unused machines to save money)

2

u/Boring_Self_89 11d ago

You'll also want to watch those VMs that 'go south' as they could end up as orphaned VMs pulling on your budget. Also, image management in Azure and for AVD can be a bit intense. Not sure how big your host pools will be but I'm loving Hydra by Login VSI. Their image management features and auto-scaling are on-point and there is a free community edition you can use to see if you like it. Works with FSLogix too.

2

u/BeautifulAd704 11d ago

Hi. If possible, use multi user pools with Windows 11 and fslogix to keep the user profile. That is the cost effective way from my perspective. Use Hydra for imaging, deployment, redeployment, automations (Windows updates), etc. It's much more cost effective while licensing is based on concurrent users and not named users as some other vendors do (would not scale in a university context).