• Dell Validated System for Virtualization delivers on the promise of service-defined infrastructure, resulting in the industry’s most flexible converged system to-date¹
• Dell Solutions for VMware Virtual SAN Ready Nodes for desktop and application virtualization delivers a simple, elastic and efficient hyperconverged solution optimised for virtual machines
• Support for VMware Blast Extreme remote protocol for Dell Wyse Windows-based thin clients for increased flexibility and management
• Dell Financial Services named preferred financing partner for VMware

At VMworld® 2016, Dell today ushered in the next phase of the multi-billion dollar converged systems market with the introduction of the Dell Validated System for Virtualization, the industry’s most flexible converged system to-date.¹ Dell also announced new client virtualization solutions with enhanced performance for demanding power users and VMware has selected Dell Financial Services as its preferred financing partner.

“For more than a decade, Dell and VMware have closely collaborated to help customers achieve greater efficiencies from their data centers and simplify IT operations,” said Jim Ganthier, vice president and general manager, Dell Engineered Systems, HPC and Cloud. “With today’s announcements, we continue to demonstrate how our innovations can enable customers of all sizes to accelerate their journey to hyperconvergence, convergence, and the cloud.”

Next generation converged systems for virtualized environments

A growing number of organisations are attracted to the benefits of converged systems, which combine compute, storage and networking components for simply deployed and managed systems. However, the majority have not yet realised their goals because they demand a higher degree of flexibility and simplicity that moves beyond rigid hardware-defined converged offerings. Dell’s service-defined infrastructure approach uniquely addresses these challenges and the need for improved infrastructure agility and simplified systems management. In support of this approach, Dell today unveiled:

• The new Dell Validated System for Virtualization, allowing customers of all sizes to accelerate their journey towards converged infrastructure. Enabled through robust automation and extensive testing and validation, it is the most flexible converged system in the industry.¹ The system incorporates a wide range of form-factors, technology choices and deployment options, right-sized to fit each customer’s needs. A fully validated system can be configured, quoted and ordered in minutes, while automated lifecycle management tools allow customers to easily deploy, scale, and update the system.
• A fully customisable, modular, self-service hybrid VMware cloud, as a proof of concept for customers moving beyond virtualization to cloud. The Dell Validated System for Virtualization, with the addition of the VMware vRealize® Suite, allows efficient delivery of services and enables an organisation to gain greater control of IT resources. The combination of VMware vRealize and Dell’s automated provisioning across physical and virtual environments makes it easier for customers to plan and operate their own cloud.

New powerful client virtualization solutions for end-user computing

Dell is expanding its client virtualization solutions for VMware to provide customers with the manageability, flexibility and performance they require in their virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) environments. These include:

• The Dell Solutions for VMware Virtual SAN™ Ready Nodes, a hyperconverged solution for desktop and application virtualization that delivers simple, elastic and efficient infrastructure optimised for virtual desktops. Deployment options range from a reference architecture to a fully configured VMware Virtual SAN appliance that’s been certified by VMware. Configuration options include discrete GPU graphics for uncompromising density and productivity as well as storage options including hybrid storage (HDD & SDD) or an all-flash SSD configuration for those who require supreme performance. The solutions come with a choice of virtualization software broker options: VMware Horizon® 7 or VMware Horizon™ Air Hybrid-Mode. VMware Horizon Air Hybrid-Mode is the first management plane to manage virtual desktops from the cloud, and Dell is the first major vendor to ship this solution today, including a comprehensive reference architecture.
• Support for VMware Blast Extreme™ remote display protocol, which will be incorporated on Dell Windows Embedded thin clients running VMware Horizon 7 with Horizon Client 4.0. This enables Horizon end users to access their virtual desktops via a web browser or a full-featured VMware Horizon client for an even richer graphical experience, providing greater flexibility and management options in their virtual workspace environments.
• The next-generation of the Dell Precision Appliance for Wyse, which offers a new configuration based on the Dell PowerEdge R730 server and the NVIDIA Tesla M60 GRID 2.0 graphics card for demanding power users from a variety of organisations including the oil and gas industry or engineering and construction firms. This solution offers customers higher user density with up to 32 users per appliance.

Dell is introducing two new security solutions to provide organisations with a superior layer of advanced threat protection to an already secure computing environment, Dell Data Protection | Threat Defense for Windows Embedded (WES) thin clients and Dell Data Protection | Endpoint Security Suite Enterprise for persistent virtual machines. These solutions provide organisations with advanced threat protection powered by Cylance that spans from the endpoint (including thin clients, traditional PCs and even Mac OS systems) to the data center, ensuring that all facets of an organisation’s Windows-based VDI environment are protected.

“Organisations are looking to Dell to provide them with true end-to-end client virtualization solutions that are easy to plan, deploy and run – and take the guess work out of VDI,” said Steve Lalla, vice president and general manager, Dell Commercial Client Software & Solutions. “The Dell VDI Solutions for VMware Virtual SAN Ready Nodes with Horizon and support for Blast Extreme remote protocol on Windows thin clients gives our customers solutions that are tailored for their environment, as well as high performance and manageability.”

Dell Financial Services named the Preferred Financing Partner for VMware 

Dell announced that Dell Financial Services (DFS) has been selected as VMware’s preferred financing partner, offering flexible payment plans for VMware solutions. This new partnership offers VMware customers and channel partners access to all of DFS’ traditional financing options, in addition to a variety of flexible solutions to help them finance their virtualized environments.