Category Archives: Cloud PC

Windows 365 App Now Available

Too cool!  The Windows 365 app — now available in the MS Store — is out. Search on either “Windows 365” or “Windows 365 Preview” and it should come right up. The app’s Store page appears as the lead-in graphic for this story, in fact.

With Windows 365 App Now Available, What Else Is Needed?

Good question! I immediately downloaded and installed the app. Upon running same, I learned that a valid Windows 365 subscription is required so that the app can connect and interact with a Cloud PC instance. Because I lack such a subscription, here’s what I got from the cloud when I logged into my AD tenant account:

Windows 365 App Now Available.noacct

Drat! I was afraid that Preview didn’t confer temporary or evaluation access. I was right, alas…

Looking at Windows 365 Business Plans for SMBs, I see they cost from US$31 to 61 per month. Ouch! That’s costish, for something I don’t really need, but would love to play with.

Visiting the MS Evaluation Center, nowhere do I see Cloud PC among its various offerings. I guess that makes sense: it doesn’t cost MS anything more than storage space to provide ISOs for download. Hosting (extra) cloud PCs for evaluation means they bear more or less the same costs that the real thing imposes, with none of the revenue generating benefits.

Ifs and Buts for Cloud PC, Windows 365 App

Too bad! I’ve wanted to give the Cloud PC thing a try since it was first announced in 2018-2019. Right now, it seems like there’s no way to try it out without buying it. And with costs at US$372 per year and up, that means tangible costs. I’ll have to think about this, to see if I want to “pay to play.”

But those who already have Windows 365 subscriptions can simply download the app. When they log into an AD tenant with associated Cloud PC instances, the app should take it from there…

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Appreciating Apple CarPlay

Hello there! We’re just back from a combination trip to the Northeast. On August 25, we flew to Boston with son Gregory to move him into Emerson College. On August 31, we took an Uber to the Boston Logan rental car pickup to head north to Maine. This latter half of the trip has me appreciating Apple CarPlay greatly and enthusiastically.

Why I Am Appreciating Apple CarPlay

I’ve owned and used various in-car GPS systems for years, including those available in Mercedes, Volvo, and Toyota models. Each one is a little different. Each one has its decided UI quirks and foibles. That leads me to my number one source of CarPlay gratitude: a single, consistent and pretty intuitive UI for navigation via Google Maps. It’s great!

Item number two may be just as important. I can remember paying $300 to $500 to access GPS capability in several cars. CarPlay comes as a standard (no added cost) feature on many cars these days. That’s a nice savings, in addition to the benefits of a familiar and standard UI.

My third source of gratitude is a YMMV thing, or it may be a matter of personal preference. I find the voice instructions in Google Maps to be easier to understand and follow than those in the Mercedes GPS (that’s the built-in one I know best thanks to using it in 3 cars over the last 10 years or so).

When driving in unfamiliar places, that’s a benefit that’s hard to overstate. I’ve learned to turn around or re-route to rectify my mistakes while driving. But gosh! I’d rather not have to rectify mistakes that result from misunderstanding voice instructions. Google Maps works better for me in that regard.

All My Future Vehicles Will Have CarPlay

Because we’re an iPhone family (wife, son and myself all have 13 models right now), it makes sense to integrate phone and vehicle. There are lots of other benefits, too — including music, phone calls and SMS messages, the Waze app, and more. Frankly, I just can’t see paying extra for a feature from a carmaker that doesn’t work as well for me as the iPhone running Google maps (or some other equivalent). One more thing: here’s an interesting MakeUseOf story that explains the best of the CarPlay apps, and what new stuff lies ahead in this category. Check it out!

‘Nuff said!

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Remote Desktop App Holds Cloud PC Keys

OK, then. I’ve finally had a chance to read and learn a bit more about Microsoft’s Cloud PC offering. Indeed, it’s now finally available for subscription and use. I did not luck out and land a free trial (the offer was swamped beyond capacity within minutes of opening). Over at ZDNet, however, Ed Bott ponied up for a subscription. He reports on his experiences working with the Windows 365 Service, built around Cloud PC. His “Hands-on” story appeared yesterday and includes lots of useful info. Not least amongst its nuggets of wisdom and observation is the notion that the Remote Desktop App holds Cloud PC keys.

Why Say: Remote Desktop App Holds Cloud PC Keys?

Bott describes the “Open in Browser” button for Cloud PC as  “the simplest way to begin working with” its capabilities. His story shows useful screenshots and example. In fact, it’s well worth reading from end to end.

In that story, Bott further opines as follows:

“The browser is fine for casual connections, but you’ll have a better experience using Microsoft’s Remote Desktop client, which is available for download from a separate page on the Windows 365 dashboard. Apps are available for Windows, Mac, iOS, and Android.”

I wrote a story for ComputerWorld earlier this year called “Windows 10’s Remote Desktop options explained.” Its conclusion starts with the heading “The future of Remote Desktop.” In that section I put forward the guess that “URDC [the store app for Remote Desktop depicted as the lead graphic here] and MSRDC [an enterprise version of the same tool] will become much more important and capable clients than they are right now.” I also expressed the idea that this might spell the waning days for the old Remote Desktop application (mstsc.exe). I believe Mr. Bott’s story just proved me right, to my great relief.

What Remote Desktop Brings to Cloud PC

In short, it makes interacting with Cloud PC just like any other remote PC session. It permits full-screen (and even all displays in multi-monitor set-ups) operation and works just like desktop access over the network. Of course, that’s what it is, so this is no surprise.

What is surprising is what Bott report about Cloud PC performance. Not much lag, with only “momentary display glitches” for graphics-heavy apps, and “general productivity apps like Office perform just fine.” His only compatibility issue came when trying to connect to a Gmail account with Cloud PC (the server didn’t accept Outlook authentication dialog boxes, but Bott did access the account using the built-in Mail app and via MS Edge).

Bott’s economic analysis of Cloud PC is also interesting. At a minimum of US$20 per month (single vCPU, 2 GB RAM, 64 GB storage) — useful for what he describes as “only the most lightweight tasks” — it offers no significant value-add for home or small business users. For larger businesses, though, I think he observes correctly that the simplicity of Cloud PC (operable from any Internet-attached device including PCs, tablets and smartphones) could appeal to and might even cost less than deploying a managed and secured company-owned PC to employees at home (and other remote locations). It also lets remote users work from familiar local platforms already to hand and might even boost productivity.

So far, I very much like what I’m seeing and reading about Cloud PC. But that’s not the same as trying it out for oneself.

From Reading About to Hands-On

Next, my goal is to figure out how to get involved with Cloud PC myself. I’ve already floated the question with the Windows Insider MVP program if they can’t make  such subscriptions available as part of the award benefit.

But just because I think they should, doesn’t mean they will. In that case, I’ll have to carefully examine the family exchequer to see if it can float the $492 a 1-year subscription for a suitably equipped Cloud PC would cost. By hook or by crook, though, I want in! Stay tuned: I’ll keep you posted…

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