Terminal server vs. the cloud

[Siberian]

My company (5 employees) is considering moving from our terminal server to Office 365. I'm trying to list pros and cons with both:

Terminal server:

• PRO: Nothing needs to be installed locally.
• PRO: Accessable from all kinds of units, also non-windows ones.
• PRO: Familiar interface, working with files and folders is easy.
• CON: Not cloud based, and so more expensive as it must be hosted and updated regularly (can someone confirm?)

Office 365:

• CON: Full versions of software needs to be installed locally.
• CON: Navigating and working with files and folders is cumbersome with OneDrive if not installed locally.
• PRO: Easier login-procedure than with a terminal server (especially if the terminal server has a gateway).
• PRO: Cheaper (?) and constantly kept updated.

If anyone has any comments - or corrections - please shout, as I appreciate any info I can get

 

[voyagerfan99]

So what do you do with your terminal server?

OneDrive is meh. It's basically Microsoft's version of Dropbox. You can use SharePoint Online, but even that sucks.

 

[GooSeSmith]

Can you give some more details about your office. You have 5 employees, okay what else?
- DO they work in the office or from home?
- Do they all work in the same office?
- Do they need remote access to the office and files?

Pros and Cons for TS (IMO)
- You have control over the whole server and its files. (PRO)
- If you lose internet or the office loses internet you can still get to your files and be productive. (PRO)
- doubles as a remote access point for employees working remotely where they can run programs installed on TS. (PRO)
- Employees can access files from anywhere they have an internet connection and not just Office files. (PRO)
- Maybe be more cost up front for hardware and licensing (CON)
- Manual administration of the server. (CON)

Cloud -
You can access it from anywhere with internet connection. (PRO)
Could be cheaper in the beginning but over the long haul maybe came out evenly
If your office loses internet you can't access your files. (BIG CON)

If you do not have remote users or need access to the files outside of the office I would turn that TS into a File server and host the files off it with a backup procedure in place.

If you need remote access to the files I suggest keeping the TS for remote access while creating a network share on the TS to house the files that everyone saves to.




PS - I have never been a fan of the cloud, especially for businesses. I would rather incur the additional costs and be able to physically put my hands on my data than have to rely on someone else to get me my data.

 

[Geoff]

Do you only use Terminal Services for Office products? If so, with only 5 employees why not just buy 5 local copies and map each user to a network share to store the files?

 

[Siberian]

Thanks for answering
All the employees work with the core Office products (Word, Excel, Outlook), and all the documents are stored on a file server hosted by an external company - who also takes care of the TS, and so we don't need to deal with backups, updates and such ourselves. This of course also means that we won't be able to work with either the TS or the Cloud if we loose our internet connection.

Say somebody hands you their tablet to connect to your system an work with some documents. If you have Office 365 you can log on easily, but navigating files and folders in OneDrive is way too inconvenient if you can't use the File Explorer - which also sadly requires Internet Explorer to be available. And even if you manage to locate what you want to work on, you're still left with the apps-version of the Office products. In contrast I can start the RCD-app and log on quite easily (although a bit more clunky than with Office 365), and have easy access to all files, folders, and also utilize the full versions of the Office products.

I notice that I tend to favor the TS, but it may just be that I'm used to it, that we don't have to deal with maintaining it ourselves, and that I hate how hard OneDrive is to use when not being on my laptop and being able to use the File Explorer. So what is unclear to me now is the accurate cost, but that should be easy to determine.