If your credit union is like most others, nearly every employeeworkstation is fitted with a personal computer. These PCs, whileseemingly necessary, are expensive to acquire, maintain andupgrade. And when one considers that the typical smartphone is atleast 1,000 times more powerful than the computer that put Apollo11 on the moon, one must wonder whether credit union employees needa PC's full computing power to type letters, send emails andperform core platform transactions.

But what's the alternative?

Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI), or desktop virtualization,replaces those expensive PCs with low-cost, thin-client terminals.This consists of a monitor, mouse, keyboard — and just enoughsoftware to run those three components. In a VDI environment, allprocessing that would normally be performed on a PC is insteadcarried out on a centralized server. The employee has the same userexperience as on a PC. And thanks to dramatic recent improvementsin internal network bandwidth, VDI is a viable option for creditunions looking to cut costs and streamline operations.

Why VDI?

Your credit union can save a lot of money by getting rid ofexpensive PCs, but that's just one of VDI's many benefits. Desktopvirtualization is also valuable in disaster recovery. Suppose youlose a branch in a tornado. With a PC setup, every scrap ofinformation in that branch would be lost. But with VDI, all data isstored on centralized servers. Your employees can quickly be up andrunning at a hot site or other location with no disruption ofoperations. Their customized operating environment is availablefrom virtually anywhere.

Desktop virtualization is much more secure. Employee data theftis still the most common type of fraud in financial institutions,but that's not an issue in a VDI environment. Since no data can bestored on the thin-client terminal, no data can be stolenfrom the thin-client terminal. Likewise, the thin-client terminalhas no means to store or execute malware. Finally, if someone stolea thin-client terminal – which no knowledgeable thief would– theywill have obtained absolutely no useful credit union data.

If you're thinking about moving your core processing and otherIT infrastructure to the cloud, VDI is a good fit.

Things to consider before moving to VDI

Desktop virtualization was designed for mainstream users, somost common business software will run fine in a VDI environment.The one piece of specialized software to which you must payparticular attention is your core processing system. Depending onthat platform's age and architecture, you may need to addressunique issues before you can virtualize your employees' desktops.If you're seriously considering desktop virtualization, makes sureyou talk with your core processor before you make anydecisions.

Is desktop virtualization for every credit union? Probably not —but it's certainly worth exploring.