● The data center also hosts a Cisco WAAS Central Manager, which is used to manage the Cisco WAAS
solution from a central point.
● The branch-office Cisco WAAS Appliance also provides print services locally to the branch-office users by
running Microsoft Windows Print Services on the appliance.
● Cisco WAAS Mobile Software on mobile-worker laptop computers reduces the effects on the WAN through a
combination of TFO, compression, and DRE. The Cisco WAAS Mobile headend device and the Cisco
Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) VPN device are located in the data center.
Testing Scenarios
This document presents solution benefits for remote users accessing their Microsoft Windows 7 VDI desktops in the
data center.
The tests measured performance improvement (response time) and WAN bandwidth optimization (WAN data
reduction) when branch-office and mobile users are running standard office productivity tasks on the VDI desktops,
accessing video using MMR, and printing documents in the branch office.
Table 1 summarizes the activities and WAN bandwidth conditions.
Table 1. VDI Test Activity Details
User
Type
Activity Display Protocol WAN Condition
Bandwidth Round Trip Packet Loss
Branch office Log in and use email, web, and Microsoft Word and PowerPoint (10 users)
RDP 7.0 1.544 Mbps 80 ms 0.1%
Access video using MMR
Print jobs in the branch office
Log in and use email, web, and Microsoft Word and PowerPoint (2 users)
*
RDP7.1 with Microsoft RemoteFX*
(beta code)
10 Mbps 80 ms 0.1%
Mobile Log in and use email, web, and Microsoft Word and PowerPoint
RDP 7.0 768 kbps 80ms 1.0%
Access video using MMR
Log in and use email, web, and Microsoft Word and PowerPoint
RDP7.1 with Microsoft RemoteFX*
(beta code)
1.5 Mbps 80ms 1.0%
* Note: Testing on RDP 7.1 with Microsoft RemoteFX is currently in progress. Preliminary test results based on two-user testing for RDP 7.1 with Microsoft RemoteFX are presented in this document. Testing results with more users will be made available after the RDP 7.1 with Microsoft RemoteFX testing is complete.
Solution Benefits
Performance Acceleration for Microsoft Windows 7 Display
The combined solution accelerates the performance of all applications accessed through Microsoft Windows Server
2008 R2 RDS such as Microsoft Exchange for email and calendaring, Microsoft Office for the use and sharing of
Microsoft PowerPoint presentations and Microsoft Word documents, and Microsoft Internet Explorer 9 for browsing
enterprise websites.
● Cisco WAAS accelerates VDI display performance by up to 44 percent (Figure 3) under light WAN use
conditions.
● Cisco WAAS accelerates VDI display performance by up to 61 percent (Figure 4) under heavy WAN use
conditions. Users experience response times that are more than twice as fast with Cisco WAAS. The morning
and peak office work hours are the typical times when WAN links near congestion.
● Cisco WAAS performance benefits under both light and heavy WAN use conditions are similar, demonstrating
that Cisco WAAS can provide consistent performance acceleration even as WAN link use increases due to
increasing number of users.
● Cisco WAAS offers superior subjective user experiences such as faster menu drawing, Microsoft PowerPoint
transitions, and screen updates under WAN use conditions.
Figure 3. Cisco WAAS Performance Acceleration under Light WAN Utilization
Figure 4. Cisco WAAS Performance Acceleration with Heavy WAN Use
Bandwidth Optimization for Microsoft Windows 7 RDP 7.0 with Microsoft RemoteFX
Cisco WAAS considerably helps save expensive WAN costs by reducing VDI WAN bandwidth consumption for
desktop display
● Cisco WAAS reduces bandwidth use by up to 55 percent for RDP 7.0 display (Figure 5).
● Cisco WAAS reduces bandwidth use by up to 53 percent for Microsoft RemoteFX* display (Figure 6).
● Cisco WAAS Mobile reduces bandwidth by up to 67 percent for RDP 7.0 display (Figure 7).
● Cisco WAAS Mobile reduces bandwidth by up to 52 percent for Microsoft RemoteFX* display (Figure 8).
As the number of users in the branch office increases, the compression offered by Cisco WAAS improves as the DRE
function finds repeatable display patterns across multiple user sessions and optimizes them.
Also, in actual production networks, the DRE disk cache builds up over several days and contains a much longer
cache history, which can result in higher levels of compression in production deployments than the levels typically
found in lab testing.
* Note: Testing on RDP 7.1 with Microsoft RemoteFX is currently in progress. Preliminary test results based on two-user testing for RDP 7.1 with Microsoft RemoteFX are presented in this document. Testing results with more users will be made available after the RDP 7.1 with Microsoft RemoteFX testing is complete.
