Understanding the HDI
Your most demanding workloads shouldn’t have to wait on anyone else’s machine. That’s the reality shared virtual desktops have imposed on the people who actually drive results: the traders, quants and analysts whose tools slow down, stutter or simply refuse to keep pace when everything is fighting for the same underlying hardware. Options’ Hosted Desktop Infrastructure (HDI) changes that by giving those users their own dedicated 16-core processor, high-capacity memory and NVIDIA GPU, a full desktop in an Options data centre, not a slice of a shared host. Across the industry, the shift toward dedicated, high-performance compute for power users is well established; the question is no longer whether this is the right direction for firms that depend on speed, but whether your own users are still being held back by the compromise.
A HDI is a physical machine in one of our data centres, assigned to one user. Not a virtual machine on a shared host, not a slice of a larger server: a dedicated chassis with its own processor, memory and GPU, running a desktop operating system, racked in an Options facility and connected to the Options network. The user’s applications, files and compute all live on that machine; only the display travels to wherever the user is sitting.
We own and operate this infrastructure end-end. The desktop runs on Options hardware in our data centres, behind the same physical safeguards, engineering and 24/7 global support that underpin everything else we host. The desktop itself is the hardware, and the hardware is the product.
Users reach their desktop through a control plane. Today that is via our Horizon platform or Citrix; however we are now successfully adding Microsoft’s AVD Hybrid, which has just reached general availability, as our new preferred control plane. In every case the control plane handles authentication, brokering and policy. The session, the applications and the data stay on Options metal.
Control plane of your choice, the hardware is ours to manage
The new Microsoft option deserves a word of explanation, because the name is misleading. There is no fully on-premises Azure Virtual Desktop: the broker, gateway and diagnostics live in Microsoft’s cloud no matter what you do. “Hybrid” means the session hosts run on infrastructure like ours, registered via Azure Arc, while the control plane stays in Azure. For users, the front door is the Windows App on Windows, macOS, iOS, Android or a browser. Sign in once, and the desktop can span multi-monitor 4K displays.
Two details from our testing stood out:
– No Active Directory required. Hybrid session hosts did not need to be joined to a traditional AD domain; Microsoft Entra join was sufficient, removing a piece of legacy plumbing for firms modernising their identity stack.
– Voice and video work properly. Teams and Zoom clients run in optimised mode on the HDI, meaning voice and video processing is offloaded to the user’s device rather than handled by the session host.
None of these changes where the workload runs. Whether the control plane is Horizon, Citrix or Microsoft’s, the compute stays in Options facilities, on machines we racked, on a network we operate.
“Being the first financial sector provider to achieve Microsoft Solutions Partner accreditation for Private Cloud is what makes launches like AVD Hybrid so natural for us. Now that it’s reached general availability, we’re able to bring it to new and existing customers straight away.”
Jason Davidson, VP, Product Management, Cloud Solutions
How we got here
HDI began when it became clear that shared VDI was not meeting the requirements of users running heavy GPU workloads. We benchmarked against comparable hardware already in production at client sites, purchased the equipment, and proved it on a live client estate. A second client environment then came to us with the same requirement, and that pattern has repeated since: firms come to us when their power users outgrow shared infrastructure.
Why dedicated beats shared
Traditionally, virtual desktops share hosts, and shared infrastructure means noisy neighbours. HDI allocates each user a dedicated 16-core processor, high-capacity memory and NVIDIA GPU resources. Bloomberg Terminal, MATLAB, large Excel models and real-time analytics get consistent performance because the compute underneath them is not a timeshare. Workloads that historically struggled in shared cloud desktops behave like they do on a physical workstation, because they are running on one.
Security and compliance
All compute is hosted within Options’ data centres, with physical safeguards, centralised logging and automated compliance monitoring as standard. Data stays centralised in facilities you can point to on a map; access comes to it from any location or device, backed by 24/7 global support.
The bottom line
Struggling to run your day-to-day algorithms, Excel macros or Bloomberg Terminal on your device? That is exactly what HDI is built for: dedicated GPU-accelerated hosts on Options hardware, in Options data centres, under Options operations, with the Windows App as the front door and a choice of control planes on top. And because the desktop lives in the data centre rather than on the device, it doubles as business continuity: users can reach the same desktop, applications and data from anywhere, on any device, at short notice. Talk to our team about putting your power users on hardware that can keep up with them.