Old Desktops Minus Hammer

Pratima H

INDIA: Odd and Offended. That’s how a poor handkerchief certainly feels in new-generation wardrobes.

H.a.n.d.k.e.r.c.h.i.e.f, yes that poor scrap of fabric if we happen to recall at all. The same sartorial item of pride and necessity that assisted us in good old days and was almost inseparable from other chattel.

But time’s cruel hands frazzled that accessory too and now it stands orphaned, slouched and desperately looking for a small corner to be parked daintily in. But then, a black-tie event has no place for tatters.

Neither in high-heeled aristocracy-dappled ballrooms, nor in the new swish-set hierarchy of technology that shimmers with red-carpet strut of tablets, smartphones, wearables, and Le Tout BYOD.

Lost in this new dazzle are old machines, not as much exhausted by irrelevance as knackered by quick displacement and abrupt disruption that new wheels have brought in unannounced.

Desktops are turning into jalopies and unlike handkerchiefs, they did not get too much time to catch a breath or idea about possible resurrection or salvage pockets.

The last three to four years bear a hint at the consistent beating that this form factor has taken. Once an enviable machine to reckon with, and an undeniable ruler in the post-mainframe era, PC has now surprisingly taken a pillion seat in the world of IT.

With shrinking market demand, and changing lifecycles, desktops may soon find themselves questioning their very existence too.

A recent tab shows how worldwide PC shipments posted a decline and not chugging forth beyond 73.7 million units in the third quarter of 2015. Gartner, Inc. also captured here that Desktop PCs keep showing weakness with a high-single-digit decline and not even Windows 10 launch could arrest the shipment decline too much for the quarter.

IDC noted a 11.8 pc dip in y-o-y terms to 66.1 million PCs shipped in Q2,2015

As to Asia/Pacific, the dip in desk-based PC shipments was to the tune of 4.9 per cent while mobile PC shipments rose 2.2 per cent in the same third quarter.

It’s not just about turning weary in terms of market growth but desktops have also been getting increasingly wary with the sharp icy winds of obsolescence that are all around.

Frank Noon, Vice President Worldwide at VXL Instruments, a player in the manufacturing of thin, zero and cloud client devices assesses the malaise of hidden obsolescence gaining gravity in technology space.

“Newer applications don’t work on older technology, and getting these technologies up to date is difficult and usually more expensive, if not done on a regular basis.”

And this unrelenting kind of obsolescence is not just about style and new-fangled stuff that consumerisation or BYOD pushes in. This is as much about barebones and functionality that new generation products seem to be promising.

Vishal Dhupar, Managing Director, South Asia, NVIDIA lets on that both style and muscle are impacting adoption of new forms. “In fact consumer needs are always higher than what corresponding technologies can deliver so for technology it is always a game of catching up with what the user really needs. As a company that is about visual computing, graphics and virtual reality, we have to think about what a gamer or an artist actually needs and not just what existing technology is capable of.”

He compares the age of technology entities to the life of a banana on a shelf. Lifecycles for technology products have always been short, there is nothing novel about it, he argues. “The more you apply a technology, the better insight you get and the more you need it. So a CIO must be agile to adapt and adopt as per users. It’s all about what the end user would find good.”

Think of age, and Girish Gupta- Director - Technical services, Citrix, reminds us of the subjective ways in which the same is interpreted at different levels. In India, the age of a product is all about how much it can be stretched. “Traditional desktop refresh cycles globally may be three to four years, but here, in India, they tend to be about five years. We are, by nature, a cost-conscious culture and desktops too, fall in that bracket.”

For Anwar Shirpurwala, Executive Director, MAIT, the sentiment resonates. “As a country, we don’t like wasting.”

So, that should mean that an old machine here is not really written off until there is any tiny room of reloading it for alternative uses.

Like?

Valet Parking

If you can’t use it, give it to someone who can still put it to some use. This someone can be a recycler or a student or a NGO worker in case of desktops.

There’s ample argument and reason for considering such skating-board garages for old wheels. As per electronicstakeback Coalition, 81 per cent of a desktop computer’s energy use goes into making it and not using it. Now resource-intensive manufacturing of devices like desktops is something that does call attention to the environmental burden and responsibility that comes upon users who buy them.

Looking at a United Nations study also brings to fore the question that if a reported 41.8 million tons of electronic waste was discarded in 2014, what happened to the 90 percent that is guessed to have been illegally traded, exported or dumped?

Indian industry started the BigBridge hardware donation program in April 2009 and through Nasscom Foundation, NGOs can access to refurbished computers donated by IT companies looking for responsibly managing their e-waste.

Being a Good Samaritan can also be about putting the battered-down equipment to some save-what-you-can route. It has been estimated (as per Institute of Local Self Reliance) that in comparison to a disposal route, computer reuse can spur 296 more jobs per for every 10,000 tons of material disposed on an annual basis.

Donating such old machines to schools or NGO programmes is always an ideal way as industry experts chime in as well.

Gupta feels that donating desktops is a good way to extend its run. Dhupar avers that donations are happening in the industry and that’s a good approach.

Shirpurwala from MAIT gives the view from his vantage point. "India is possibly the best example of equipment being used to its full capacity. Large and small organizations alike are making extra efforts and CSR initiatives in ensuring that used equipment can be used further."

Recycling, Great!, Charity, Applause!

And then there is virtualization. Yes, another way of repurposing an old desktop into something that blends in well with the new-generation of products and platforms for IT.

On some grounds, it can be just a matter of choice, inclination, circumstantial factors. On other ones, going for virtualisation can also be a better alternative than general salvage or upgrade or e-waste/donation initiatives.

Or not? There is only one way to find out.

Under the Hood

Virtualisation, Cloud, VDI (Virtual Desktop Infrastructure) etc are now part of usual IT babble and no more far-off trends or futuristic ideas.

So at least hypothetically, it sounds like a good and economic idea to send an old desktop into some cool carwash and turn it into a squeaky-clean version fit for use as a VDI end point. The motherboard stays intact while memory, keyboard, hard drive etc leave room for refurbishing an old desktop and hence, extending its life a tad more.

By repurposing old desktops, we are essentially creating a Thin Client desktop: Noon

Noon reasons that virtualisation, through repurposing enables companies to extend their life of their current desktops from say four years to possibly eight to nine years. “Because repurposed PCs are not dependent of high speed processors (Processing carried out by the server), there is no need to continually refresh the desktops with faster technology devices. The commercial benefits – and environmental benefits also as a matter of fact - for salvage or e-waste/recycling are nowhere near those that such extension of a PC’s working life would create.”

As to what role VDI trends play here, he explains, “VDI has been considered too expensive but currently it’s on rise and most of the enterprises want to make use of the latest technologies, either on premise, DaaS or SaaS. VDI and Desktop-as-a-Service (DaaS) offerings are increasingly being considered by Indian enterprises as they address the needs of a more global and mobile workforce and enables them to adopt a user-centric, flexible approach to computing. In particular, cloud environment allows employees/end users to work remotely or on devices like tablet, smart phones, and laptops etc., they can access ‘anytime/anywhere’ which in turn increases productivity.”

Humans want their needs to be serviced and as long as that happens, any way can be a good approach to take. Dhupar outlines how IT has moved from heavy desktops (which entailed feeding data into processes), to laptops (moving around and sharing data while also pulling out data) to agile devices whereby users dictate how and where they want to work.

“Data centres are transforming and at the same time enterprises have started realizing that they utilise at best 15 to 20 per cent of all the hardware they have accumulated. As economy started entering a slow phase, attention went to re-utilisation of hardware and that brought virtualization into spotlight. As time rolled, the next challenge of keeping agile users satisfied and servicing their needs also put virtualization into a strong role.”

What was missing out however were content-heavy pieces like graphics or image as he opines. “Nvidia brought virtualization both at data centre and front-end level and with the same fidelity as earlier. So now virtualization is a different scenario altogether.”

Gupta adds how converting desktops into thin clients bolsters this form factor with extended life and TCO advantages while investments in fresh clients is saved.

Noon also feels that virtualised servers and desktops hold the key to more efficient IT management. Specially as Cloud computing offers a cost-effective, managed platform for VDI that stands to revolutionise the structure of enterprise IT in coming years.

Going by an IDC report, the Centralised Virtual Desktop (CVD) market in India will grow at a CAGR of 37.8 per cent to US $32.14 million by 2017. Noon, who, steers a brand like CloudDesktop PC repurposing software among other ones in its kitty, talks about the need that is shaping up strongly.

“By repurposing old desktops, we are essentially creating a Thin Client desktop. The acceptance by Enterprises of DaaS and SaaS from Amazon, Microsoft Azure and Google, is driving the demand for virtualised desktops and repurposing old PCs has shown to be one of the most cost effective ways of satisfying this demand.”

No Moving Parts, Really?

So there are two ways to go about using an old machine as a virtualisation device. As Thin clients, with a stripped-down version of the OS for basic functioning; or as Zero clients with just enough interface cabling for mouse, keyboard etc and hence longer lifespan and lesser patching/update work for engineers.

Converting an old desktop into a VD point can be done the zero way or thin way. Thin clients are the same in terms of form factors but they have to be managed and patched due to the OS, whereas zero clients are small, better to manage and do not need many patches, tells Gupta.

It would depend on the processor and storage strength, as Dhupar sees it. “The challenge with graphics virtualisation is usually about latency. When that is solved well, then virtualisation truly dissolves erstwhile distinctions.”

What matters is opting for the right model – hybrid or full-sweep virtualisation – depending on unique needs and constraints.

Like Gupta illustrates, if an organisation needs video-conferencing sprawling across physical desks where old desktops are already squatting, then repurposing them is a good idea instead of Greenfield VDI thin clients. “But if the desktop is older than four years or so, then disposing it off responsibly is a better idea than a VDI route.”

It is indeed possible to go for complete brownfield turn-outs too. As Dhupar cites, there are other options too, like start-ups in Bangalore which are taking advantage of new possibilities that come with new platforms without opting for capital investments in new hardware.

Flat Tyres

No matter how tempting it sounds to peel unwanted paint and steel from an old machine and bolt in some free or open software; there are doubts about the efficiency, enhancement scope, ruggedness of the PXE(Pre-execution Boot Environment), TFTP (Trivial File Transfer Protocol) environments, configuration testing over other devices, and issues on centralized management that soon surface.

If the case of a thick client redone also entails the IT hours that would go in for the souping-up hassle, network driver updates, administration loops, hard drive maintenance etc, then the basic premise of money-saving or ease goes for a toss. In case commercial software is used, the duplication of pre-installed software with virtual connection software and attendant issues pop there too.

Industry players have also argued on questions around the same surface area for security or hardware failure vulnerabilities that the old PC presents.

Gupta advises that even if one applies variety of Linux options, management of end points remains a chore with as many moving parts and hardware failure risks and hence the level of efforts to be put in. “Maintenance and sustenance cannot be sidelined even in this old-to-thin set-up.”

But most imminent and hard-hitting are perhaps the burden on power usage that the old PC brings forth.

As Gupta distills, even if the level of power usage is 70 KW in case of a thin client, versus 90 to 100 KW for a desktop, the processor within does not let power guzzling change too much. “From a hardware point of view, the end point can be a refurbished desktop or an iPad or a new thin client, but the building blocks for virtual desktops, i.e. shared storage, shared compute and associated software or networking gear, still have to be factored in.

The Ultimate Circuit

On one hand, enterprises can offset upfront VDI costs, and on the other hand they can stretch the span of an existing hardware investment when they appropriate desktops for VDI.

Yet, the actual picture on knee-deep issues, costs and surprises can only be reckoned once the jump has been taken. Noon puts desktops converted to thin clients better than fat clients or BYOD clients (Apple, Android both?) or zero clients.

Not many organisations would give or throw away old desktops if there is scope of extending its life: Gupta

“They fare better because of increased security and lower support costs. Major gains of virtualisation through repurposing legacy PCs include, capital cost savings, security (virtualisation is read-only technology, therefore no-viruses, spyware etc.), lower administration support- cost (through no personal use of the device) and lower hardware support costs.”

There it is. One more way of being smart, responsible and creative with the way you look at the so-called junk lying stranded, alone and under-utilised.

Every mothballed wardrobe and cob-webbed garage has that tiny possibility of a new life, if the right hands are around.

Fashions change but style endures. When one handkerchief dies, aren’t two cravats born?