Tuesday, November 19th 2024
Microsoft is Introducing a $349 Mini PC That Streams Windows 11 from the Cloud
Microsoft is introducing Windows 365 Link, a compact cloud PC for business users. The device costs $349 and measures just 120 x 120 x 30 mm, making it smaller than Apple's Mac mini. The compact size comes from the fanless cooling design and the fact that the device doesn't have local storage capabilities. This small computer has quite a variety of connectivity options, including one USB-C, three USB-A ports, HDMI, DisplayPort, and Ethernet connections, supports two 4K monitors, and has Bluetooth 5.3 and Wi-Fi 6E wireless capabilities. The specific hardware details are not yet revealed by Microsoft.
It requires Windows 365 with Microsoft Intune and Entra ID, and it works with 365 Frontline, Enterprise, and Business editions. As with other cloud-based solutions, Microsoft will lock some of the security options, "features like Secure Boot, the dedicated Trusted Platform Module, Hypervisor Code Integrity, BitLocker encryption, and the Microsoft Defender for Endpoint detection and response sensor can't be turned off, further helping to secure the device". Microsoft plans to launch the device in April 2025, with early previews in the US, Canada, UK, Germany, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. Businesses interested in testing the device can contact their Microsoft account team before December 15, 2024, to join the preview program.
With Windows 365 Link, Microsoft is getting one step closer to its intention to make Windows available anytime, anywhere from the Cloud as a subscription service, similar to what Adobe did years ago.
Source:
Microsoft
It requires Windows 365 with Microsoft Intune and Entra ID, and it works with 365 Frontline, Enterprise, and Business editions. As with other cloud-based solutions, Microsoft will lock some of the security options, "features like Secure Boot, the dedicated Trusted Platform Module, Hypervisor Code Integrity, BitLocker encryption, and the Microsoft Defender for Endpoint detection and response sensor can't be turned off, further helping to secure the device". Microsoft plans to launch the device in April 2025, with early previews in the US, Canada, UK, Germany, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. Businesses interested in testing the device can contact their Microsoft account team before December 15, 2024, to join the preview program.
44 Comments on Microsoft is Introducing a $349 Mini PC That Streams Windows 11 from the Cloud
This should crash and burn, and harder than the Surface ever did. At least the Surface had a concept of a good idea. This could only ever be used as a way to shift the security burden of publicly accessible computers to MS.
This thing screams to have ARM. Why put an Intel processor in it?!?!
Garbage.
It can make sense for admistration type jobs, call centers, etc. but it needs to be cheap.With this pricing they still have a long way to run, at 350$ you can buy a nuc with storage, it's own local windows home license and with better specs than this.
No local storage. No local OS. $349...significantly more than any of the cheap NUC clones that you can get on the market tomorrow with local storage and an OS that can't just vanish if MS decides to pull the plug...let alone if you're in an area without great internet services.
Who drank the proverbial bong water and hallucinated this was a good idea? That price tag buys you all of the problems that a thin client from ten years ago always seemed to deliver, and the only payback is that you don't have to have active cooling. Great. Today they call that thing a cell phone. Only a cell phone isn't bound to MS and whatever their service can provide you. Heck, there are tablets that cost less than this. What is MS thinking?
....insert joke about Office 365 being crap, the failure of software companies to make hardware, or Uplay....
Why?
Well, most of the people in the World, do not have the access to internet in order to stream the Win11!
So they need to make a local computer to run Win11.
& this is also "wrong way to do it". Again, why?
If you want some "terminal login" to run Win11 from a cloud, that is OK. But you need also monitor to do it, so why not make "All in one terminal Win11"?
(Oh God, we are back to terminals...a complete circle to rubbish!) :cool:
Just what the world needed, a Steam Link for streaming Excel. This thing screams managerial hubris, or maybe just, "I needed an excuse to pay my cousin, and this was the best idea he could come up with."
And this isn't specific to really cheap hardware. You could net boot an SGI Indy workstatin (entry price around $5000 thirty years ago) in diskless mode.
And like all of those devices, this one is focused on enterprise customers not consumers. Think of this $350 net PC as replacing a $1000 Dell Optiplex in a hospital. Or rather, think of $350,000 replacing $1,000,000 in hardware.
I know it's hard for a lot of TPU readers to think outside of their consumer bubble dreamworld but there are usage cases that are commercial/enterprise where having a lot of power on the desktop really isn't necessary. People at your medical clinic, bank or insurance company aren't playing Cyberpunk 2077.
Although this indeed does have a higher price point that those other Mini-pcs that should be even more capable, I can see this making sense for bussiness that don't want to have a proper IT team. Just have a functioning internet connection and relay everything onto the cloud for management.
WTF are you people smoking? Lay off the damn drugs and stop with the goose-stepping nonsense! Knock it off!