No, the GoCloud hosted desktop does not have a minimum period; each hosted desktop is on a month-to-month contract. One of the benefits of the hosted desktop is the flexibility it gives your IT infrastructure in that it can be expanded or reduced rapidly to meet the seasonal demands on your business. A minimum contract length would mitigate against this benefit for our customers.

No, you can use any PC, Mac or Linux machine to connect to your hosted desktop. One of the initial cost-savings is the ability to continue to use your existing PCs. As the processing power, RAM, and storage are provided by our servers you are even able to use older PCs that would be unable to run a new OS themselves, thereby extending their working lives and your ROI.

Alternatively, you may decide to purchase thin clients, to further enhance the benefits of moving to a hosted desktop environment. Thin clients are physically smaller PCs; they cost less than a normal PC (aka a "fat client"), and use a lot less of expensive energy. Of course, as a hybrid measure you may opt to simply replace existing computers with thin clients as they begin to fail.

Yes, a reliable Internet connection is essential. As the hosted desktops are housed within our UK data centres, the only way for you to connect to them is over the Internet.

We are able to supply both advice and equipment that will ensure a backup solution is in place so that, should an Internet connection go down, you will still be able to access your desktop via the backup Internet connection.

Absolutely. All transmissions over the Internet to and from your hosted desktop are encrypted. Hosted virtual desktops are not only housed within our fully secure UK data centres, manned 24/7 by security personnel, but all the data is actually stored and processed on servers within the data centre itself, so all that is actually transmitted across the Internet are the screen changes on the desktop, key presses and mouse movements. Consequently, a hosted desktop is even more secure than a normal desktop PC.

Yes. We backup all your server data to an offsite location, and we also provide you with the option to use our remote backup service to backup your hosted desktop through a self-managed backup system.

As the requirements of each application are different not every application is suitable for use on a hosted desktop. However, the vast majority of Windows applications will run with no issues whatsoever. If you are unsure whether an application is suitable for GoCloud's hosted desktop, contact us.

Certain applications may not perform to their full potential in a hosted desktop environment, such as Autocad, video editing software or other similarly graphically-intensive applications.

If you are unsure as to whether a certain application will run, feel free to contact us and check if it does or not. We may need to run some tests.

Software that causes damage to other systems such as malicious DoS attacks, and streaming applications are not permitted.

Hosted desktops are secured by using a username and password combination just like a normal Windows desktop PC.

Additional hosted desktops can be added simply by placing an order with your reseller.

Yes. Although the GoCloud hosted desktop network is built using virtualisation technologies, you are still able to control your network in exactly the same ways that you would control and administer a hardware-based infrastructure.

As all of GoCloud's services are fully managed, all you need to do is let us know the details of the person that you need adding, and what access the user requires, and our operations team will action your request.

Yes. We can add almost any application to your network, making it available on whichever desktops you wish. It is your responsibility to ensure that you have the correct software licences for use on a multi-tenanted, hosted infrastructure.

No. The hosted desktop places no additional technical restrictions on the normal use of a desktop. However, the administrator of your hosted desktop network is able to place restrictions on the use of a hosted desktop, just as any administrator of a network may do.

As GoCloud's servers are housed within data centres situated in England the use of the hosted desktop is bound by the laws of England & Wales and, obviously, hosted desktops may not be used for illegal or unlawful purposes.

As our service is fully managed, to administer your Exchange server just contact your reseller by phone or email and they will make any necessary changes.

If you are unable to access your office or its PCs because of fire, water damage, theft or vandalism, or staff cannot get to the office because of bad weather, or industrial action - unlike a standard computer network, your hosted desktops will provide you with multiple options to deal with this range of minor/major problems.

Hosted desktops can be accessed in an emergency from anywhere with an Internet connection, for example, your home, business hubs, business centres with hot-desking, a helpful neighbour or client, even hotel rooms; basically, anywhere with an Internet connection, because all connections to your remote hosted desktop are 100% encrypted, not just the log-on process.

Yes. There is no restriction on when the hosted desktops can be accessed, unless one is specified within the security policy of your network itself, which would be a restriction set by your own organisation. GoCloud do not impose any such restriction as standard.

We encourage our resellers to offer support to end users 24 hours 7 days a week, 365 days per year. We offer our resellers 24/7 facilities in order to achieve this target.

Technical support is obtained by contacting your reseller.