Dell's Streak Handheld Will Download Virtual Desktop

[TeamDesktop]

Dell's Streak Handheld Will Download Virtual Desktop
by Mark Long

Dell CEO Michael Dell says the upcoming Dell Streak will maintain work productivity on the go by downloading virtual desktops. Speaking at Citrix Systems' Synergy conference, Dell said 4G is an essential step for workers to be able to work from anywhere. Dell said a virtualized thin client like the Dell Streak "offers immense benefits."

Dell's chief executive showed off an Android-based mobile device called the Dell Streak before attendees at Citrix Systems' Synergy conference Relevant Products/Services in San Francisco on Thursday. The new handheld computer with five-inch touchscreen, which Dell previewed at the Consumer Electronics Show in January, will be available from AT&T this summer after taking its inaugural bows on Telefonica's network in Europe next month, Michael Dell said.

Among other things, the Dell Streak will make it possible for business users to maintain top work productivity while on the go by downloading virtualized images of their PC desktop onto the palm-sized gadget. Ultimately, however, "the device shouldn't matter because your client image can follow you everywhere," Dell said during his keynote address Thursday.

Going Global
Dell described how health-care workers at Silver Cross Hospital are currently saving time and enhancing medical care with mobile devices that can download thin clients that mirror their PC desktops. "Now the data and apps follow the caregivers around" in an authenticated, secure environment, Dell said.

To implement this technology on a wide scale, however, the forthcoming transition to wireless 4G is an essential step. "Like the leap to Wi-Fi, this is a pretty significant one," Dell said. "Let's face it, we need this new capacity because the networks cannot really support all of the traffic."

When devices like the Streak run thin clients that virtualize the traditional desktop, Dell said, they can help businesses become flexible enough to enable their workers to perform all their work assignments from anywhere -- not just from a seat in the main office.

"It used to be that only the big companies were global," Dell said "Now you are seeing small companies become global, and this new way of working is making it happen."

Dell also sees the technology giving more companies the ability to recruit highly skilled workers no matter where they reside. "It enables us to find the most talented people in the world, and it connects them in," Dell said.

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