Is it just me, or does it seem like every few releases Citrix finds ways to further reduce bandwidth consumption. When 7.13 came out, there were statements saying bandwidth utilization dropped. And in 7.17, we are hearing similar remarks. If we look at the latest releases, we see the following major improvements to the ICA protocol
- 7.13:
- Introduce glyph detection/caching algorithm – Beneficial for text-based workloads
- Improve scroll detection
- 7.17:
- Update glyph detection/caching algorithm – Beneficial for text-based workloads
- 7.18:
- H.264 Build-to-Lossless – Beneficial for graphically interactive sessions
- Progressive Display – Beneficial for low bandwidth and/or high latency connections
I want to see how these improvements impacts network utilization, so I ran my own simulations. I decided to run the same tests against the 7.11, 7.12, 7.13, 7.14, 7.15, 7.16, 7.17, 7.18, 1808, 1811, 1903, 1906 and 1909 releases.
Bandwidth Findings
In case you don’t wish to look at the graphs and details, here are the high-level findings for each release
Release | Knowledge Worker User Experience |
Knowledge Worker WAN Experience |
Task Worker User Experience |
Task Worker WAN Experience |
7.11 | 196 kbps | 108 kbps | 273 kbps | 97 kbps |
7.12 | 214 kbps | 113 kbps | 268 kbps | 100 kbps |
7.13 | 202 kbps | 116 kbps | 273 kbps | 77 kbps |
7.14 | 203 kbps | 128 kbps | 277 kbps | 81 kpbs |
7.15 | 204 kbps | 99 kbps | 270 kbps | 78 kbps |
7.16 | 202 kbps | 126 kbps | 288 kbps | 86 kbps |
7.17 | 205 kbps | 95 kbps | 98 kbps | 29 kbps |
7.18 | 174 kbps | 82 kbps | 100 kbps | 25 kbps |
1808 | 177 kbps | 91 kbps | 103 kbps | 28 kbps |
1811 | 183 kbps | 87 kbps | 103 kbps | 27 kbps |
1903 | 171 kbps | 79 kbps | 102 kbps | 27 kbps |
1906 | 172 kbps | 100 kbps | 99 kbps | 25 kbps |
1909 | 176 kbps | 105 kbps | 99 kbps | 25 kbps |
Knowledge Worker – User Experience Policy
In the first graph, we have the following:
- Workload: LoginVSI Knowledge Worker
- Policy: Optimize for User Experience
- Test Duration: 60 minutes
- Sample Period: 5 second
I notice the following:
- 7.13: A slight drop in cumulative bandwidth usage. This drop extends through the 7.17 release.
- 7.18: A noticeable drop, most likely due to the H.264 Build-to-Lossless capability with the graphical knowledge worker workload.
- 1906: Bandwidth was consistently lower than all other test until the very end where it jumps. Need to see if something outside of the test impacted the results.
Knowledge Worker – WAN Policy
Let’s change the policy and retest
- Workload: LoginVSI Knowledge Worker
- Policy: Optimize for WAN
- Test Duration: 60 minutes
- Sample Period: 5 second
Besides lower numbers, as we would expect with the optimize for WAN policy, we see similar bandwidth reductions in the releases.
Knowledge Worker – Comparison
By looking at average bandwidth utilization across the 60 minute test, we can start to see these improvements a little easier.
Task Worker – User Experience Policy
In the first graph, we have the following:
- Workload: LoginVSI Task Worker
- Policy: Optimize for User Experience
- Test Duration: 60 minutes
- Sample Period: 5 second
WHAT???
The releases after 7.17 look crazy. This would be due to the improvements in glyph caching, which is extremely beneficial for text-based workloads, like Excel. I compared the steep increases in the 7.11-7.16 graphs with the actual workload. Turns out these all align with Microsoft Excel. Imagine scrolling through a spreadsheet full of numbers. The glyph detection/caching improvements in 7.17 really shine on this portion of the simulation.Task Worker – WAN PolicyIf we change the policy to WAN and retest
- Workload: LoginVSI Task Worker
- Policy: Optimize for WAN
- Test Duration: 60 minutes
- Sample Period: 5 second
We see similar reductions in the 7.17 release. In addition, we also see the introduction of the glyph caching in the 7.13 release with the optimize for WAN policy.
Task Worker – Comparison
When we change the graph to look at the estimated kilobits per second, the improvements are quite interesting for the Task Worker.
Based on all of these tests, workload changes and policy changes, there are essentially 3 distinct groupings of data based on improvements made to ICA:
- Group 1: 7.11 and 7.12
- Group 2: 7.13-7.16
- Group 3: 7.17-1909
Stay tuned as I plan to keep running these standard tests on upcoming releases.Daniel (Follow on Twitter @djfeller)
Citrix Workspace Poster
XenApp/XenDesktop On-Prem Poster
XenApp/XenDesktop Cloud Service Poster
Hi Daniel, what kind of tests did you run? I’m trying to tweak bandwidth performance on my VDI for some time.
Regards Christian
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What is the main reason not providing standard Power User’s BW requirement?
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Any updates for 1906?
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Awsome, I really like your studies of Citrix releases..
A Note is that if we compare vda 7.x releases with 6.5 Rxx we nowadays talk about bandwidth compared to how many users you could get in one XenApp server…
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Hey Dan, you did see the fact that in recent versions, the VDA is disabling some animation that impacts the LoginVSI progress bar, and thus the amount of data sent (and measured FPS). Muhammad and I covered this with the EUC-Go Team: https://www.go-euc.com/important-influence-of-citrix-login-vsi-on-the-results/
Cheers Martin
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