Dell has launched a new Wyse machine, which it says will dramatically simplify its thin client portfolio, allowing channel partners to sell the hardware to businesses more effectively.
The new Wyse 5070 is designed to occupy the mid-range segment of Dell's thin client business, sitting between last year's entry-level Wyse 3040 and the top-end 7000 series units. According to Dell's EMEA cloud client-computing lead David Angwin, the new 5070 will replace six pre-existing units in the Wyse range.
"That will be our very simplified, very streamlined portfolio, which our customers and our channel partners have been very receptive to," he said. "They really like the simplicity of this."
"We think from a channel perspective, it will accelerate our business," Angwin said. "We've always known that the more complex we make the portfolio, the more complex we make it for channel partners."
The 5070 will be available in a huge variety of different configurations - more than 1,600, according to the company. This includes two different chassis models, an optional AMD Radeon GPU and processor option ranging from Intel Celeron chips to quad-core Pentium models. Angwin said that the company has no plans to offer configurations featuring AMD's Ryzen processors.
One of the 5070's headline features is its ability to support up to six monitors, including four 4K panels running at 60Hz. This, coupled with the optional discrete graphics chip, makes the 5070 capable of handling even graphically demanding tasks such as image and video editing.
The new unit is fitted with 21 separate ports, and along with all the expected ports (such as USB Type-C, DisplayPort and Ethernet), the 5070 also features support for the legacy ports which are still widely used within organisations, such as serial and parallel ports.
Back by popular demand, the integrated smart card reader seen on previous units has also been reintroduced to the range. Angwin told Channel Pro that this feature is something that customers have been asking for consistently, as it frees them up from buying expensive peripherals with in-built smart card readers.
"Organisations today want the security and consistency of desktop and application virtualization with the option to scale up on power and performance," said the president of Dell's client product group, Jay Parker.
"With the Wyse 5070, we're changing the definition of the thin client altogether by providing multiple options based on their needs - all based on a single platform that can be tailored to meet the needs of a task worker all the way up to power users requiring multi-display technology and workstation-class performance."
Image credit: Dell
