In order to function in a RAS Farm, a Provider (hypervisor or cloud-based) needs RAS Provider Agent to be installed in the Farm. RAS Provider Agent acts as an interface between other RAS components and a Provider. RAS Provider Agent conducts all communications with a Provider through the provider's native API.
Parallels RAS has two types of RAS Provider Agents that can be installed in a Farm:
Built-in: This RAS Provider Agent is built into the RAS Connection Broker and is installed automatically when you install Parallels RAS. The agent can handle multiple Providers and can also be configured for high availability.
Dedicated: This RAS Provider Agent is installed manually. It can handle only a single Provider. If you want to use this agent type with more than one provider, you need to install a separate instance for each provider.
Both built-in and dedicated RAS Provider Agents are compatible with all types of Providers supported by Parallels RAS. Which agent you choose to install depends only on your requirements. When possible, it is always recommended to use the built-in Provider Agent for high availability and business continuity.
What to read next:
If you are adding a Provider that will use the built-in RAS Provider Agent, you may skip to Add a Provider.
If you want to install a dedicated RAS Provider Agent on a host of your choice, read the RAS Provider Agent installation options section, which follows this one.
If you are installing a dedicated RAS Provider Agent, you first need to determine where it will be installed. Depending on the Provider type, the following options are available:
The host on which the hypervisor is running. This option is available for Microsoft Hyper-V only.
A supported version of Windows Server running on a physical box or in a virtual machine. For supported Windows Server versions, see Software requirements > RAS Provider Agent.
The following table lists RAS Provider Agent installation options for each supported Provider:
| Provider | Built-in Agent (part of PA) | Agent on a Provider | Agent on a Windows Server (VM or HW) |
|---|---|---|---|
* High Availability is not available with these Provider Agent installation options. For details, see Enabling high availability for VDI.
Note: The Remote PC is a special type that can be used to create and manage pools of Remote PCs as part of hosted desktop infrastructure (HDI). When you add a Provider of this type, you can manage it like one of the real Providers with some limitations, such as you cannot create templates and use some other strictly VDI-specific functions. The main feature when using this type is the ability to create pools of HDI-based Remote PCs (e.g. HPE Moonshot System, Atrust Remote PC Array) and making PCs persistent by assigning an individual PC to a specific user. For more info, see Remote PC pools.
In the table above, find the Provider type that you are using and see where the RAS Provider Agent can be installed. Depending on the available choices, do one of the following:
Built-in Agent: The agent is a part of RAS Connection Broker, so it is already installed. When possible, it is always recommended to use the built-in Provider Agent for high availability and business continuity.
Agent on a the provider: This option is only available if you are using Microsoft Hyper-V. You can simply install the agent on the host, as described in Add a Provider.
Agent on a Windows Server (VM or HW): To use this option, make sure you have a physical box or a virtual machine running a supported version of Windows Server. You will need to specify its FQDN or IP address when adding a Provider to the Farm.
Microsoft Hyper-V
Yes
Yes
Yes*
Microsoft Hyper-V Failover Cluster
Yes
No
Yes*
VMware VCenter
Yes
No
Yes*
VMware ESXi
Yes
No
Yes*
SC//HyperCore
Yes
No
Yes*
Nutanix AHV (AOS)
Yes
No
Yes*
Remote PC (see the Note below)
Yes
No
Yes*
Microsoft Azure
Yes
No
Yes*
Amazon Web Services
Yes
No
Yes*