# EfficientEther - full text > Extended companion to https://efficientether.co.uk/llms.txt. It carries the readable text of every EfficientEther product, solution, pricing and comparison page so an answer engine can quote them without fetching each URL. Sections are separated by the page URL; long pages are trimmed at a line boundary and the full page is always available at its URL. Source: https://efficientether.co.uk | Pages: 32 | Generated from the prerendered build output. https://efficientether.co.uk/products # Microsoft Cloud Products - EfficientEther > Choose the EfficientEther product for your Microsoft estate pressure: cost and Windows 365 visibility, governed AI support, or MSIX packaging for legacy apps. Products ## Choose the product by the Microsoft estate pressure in front of you. Cost review, Windows 365 rollout, Copilot readiness, support workload, audit evidence, or legacy application migration: start with the pressure your buyer or team is already trying to explain. Match pressure to product› Book a Microsoft estate review› Portfolio ## One company story, three practical routes. Use EtherInsights when the Microsoft estate needs cost visibility, governance evidence, Windows 365 planning, or MSP review packs. Use EtherAssist when repeat IT work needs governed AI support. Use EtherApps Forge when legacy applications are slowing Intune, AVD, Windows 365, or Windows 11 delivery. For teams that only discover Microsoft 365 waste, Azure overrun, Cloud PC drift, or tenant risk when someone asks for proof. EtherInsights gives them Microsoft 365 cost optimisation, reporting, spend, posture, Windows 365, users, devices, and Intune evidence in one operating view. Learn more about EtherInsights Get your savings report For IT and compliance teams under pressure to use AI without losing control of sensitive context. EtherAssist brings redaction, run history, hosting choice, admin oversight, and workflow grounding to day-two Microsoft operations. Learn more about EtherAssist Book an AI controls demo For migration teams facing lost installers, scarce MSIX skills, Windows 11 deadlines, and Azure Virtual Desktop AppAttach requirements. EtherApps Forge captures running applications and produces modern delivery outputs without turning every package into a manual investigation. Learn more about EtherApps Forge Get a packaging quote Product fit ## Start with the pressure your team is already feeling. If spend is unclear, start with EtherInsights. If support work keeps repeating, start with EtherAssist. If a Windows migration is blocked by packaging, start with Forge. Find the pressure, pick the route, and move to the first useful proof point. ## EtherInsights You need to explain spend, drift, Cloud PC demand, and tenant risk before the next review Surface hidden spend, baseline AVD or legacy VDI moves, assign owners, and support recurring savings and rollout reviews. Learn more› ## EtherAssist Your team wants AI help, but security and auditability cannot be optional Reduce manual workload while keeping data control, run history, and practical governance. Learn more› ## EtherApps Forge Legacy applications are blocking Windows 11, Intune, AVD, or Cloud PC delivery Reduce packaging unknowns and accelerate Windows 11, Intune, AppAttach, and Cloud PC readiness. Learn more› Proof ## Proof your business can act on. Built for Microsoft-focused IT teams, MSP delivery functions, and compliance-conscious organisations that need practical answers quickly. Designed to make the next step visible: owner, evidence, route, and commercial action. Honed by buyer context: cost review, Cloud PC rollout, secure AI controls, compliance evidence, or application migration. Explore solution routes› Book a Microsoft estate review› ## Need help choosing the right route for your Microsoft estate? Book a Microsoft estate review. We will map the blocker to the right product, show the first evidence point, and recommend the next step: trial, savings report, governed AI demo, or packaging fit check. Book a Microsoft estate review› Explore solution routes› --- https://efficientether.co.uk/products/etherapps-forge # MSIX Packaging Software for Intune - EtherApps Forge > EtherApps Forge captures legacy Windows apps and outputs MSIX, AppAttach, IntuneWin, and MSI packages for Intune, AVD, and Cloud PC, without installer media. Who it is for Evidence What it does Free training Pricing Questions Book a fit check› Try it free› ## MSIX packaging software for Windows 11, Intune, and AVD, without the installer media. EtherApps Forge captures legacy Windows applications from running systems, converts MSI and App-V to MSIX, and produces Intune-ready and AppAttach-ready packages. AI-guided routing handles signing, manifest fix-ups, and dependency resolution when in-house MSIX skills are thin. Try it free› Book a packaging fit check› 7 days. No credit card. Capture a real application on day one. Two free courses. A certificate and a badge for each, even if you never buy.See the training Recognised by Microsoft. Certified to the standards your procurement team will ask for. Microsoft MarketplaceBuy on the Microsoft invoice you already pay ISO 27001, 9001, 42001Certified for information security, quality, and AI management Runs in your estatePackaging data stays in your tenant Review certifications Who it is for ## Built for Windows modernisation teams, developers and ISVs, and the partners who package at scale. ## For Windows modernisation teams Windows 10 support has ended, and a handful of applications still hold up the move to Windows 11. Packaging engineers and endpoint teams use Forge to make Windows 10 estates ready for Windows 11, Intune, and AVD without rebuilding from installer media. In a published study, Forge built an MSIX for 90.68% of 3,261 application cases.1 Try it free› Book a fit check ## For MSPs and packaging factories Every customer migration stalls on the same few awkward applications. Channel partners and MSP packaging factories use Forge to standardise capture and output across many customer estates, with CLI and MCP automation for scale. Free certification for each engineer, with a badge your customers can check. Get a volume quote› See partner programme ## For developers and ISVs The build is healthy. Packaging and signing it is where the release slows down. Ship your own builds, not just captured apps. forge_msix is a drop-in makeappx replacement that turns a build folder into a signed, validated MSIX, ready for your CI pipeline. The same switches as makeappx.exe, with no Windows SDK on the build agent. Try it free› See MSIX packaging The app nobody can reinstall0:45 0:00 / 0:45 Read the transcript 0:00 Every company has one. 0:04 No vendor. No installer. And Windows 10 has ended. 0:08 But it still has to run. 0:10 Forge captures it from the PC where it still runs, in the app, from the command line or with your AI agent. 0:18 One signed MSIX, validated and tested. 0:25 The same app, on Windows 11 and Server 2025. 0:29 The old PC can finally retire. 0:32 We tested Forge on 3,261 app cases. 0:36 More than nine in ten built an MSIX. 0:40 Bring yours. Try Forge free, no card. Evidence ## Will Forge package your applications? We tested 3,261 first. Forge's automated workflow built an MSIX for 90.68% of 3,261 Windows application cases, across eight installer types. Your estate is not our sample, so the honest next step is to run your own applications through it, free. Try it free› Read the published study A smoke test is a first check, not proof of production readiness. The study is a preprint, and EfficientEther builds Forge. 90.68%1 of 3,261 cases produced an MSIX package 80.04%1 passed a recorded smoke test: installed, launched, cleaned up 8 installer and distribution types, with passes from every one £320 to £5752 per application, the published outsourced packaging price range on G-Cloud 15 Pipeline ## Capture, decide, package, deliver. Capture-first packaging for legacy Windows applications, with AI-guided route support and deployment-ready outputs for modern environments. What EtherApps Forge does ## End-to-end MSIX. Capture, convert, sign, deploy. A capture-first application packaging platform that produces MSIX, AppAttach, IntuneWin, and MSI from one source application. AI-guided routing supports Intune application packaging when in-house MSIX skills are thin, and developers can push their own builds through the same signed, validated MSIX pipeline. ## Capture from running systems Package installed Windows applications from live systems when installer media is lost, incomplete, or no longer usable. See application modernisation ## One capture, four outputs Produce MSIX for Intune, AppAttach for Azure Virtual Desktop, IntuneWin for endpoint deployment, and MSI for legacy targets from one source capture. See output formats Delivers through the platforms you already run: Microsoft Intune Azure Virtual Desktop Windows 365 Citrix Omnissa Parallels RAS ## Signing, manifest, modification packages MSIX signing, manifest fix-ups, and modification packages handled inline so the workflow does not split across external tooling. Signing and manifests ## PSF compatibility fix-ups Legacy apps often misbehave inside the MSIX container. Forge stages the Package Support Framework, with file and registry redirection and working-directory fixes, so captured apps run correctly with no code changes. Compatibility fix-ups ## AI-guided packaging decisions Embedded EtherAssist guidance routes packaging choices, resolves dependencies, and closes the MSIX skills gap inside the workflow. AI-guided packaging ## CLI and MCP for build pipelines Capture, sign, and produce a deployment-ready MSIX from one command. MCP integration drives Forge from AI agents and pipelines. Automation ## Dependency intelligence Registry and AppData mapping surfaces hidden dependencies early, so testing and deployment hit fewer surprises late in the cycle. Dependency mapping ## Bring your own AI assistant Connect Cursor, Copilot, Claude, Codex, or a local model. Teams use the AI tooling they already trust without being locked into one vendor. Agentic packaging Product walkthrough3:30 Product walkthrough ## See EtherApps Forge in action. A guided walkthrough of capture-first packaging from a live system through to MSIX, AppAttach, IntuneWin, and MSI outputs ready for Windows 11, Intune, AVD, and Cloud PC delivery. Live capture from a running Windows system, no installer media required. AI-guided routing into MSIX, AppAttach, IntuneWin, and MSI. Signing, manifest, and modification packages handled inside the workflow. Capture a real application on day one. 7 days. No credit card. Try it free› Book a packaging fit check› Inside the platform ## Real views from inside EtherApps Forge. Four screens from the EtherApps Forge capture-first workflow: live capture, App-V conversion, the scriptable CLI, and inline package validation. ## Capture from running systems Live-capture wizard: file, registry, AppData, services, and dependency capture from a running Windows system when installer media is missing or incomplete. App-V to MSIX0:30 0:00 / 0:30 Read the transcript 0:00 Still resequencing App-V? 0:02 Moving off App-V usually means doing every package again. 0:06 Forge extracts the App-V package, then builds the MSIX. No resequencing, no installer. 0:12 Script it, and convert the whole estate. 0:17 Signed, validated and ready for the platforms you already run. 0:22 No panic. App-V server support runs to 2029. 0:26 Convert your first one free. No card. ## Convert without rebuilding App-V to MSIX migration: ingest legacy App-V packages and produce MSIX with install-time behaviour preserved. No rebuild, no installer media. ## Scriptable from the command line Forge MSIX CLI for build pipelines and MSP packaging factories: capture, sign, and produce a deployment-ready MSIX from a single command. No GUI required. ## Audited every build Forge assesses each MSIX against best-practice signals from the same CLI session: capabilities, publisher alignment, visual assets, and trust state. Free training and certification ## Learn MSIX packaging for free. Leave with a badge anyone can check. Two courses, open to anyone with a work email. You do not need a licence. Start the free training› Check a credential› Learn MSIX free0:35 0:00 / 0:35 Read the transcript 0:00 Learn MSIX. Get certified. Free. 0:03 Short on MSIX skills? Learn the answers properly. 0:08 [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/products/etherapps-forge] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/products/etherassist # EtherAssist - Secure AI Assistant for IT Professionals > Use secure AI for IT troubleshooting, documentation, workflow support, and audit tasks with clear controls and regional hosting. Agentic AI for day-two IT ## Secure agentic AI for IT, compliance, and MSP teams. EtherAssist is a secure AI assistant for IT professionals: troubleshoot faster, document work, and support audits. MSPs can repeat the same controlled workflow across customers. Regional hosting, redaction, and admin oversight are built in. Try it free› Book an AI controls demo› 14 days. No credit card. Choose UK, EU, or US hosting on day one. What EtherAssist does ## Agentic AI first. Compliance evidence next to it. Run multi-step IT workflows with triage, knowledge capture, regional hosting, and reviewable history. Keep support useful without losing control. ## Agentic AI for day-two operations Run multi-step workflows with scheduling, handoffs, and reviewable history. Keep automation auditable as usage grows. See agentic operations → ## Compliance AI assistant and policy support Use the compliance AI assistant to draft policies, review gaps, and prepare audit evidence across ISO 27001, ISO 42001, NIS2, DORA, and SOC 2. See ISO and audit readiness → ## IT operations AI assistant Use plain-language triage, likely root cause, and admin-centre links to reduce repeat escalations. Triage and support ## Regional hosting and admin oversight Choose UK, EU, or US hosting. Add redaction, reporting, and run history so teams stay in control. Trust and controls ## Secure knowledge capture Capture operational knowledge with redaction, evidence-pack support, and audit-ready outputs built in. Knowledge and evidence ## Customer-controlled data Customer data stays under customer control and is not used for model training. Data control ## Reviewable run history Every workflow run keeps timestamps, attribution, handoffs, and outputs reviewable. Service and audit teams see the same evidence trail. Audit trail Product walkthrough ## See EtherAssist in action. A guided walkthrough of triage, workflow execution, documentation, and compliance support in one controlled experience. Triage on a live ticket with tenant-aware context and admin-centre links. A multi-step workflow run with handoffs, schedule, and reviewable history. Trust controls: region selection, redaction, reporting, and run history. Inside the platform ## Real views from inside EtherAssist. Five day-two views: dashboards, diagrams, editable Draw.io, safe PowerShell drafts, and ISO policy creation. Dashboard Dashboard-ready operations output Turn Microsoft 365 operations data into KPI summaries, charts, risk tables, owners, and next actions. Diagram Diagram generation for IT workflows Create clear IT workflow diagrams from plain-English prompts, with notes kept in the same conversation. Draw.io Draw.io diagrams that stay editable Generate editable Microsoft 365 workflow diagrams, then review and update the visual directly. PowerShell Safe PowerShell script drafting Draft reviewable PowerShell for Intune and Microsoft 365 with comments, sample data, and validation notes. Compliance ISO policy creation and evidence prompts Draft ISO policy sections with controls, evidence prompts, owners, and audit notes for review. Free practitioner ebook ## The IT Support and Compliance Assistant Handbook See how an AI assistant can help with support questions, troubleshooting, documentation, and compliance preparation while people stay in control. Includes practical examples, decision frameworks, diagrams, a 90-day operating plan, a glossary, and source references. Get the free handbook› Who it is for ## Built for IT operations and the compliance teams that sign off on AI. ## AI for MSP teams and IT operations Service desks, ops leads, and MSPs use EtherAssist for triage, workflow runs, PowerShell drafts, and reviewable history. Book a demo → ## For compliance, GRC, and audit leads Compliance and risk teams use EtherAssist to draft policies, capture evidence, and support ISO 27001, ISO 42001, NIS2, DORA, and SOC 2 work. See compliance support → Pricing ## Choose the model that fits your rollout. Start with a demo or 14-day trial, then move into either a per-user subscription or a metered plan for variable usage and broader operational rollout. The default route is simple: demo or trial first, then standard subscription for steady adoption. Teams with more variable usage can switch to metered billing during onboarding. Book an AI controls demo› Try it free› Get it on Microsoft Marketplace› See all pricing› Standard subscription £16.00/ user / month Best for teams standardising EtherAssist across day-two operations. Includes Full standard feature set for troubleshooting, workflow execution, and documentation support Operations Workflow execution with run history, auditability, and admin controls Trial 14-day free trial included before commercial rollout Billed monthly. Cancel anytime. Metered plan ## Token-based pricing A better fit for teams that prefer monthly usage billing or variable adoption across users. Detailed token rates are available during demo or onboarding. Book an AI controls demo› FAQ ## Questions IT, compliance, and MSP teams ask before they start a trial. Trust controls, operational fit, regional hosting, and rollout governance: the things teams ask before controlled AI adoption. Is EtherAssist suitable for internal IT teams and MSPs? Yes. EtherAssist supports both internal IT operations and managed-service delivery environments. MSPs can deploy it across multiple customer tenants with tenant-scoped access controls and role-based admin. What makes EtherAssist different from a standard AI chatbot? EtherAssist is built for operational IT and compliance work, not general conversation. It brings scoped context from your tickets, logs, and knowledge sources, supports controlled workflows, maintains audit trails, and includes redaction and admin controls that generic chat tools do not provide. Where is my data stored? EtherAssist supports UK, EU, and US data residency. You choose your preferred region at setup, and customer data stays under customer control with tenant-scoped access, redaction, and oversight features designed for security-conscious teams. Does EtherAssist support compliance frameworks? Yes. EtherAssist supports framework-related work such as gap review, policy drafting, checklist creation, and evidence preparation across common standards and regulations. It helps teams work faster while keeping outputs reviewable and auditable. What is included in the 14-day free trial? The 14-day free trial gives full access to EtherAssist Standard features including triage workflows, agentic task execution, knowledge capture, and compliance tools. No credit card is required. Controlled rollout ## Keep agentic AI useful, reviewable, and easier to defend. Troubleshooting, scripting, documentation, and workflow support in one Microsoft-centric operating model. Customer data stays under customer control with regional hosting, redaction, reporting, and admin oversight. Pairs with EtherInsights so posture, drift, and Copilot findings flow into reviewable remediation evidence. Book an AI controls demo› Try it free› --- https://efficientether.co.uk/products/etherinsights # Microsoft 365 Cost Optimisation Software - EtherInsights > EtherInsights manages Windows 365 Cloud PCs, Microsoft 365, and Azure day to day: cost control, tenant, user, and Intune reporting, plus savings proof. Cost management and Windows 365 platform ## Microsoft 365 and Azure cost optimisation, with full Windows 365 lifecycle control. EtherInsights started as the operating view for Microsoft 365 cost optimisation and Azure cost management: find waste, prove savings, and assign owners. It now adds full Windows 365 support across design, deployment, configuration, management, and migration baselines, plus tenant, user, security, device, and Intune reporting capabilities behind the same evidence model. Try it free› Book a cost and Cloud PC review› 14 days. Card required to start. Connect your tenant in minutes. What EtherInsights does ## One operating view for Microsoft cloud cost, Windows 365, and the wider estate. Start with the cost questions or the Windows 365 rollout. Extend into security, users, devices, and Intune reporting in the same product. ## Cut Microsoft 365 and Azure waste Find unused licences, oversized Azure resources, and Cloud PC cost drift. Turn Microsoft 365 licence optimisation into a savings report with owners and clear next actions. See cost optimisation → ## Run Windows 365 end-to-end Design, deploy, configure, and manage Cloud PCs from one view, with AVD to Windows 365 migration baselines and legacy VDI context. See Windows 365 → ## Secure the tenant and ready Copilot Secure Score, Zero Trust pillars, security conformity, and Copilot readiness across licensing, labels, sharing, and data governance. Security and conformity ## Control user lifecycle and offboarding Risky identities, onboarding and offboarding, licence reclaim, revocation, wipe, and evidence capture for every action. User lifecycle ## Billing trends and anomaly alerts Visualise Microsoft 365 and Azure spend over time. Spot spikes, dips, and unexplained drift before they reach the next invoice. Cloud cost insight ## Intune reporting and tenant control Around thirty Intune reports, per-device side-blade, CVE lookup, tenant backup, drift detection, and per-policy restore. Intune reporting tool ## Virtual machine rightsizing Identify over-provisioned and idle Azure virtual machines, then act on SKU and reservation recommendations driven by real workload patterns. Right-size compute Product overview ## Watch the platform overview. A short walkthrough of EtherInsights covering cost, Windows 365, tenant posture, device reporting, security, Copilot readiness, and user lifecycle. Microsoft 365 cost optimisation, Azure, and Windows 365 evidence in one operating view. From cost and Cloud PC decisions into posture, devices, and users. A clean first share for finance, security, or a new MSP customer. Inside the platform ## Real views from inside EtherInsights. Six screens from across cost, Windows 365, tenant management, security, and offboarding. Every shot is from the product. Cost Azure cost breakdown Monthly Azure cost focus: total spend, top contributors, concentration, focus mix by resource type, and a per-resource table. Cost Microsoft 365 licence management Active, inactive, and unlicensed users, annualised savings opportunity, seat allocation, utilisation by licence, and top licences by spend. Windows 365 Windows 365 Cloud PC insights Per-Cloud PC side-blade: endpoint analytics, startup and resource performance, work-from-anywhere signal, CPU and RAM spike time, and alternative SKU recommendations. Tenant Tenant backup and drift Scheduled tenant snapshots across Entra and Intune with pin-as-baseline, drift detection, and per-policy restore. Security Security conformity with AI-assisted remediation Per-check conformity status and EtherAssist generating PowerShell remediation code for the selected finding inline. Users User offboarding evidence Per-user offboarding task log: token revocation, password reset, sign-in block, MFA, licence and group removal, with success or skipped state and export. Free practitioner ebook ## The Microsoft 365 and Azure Cost Optimisation Handbook Find avoidable Microsoft 365 and Azure spend, agree changes with the right owners, and confirm the result before reporting savings. Includes practical examples, decision frameworks, diagrams, a 90-day operating plan, a glossary, and source references. Get the free handbook› Browse all EtherInsights solution briefs→ Editions ## Also for Windows 365. Running Cloud PCs? The Windows 365 edition covers sizing, cost per user group against the AVD baseline, drift, and scheduled evidence packs. See EtherInsights for Windows 365› Who it is for ## Built for Microsoft customers, and for the partners who run them. ## For Microsoft 365 customers IT, finance, and security teams use EtherInsights to cut Microsoft 365 and Azure waste, run Windows 365, and produce ownership-backed evidence for finance, security, and governance reviews. Book a review → ## For Microsoft partners and MSPs Partners give every managed tenant the same review pack across cost, Cloud PC, posture, devices, and lifecycle, without rebuilding spreadsheets per customer. See partner programme → Pricing ## Simple per-active-user pricing. Public per-active-user price covers Microsoft 365, Azure, Windows 365, tenant, security, device, and reporting. Volume and MSP pricing on request. Try it free› Book a cost and Cloud PC review› Get it on Microsoft Marketplace› See all pricing› Simple pricing £0.79per active user $1 or €1 per active user for USD and EUR billing. Volume and MSP pricing on request. Microsoft 365 and Azure cost visibility with savings report Windows 365 design, deployment, configuration, and day-two management Tenant backup, drift detection, and per-policy restore User lifecycle, risky identities, and offboarding evidence Security conformity, Secure Score, and Copilot readiness Intune reporting catalogue and device troubleshooting 14-day trial included FAQ ## Questions cost, Cloud PC, and MSP teams usually ask before they start. Scope, fit, speed to first result, and governance: the things most people ask before a trial. Which Microsoft products does EtherInsights cover? EtherInsights covers Microsoft 365, Azure, and Windows 365. The lead motion is Microsoft 365 and Azure cost management: licence waste, Azure right-sizing, savings reports, and ownership. It also supports full Windows 365 lifecycle management, tenant management, user onboarding and offboarding, security assessments, Copilot readiness, device management, and Intune reporting. How does EtherInsights help with Copilot readiness? EtherInsights scores a tenant against five Copilot readiness vectors: licensing, data governance, sensitivity labels, sharing posture, and Purview coverage. Each finding lands as an owner-backed remediation proposal with evidence ready for the deployment review before go-live. Does EtherInsights manage Windows 365 end-to-end, or just monitor it? End-to-end. EtherInsights covers Windows 365 design, deployment, configuration, and day-two management: cohort sizing, image and licensing plans, rollout waves, MDM baseline alignment, connection health, side-blade troubleshooting, migration baselines from Azure Virtual Desktop or legacy VDI, and drift detection against the pinned Cloud PC baseline. Can EtherInsights help with Windows 365 planning and migration? Yes. Teams use EtherInsights to baseline Windows 365 rollout plans, compare Azure Virtual Desktop and legacy VDI estates against Cloud PC assumptions, and carry those findings into deployment and day-two review decisions. Is EtherInsights suitable for MSPs as well as internal IT teams? [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/products/etherinsights] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/products/etherinsights/windows-365 # Windows 365 Cloud PC Management Software - EfficientEther > Cloud PC management software from EtherInsights: size Cloud PCs, prove cost per user group against AVD, catch drift. £0.79 per active user, 14-day trial. EtherInsights for Windows 365 ## Windows 365 Cloud PC management software for MSPs and IT teams. Your Cloud PC estate lives in four admin centres: Intune, the Microsoft 365 admin center, the Azure portal, and Windows 365. Nobody can say what a user group costs against the Azure Virtual Desktop baseline, and drift arrives one ticket at a time. EtherInsights for Windows 365 is the management console that puts sizing, cost per user group, provisioning, drift, and day-two evidence on one record, for tenants running 50 to 600 users. Try it free› Get my free Windows 365 cost estimate› Get my free Windows 365 assessment› From £0.79 per active user/month · 14-day free trial 14 days. Card required to start. Connect your tenant in minutes. The cost of the status quo ## Four consoles and a spreadsheet, or one management console. Microsoft's own consoles still carry out every action in both cases. What changes is how many hours your team spends reassembling the picture, and whether the saving can be proven at renewal. ## Today: four admin centres Sizing sits in a licensing sheet, wave status in Intune, cost in the Azure portal, and drift nowhere until a user reports it. Every review starts with half a day of copy and paste, and the Azure Virtual Desktop comparison is redone by hand. ## With EtherInsights for Windows 365 Cloud PC sizing, cost per user group, provisioning state, the pinned configuration baseline, and drift events sit on one record with the Azure Virtual Desktop or VDI baseline beside them. The review opens with the evidence already in place. What the software does ## Every Cloud PC decision, on one record. Eight capabilities built for the day-two problems Windows 365 admins actually raise. ## Cloud PC sizing and right-sizing See CPU and RAM spike time per Cloud PC and act on alternative SKU recommendations, so over-bought licences come back before the next renewal. See how we approach Cloud PC management → ## Cost per user group against the AVD baseline Hold the Azure Virtual Desktop or VDI baseline on the same record as each Cloud PC user group, so the business case stays provable after rollout. Compare Windows 365 and AVD → ## Provisioning, lifecycle, and day-two operations Provisioning checks, rollout waves, connection health, and per-device troubleshooting at user-group level instead of one device at a time. ## Drift detection and configuration backup Scheduled snapshots of Entra and Intune configuration, pin-as-baseline, drift flagged as it happens, and per-object restore. ## Intune compliance and Cloud PC troubleshooting Around thirty Intune reports plus a per-device side-blade, so compliance and device questions about Cloud PCs are answered in one place. ## Licence and offboarding actions with owners Reclaim candidates, leaver offboarding, and licence removal land as owner-backed actions with a task log you can export. ## Multi-tenant view for MSPs Run every managed tenant through the same Cloud PC review pack: sizing, cost, drift, and evidence, without a spreadsheet per customer. ## Scheduled evidence packs Savings, drift, and posture evidence produced on a schedule, ready to forward to finance, security, or a customer review. One portfolio, one estate ## How the portfolio runs Windows 365 together. EtherInsights sizes the estate, holds cost per user group against the Azure Virtual Desktop baseline, and watches lifecycle and drift. EtherApps Forge assesses the application estate and packages legacy apps as MSIX ahead of the migration. EtherAssist picks up troubleshooting, runbooks, and compliance evidence on day two. ## Size the move before anyone asks for a demo. Put your own user groups into the free Windows 365 TCO calculator. Then bring the result to a free assessment and leave with a cost per user group you can forward to whoever signs it off. Get my free Windows 365 cost estimate› Get my free Windows 365 assessment› Video walkthrough ## See Cloud PC management in EtherInsights. A short walkthrough of Cloud PC planning, migration baselines, configuration, and day-two evidence in the software. Sizing, cost, and drift on one Cloud PC record. Azure Virtual Desktop and VDI baselines beside each user group. Evidence ready to forward before the review starts. Decision criteria ## What to look for in Windows 365 management software. Use this list as the shortlist test. It compares against the native Microsoft consoles, not against any other vendor. ## One record across the four admin centres Intune, the Microsoft 365 admin center, the Azure portal, and Windows 365 still do the work. The software should read all four and show one Cloud PC record, not add a fifth console to maintain. ## Cost per user group, with the AVD baseline Native reports show licence counts, not what a user group costs against what it replaced. Ask for the baseline on the same record. ## Pinned baseline and per-object restore Intune shows current state. Ask whether the tool pins a baseline, flags drift as it happens, and restores a single policy without a full rebuild. ## Right-sizing from real usage Alternative SKU recommendations should come from CPU and RAM spike time on the Cloud PC, not from the licence you happened to buy. ## Actions with owners and an audit trail Every reclaim, offboarding, or restore should land with a named owner and an exportable log that stands up in a governance review. ## Public pricing and a trial on your own tenant A per-active-user price you can put on a budget line, and a trial that runs against your tenant rather than a demo tenant. For whoever signs it off ## A cost per user group you can defend at renewal. Finance leads and MSP principals do not need another dashboard. They need the Windows 365 line explained: what each user group costs, what it replaced, and what changed since the last review. EtherInsights produces that as a forwardable savings report, at £0.79, $1, or €1 per active user per month. Book a Cloud PC cost review› Microsoft lists EfficientEther on its Windows 365 partners page. ISO 27001, ISO 9001, and ISO 42001 certified, with read-only Microsoft access. £0.79, $1, or €1 per active user per month. Volume and MSP pricing on request. 14-day trial on your own tenant. Card required to start. Solution brief ## Windows 365 Management Solution Brief Two pages on this decision: what to measure, who has to sign it off, and what should be true before you commit. Free, and written to be forwarded. Get the solution brief› Pricing ## One price for the whole platform. EtherInsights for Windows 365 is an edition of EtherInsights, not a separate licence. The same per-active-user price covers Cloud PC management plus Microsoft 365 and Azure cost, tenant, security, and Intune reporting. Try it free› Book a Cloud PC cost review› Get it on Microsoft Marketplace› Simple pricing £0.79per active user $1 or €1 per active user for USD and EUR billing. Volume and MSP pricing on request. Cloud PC sizing, right-sizing, and cost per user group Provisioning, drift detection, and configuration backup Intune reporting and Cloud PC troubleshooting Licence reclaim and offboarding with owners Microsoft 365 and Azure cost management included 14-day trial included FAQ ## Questions Windows 365 admins and MSPs ask before they start. Scope, fit, pricing, and what happens on day one. Is EtherInsights for Windows 365 a separate product? No. It is the Windows 365 edition of EtherInsights, the same platform at the same per-active-user price. This page covers what the software does for Cloud PC management specifically; the full platform also covers Microsoft 365 and Azure cost, tenant, security, and Intune reporting. Does it replace Intune or the Windows 365 admin experience? No. Intune and the Microsoft 365 admin center still carry out provisioning and policy actions. EtherInsights reads those consoles and the Azure portal, holds one Cloud PC record per user group, and adds the baseline, drift, cost, and evidence layer they do not provide. How does it compare Windows 365 cost with Azure Virtual Desktop? [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/products/etherinsights/windows-365] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions # Microsoft Cloud Solutions - EfficientEther > EfficientEther solutions for Microsoft-focused IT teams and MSPs: control Microsoft 365 and Azure cost, tenant drift, AI governance, and MSIX packaging. Solutions ## Find the route by the stakeholder pressure. A CFO asks where Microsoft spend is leaking. A CIO asks whether Cloud PCs are ready. A security lead asks for evidence. An MSP asks how to repeat the work. A migration owner asks why applications are still blocking delivery. Start there. Find your solution route› Book a Microsoft estate review› By pressure The routes By technology Product mapping How the routes are grouped ## Three commercial moments, 22 technical routes. The solution groups match how teams describe the problem before they know the product name: readiness evidence, operating control, or cost and modernisation pressure. ## Posture and readiness For teams being asked whether the tenant, devices, Copilot plans, or Cloud PC rollout are ready and who need evidence before the decision is already made. Microsoft 365 security and conformity Microsoft 365 tenant backup and drift Microsoft 365 Copilot readiness ISO compliance and audit readiness Intune reporting, drift, and device troubleshooting Windows 365 and Cloud PC Windows 365 migration ## Operating control For teams stuck between licensing, offboarding, support workload, agentic execution, and audit pressure. EtherInsights provides the evidence; EtherAssist helps the work get done. Microsoft 365 licence management and offboarding Microsoft 365 for MSPs SMB AI assistant IT operations and compliance Agentic operations ## Cost and modernisation For teams carrying cloud spend questions, Windows 11 deadlines, legacy app uncertainty, and MSIX or AppAttach delivery pressure in the same programme. Cloud cost optimisation Azure VM right-sizing Legacy apps MSIX packaging and deployment Agentic app packaging Application modernisation and migration The 22 routes ## Pick the route that maps to today's blocker. Each card starts from a pressure your team or customer can recognise, then points to the product route and the next practical step. ## Cloud cost optimisation Most organisations do not have a cloud cost problem. They have a visibility and ownership problem. Cloud waste hides across Microsoft 365 licences, oversized Azure resources, idle resources, cloud storage, and reporting gaps, so savings work stalls before action starts. Explore solution› ## Azure VM right-sizing Azure virtual machines often stay sized for yesterday's peak, an old migration assumption, or a cautious launch window. Finance sees the monthly charge, but IT needs workload evidence, ownership, and a safe action path before resizing compute. Explore solution› ## Microsoft 365 licence management and offboarding Licence allocation, user lifecycle changes, and offboarding are often handled as separate tasks. That creates shelfware, missed reclaim opportunities, inconsistent access removal, and weak audit evidence when users join, move, or leave. Explore solution› ## Microsoft 365 for MSPs MSPs manage many customer Microsoft 365 estates, but QBR reporting, licence reclaim, security evidence, and service delivery often depend on separate spreadsheets, portal exports, and senior engineer judgement. Explore solution› ## Microsoft 365 security and conformity Security baselines, overlay catalogues, Secure Score, Copilot readiness, and Zero Trust coverage sit across different admin centres, reports, and spreadsheets. Teams struggle to prove conformity against Microsoft's published baselines, CISA SCuBA, or NSA CISS, and drift between assessment and remediation is rarely visible before an audit or incident. Explore solution› ## ISO compliance and audit readiness Compliance work slows down when policies, assessments, process evidence, procedures, owners, and audit notes live across documents, spreadsheets, and inboxes. Teams need a controlled way to prepare ISO evidence without turning compliance into a one-off scramble. Explore solution› ## Microsoft 365 tenant backup and drift A bad Conditional Access change or a compromised admin does not delete files first; it rewrites tenant configuration. Microsoft's audit log answers "who changed what" for around 30 days and native policy snapshots keep 7 days, so most teams hold no lasting copy of the layer that actually controls access. Explore solution› ## SMB AI assistant Small business owners carry too many repeat questions, admin tasks, policy notes, and customer replies themselves. Generic AI can help, but it often feels too open-ended and does not turn everyday work into reusable business output. Explore solution› ## Microsoft 365 Copilot readiness Copilot rollouts stall when sharing, licensing, or labelling gaps only surface at go-live. Readiness signals across licensing, data governance, sensitivity labels, sharing posture, and Purview coverage sit in different admin centres and rarely land in one place before deployment, so remediation happens post-launch when it is slower and more visible. Explore solution› ## Agentic operations IT and MSP teams want AI to move repeat work forward, but unmanaged agents create risk when context, approvals, scripts, and evidence are not controlled. Explore solution› ## IT operations and compliance IT and compliance teams face repeat questions, troubleshooting load, documentation gaps, and audit pressure, but generic AI tools create data-control concerns and manual work still absorbs specialist time. Explore solution› ## Intune reporting, drift, and device troubleshooting Intune surfaces device state through separate reports, and tenant configuration drift, failing compliance, patch gaps, Windows 11 readiness blockers, and BitLocker or Defender issues are often discovered one device at a time. Teams rebuild the same evidence for every review, every audit, and every escalation. Explore solution› ## Windows 365 and Cloud PC Windows 365 programmes stall when design, deployment, configuration, and day-two control each sit in a different admin centre. The Microsoft 365 admin center, Intune, Azure portal, and Windows 365 views each show part of the picture. Cohort design gets compressed, rollout waves hit unclear assumptions, Cloud PC configuration drifts once the estate is live, and migration baselines from Azure Virtual Desktop or older virtual desktop infrastructure rarely join the same operating record. Explore solution› ## Windows 365 migration VDI exits stall when source cloud desktops, users, snapshots, scheduling, and post-migration cleanup are managed as separate manual tasks. Azure Virtual Desktop, AVD personal desktops, standalone Azure VMs, and custom image paths each need validation before they can land safely in Windows 365. Explore solution› ## Legacy apps Old line-of-business apps still drive the business, but the install media has been lost for years, the vendor portal is gated or gone, and nobody is sure if the software will run on Windows 11 or a Cloud PC. Migration programmes stall while teams hunt for installers that may never turn up. Explore solution› ## Omnissa App Volumes migration A Horizon or Omnissa App Volumes platform refresh gets planned, but the applications on it, often packaged years ago as ThinApp or a native install, are the part nobody wants to touch. The original ThinApp sequencer project or installer media is usually long gone. Explore solution› ## Citrix application modernisation A Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops or DaaS refresh gets planned, but several published applications were packaged as App-V years ago, or as a native install with the original media long gone, and nobody wants to be the one who breaks a working session-host app. Explore solution› ## Parallels RAS application packaging A Parallels RAS estate still delivers legacy Win32 applications that predate RAS 19's Application Packages feature, with installer media that's frequently missing and no in-house MSIX packaging capacity to close the gap. Explore solution› ## MSIX packaging and deployment [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/agentic-app-packaging # Agentic App Packaging for Intune and MSIX - EfficientEther > EtherApps Forge packages apps through AI-led VM capture and controlled review, producing MSIX, MSI, and Intune-ready outputs for modern Windows delivery. The problem What changes How it works Questions Book a fit check› Try it free› Solution ## Agentic app packaging for modern Windows delivery. Use EtherApps Forge for agentic app packaging with Foundry-backed orchestration to capture applications in a controlled virtual machine, choose the right package route, and prepare MSIX, MSI, PowerShell App Deployment Toolkit, and Intune-ready outputs for review. Try it free› Book a packaging fit check› 7-day free trial of the full workflow · licences include training and support No credit card. Capture a real application on day one. Explore EtherApps Forge Agentic app packaging0:36 0:00 / 0:36 Read the transcript 0:00 Every app in the backlog needs a decision. 0:04 Which route? Which script? Which metadata? 0:08 Ask in plain English. The agent drives Forge, one real tool call at a time. 0:15 It inspects the capture and recommends the route. 0:20 Then it prepares the package, the scripts and the Intune metadata. 0:25 Nothing ships until your team approves it. 0:30 Start with one difficult application. Try Forge free. VM-based capture and package from a controlled Windows environment 4 outputs MSIX, MSI, PSADT, and Intune-ready package paths Reviewed agentic workflow with human approval before release The problem ## Packaging stays slow when the decision work is still manual. Packaging teams are asked to move faster while dealing with missing installers, unclear dependencies, and multiple deployment targets. Traditional tools still leave skilled packagers to decide the route, rebuild scripts, prepare Intune metadata, and document the decision manually. ## Installer media is missing or unreliable Many useful applications only exist as installed footprints on old machines. A VM-based capture route gives the team a practical starting point when clean source media is gone. ## The output route is not obvious MSIX, MSI, PSADT, and Intune-ready packages each fit different deployment paths. The agent helps recommend the right route before rework starts. ## Packaging judgement is scarce Experienced packagers still make the final call, but agentic triage can remove repetitive inspection, script preparation, and metadata work from the critical path. ## Teams need control, not black-box release The workflow keeps human review and evidence around the package route, generated artefacts, and release readiness before anything reaches users. What changes ## What changes ## Package from a controlled VM Start with the application as it runs, capture the footprint in a controlled Windows environment, and reduce dependency on perfect source installers. ## Let the agent inspect before packaging Use Foundry-backed orchestration to analyse application state, dependencies, and destination requirements before the package route is chosen. ## Prepare the right output Create MSIX, MSI, PowerShell App Deployment Toolkit, or Intune-ready package paths from the same capture-led workflow. ## Keep reviewer sign-off Give the packaging team a reviewable decision trail and release checkpoint, rather than asking an agent to publish without control. ## Capture from running systems Live-capture wizard: file, registry, AppData, services, and dependency capture from a running Windows system when installer media is missing or incomplete. Start here ## Start with one difficult application. See this working on your own tenant. Try it free› Book a packaging fit check› Explore MSIX packaging› The AI controller ## AI-led route choice before packaging starts. Forge's AI controller inspects the captured application state, recommends MSIX, MSI, PowerShell App Deployment Toolkit, or Intune-ready output, and prepares scripts and metadata. The packaging team keeps the final approval before release. The AI controller1:33 Walkthrough3:30 Walkthrough ## See Forge packaging in action. A focused walkthrough of VM capture, AI-assisted route selection, signing, manifest fix-ups, and Intune-ready outputs. Feature deep dives ## The packaging workflow, broken down. VM-based capture, MSIX outputs, and MCP integration for external orchestration. One focused video per area so packaging, endpoint, and automation teams can jump to the part that matters. ## Live capture 1:12 Capture a running Windows application from a controlled VM: files, registry, AppData, services, and dependencies, without installer media. ## MSIX outputs 1:08 Produce signed MSIX, AppAttach, IntuneWin, and MSI packages from one capture, ready for Intune, AVD, and Cloud PC delivery. ## MCP integration 1:36 Drive Forge from your own AI orchestrator through the Forge MCP server: a tool-integration interface for external agents and pipelines. Separate from Forge's internal AI controller. Live capture1:12 How we deliver it ## Product mapping This route is led by EtherApps Forge. Forge supplies the VM-based capture and packaging workflow; Microsoft Foundry-backed agentic orchestration helps inspect application state, choose the package route, generate scripts and metadata, and prepare outputs for review. Use the MSIX page when the buyer is specifically searching for MSIX, signing, or App Attach. Use application modernisation when the buyer is planning a broader migration programme. ## Where this route fits best Packaging backlogs where installers are missing and the installed application footprint is the only reliable source. Intune migration projects that need repeatable package preparation, install commands, detection logic, and deployment metadata. Windows 11, Azure Virtual Desktop, or Cloud PC readiness work where application blockers are delaying the rollout plan. MSP packaging-factory operations that need a repeatable workflow across multiple customer estates. Teams moving from manual packaging triage to a controlled AI-assisted packaging pipeline. Capture installed Windows applications, reduce packaging unknowns, and produce modern deployment-ready outputs faster. Try it free› Learn more about EtherApps Forge 7-day free trial of the full workflow · licences include training and support 90.68%1 of 3,261 cases produced an MSIX package Microsoft Marketplace Buy on the Microsoft invoice you already pay ISO 27001, 9001, 42001 Certified for information security, quality, and AI management Questions ## Questions teams usually ask before an agentic packaging pilot. Keep the evaluation grounded in VM capture, package-route choice, Intune readiness, and human review before release. Ask us on a packaging fit check ## What does agentic app packaging mean? ## What does agentic app packaging mean? It means the packaging workflow uses an AI agent to inspect a controlled virtual machine capture, reason over application behaviour, recommend the package route, and prepare outputs for review. The package is still approved by a human before release. ## How is this different from MSIX packaging? ## How is this different from MSIX packaging? MSIX packaging is a specific output route. Agentic app packaging is the wider orchestration layer that helps decide whether an app should become MSIX, MSI, PowerShell App Deployment Toolkit, or an Intune-ready package. ## Does the agent publish packages without review? ## Does the agent publish packages without review? No. The intended workflow keeps a reviewer checkpoint before release. The agent accelerates capture analysis, route selection, script preparation, and metadata work, while the packaging team keeps control. ## Which outputs are in scope? ## Which outputs are in scope? The route is built around MSIX, MSI, PowerShell App Deployment Toolkit, and Intune-ready outputs. MSIX App Attach and wider migration routes still connect back to the dedicated MSIX and application modernisation solution pages. ## What happens if the AI-recommended package route turns out to be wrong? ## What happens if the AI-recommended package route turns out to be wrong? [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/agentic-app-packaging] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/agentic-operations # Agentic Operations for MSPs and IT Teams - EfficientEther > EtherAssist runs repeat IT workflows across client estates with named approvals and audit-ready records, keeping senior tech hours off low-value tickets. Solution ## Stop gathering the background on every repeat ticket. Use agentic AI for IT operations to give L1 techs the background on tickets you've already solved. Triage runs the same way every time, across every client, without a senior engineer touching it - and nothing reaches a client environment without a named sign-off, so the liability stays with the person, not the AI. Try it free› Book an operations workflow review› Explore EtherAssist› 14-day free trial No credit card. Choose UK, EU, or US hosting on day one. One workflow runs across every client - no cross-tenant mistakes, no rebuilding from scratch A name on every change so when a client or acquirer asks who approved it, you have an answer, not a shrug A change log on demand when an auditor asks what changed in a tenant, you pull a record - you don't rebuild one The problem ## What it actually costs you today. Your techs are fast. But every repeat ticket still takes 20 minutes of background work before anyone touches it. Multiply that across 30 clients and it's where your margin disappears. And when a client escalates or an auditor asks what changed in their tenant, your team is reverse-engineering Slack and ticket notes instead of pulling a record. ## Repeat work eats senior time Your best engineers still gather background on tickets you've solved a dozen times, hours you can't bill at senior rates. ## Ungoverned AI lands on your E&O If a generic AI tool goes sideways in a client tenant, the incident lands on your NOC documentation, and potentially your E&O. ## Audit trails get reconstructed too late When a client asks for a change log, your team reverse-engineers Slack messages and ticket notes, a compliance and trust problem at once. ## Due diligence sees everything If you're positioning your MSP for acquisition or carrying SOC 2 or ISO clients, your operational documentation is part of your valuation. What changes ## What changes ## Repeat tickets stop costing senior hours Your L1 tech opens a ticket and the workflow has already pulled the relevant background, flagged the classification, and drafted the next step. So your senior engineer reviews a recommendation, not a blank page. ## Every action has a name on it Every workflow moves through real steps: who's assigned, who approved, what ran, and what the output was. So you can hand a client a clean record instead of an explanation. ## Audit evidence already exists Every run logs the decision, the approver, and the output as it happens. When a client or auditor asks, you're not reconstructing history. You're pulling a record. ## More volume at the same headcount Your team handles more ticket volume at the same headcount. The human sign-off stays. The margin drain doesn't - and you're not the one explaining a change when something goes wrong. Start here ## Pick one repeat workflow. Start there. See this working on your own tenant. Try it free› Book an operations workflow review› Explore IT operations› How the workflow runs ## Same workflow, every client. No cross-tenant mistakes. A ticket or finding starts a run inside one client's environment. The workflow pulls the background, drafts the next step, and waits for a named technician to approve it. The action runs, the evidence captures, and the record is already there when a client or auditor asks what changed. Walkthrough ## See repeat work move at MSP scale. Watch EtherAssist take a repeat ticket from L1 triage to approved action, with the change log captured along the way. How we deliver it ## Is this the right starting point? If repeat tickets are where your senior hours are disappearing, start here. If you're not sure yet that triage is the bottleneck, book an operations workflow review - it surfaces where the hours are actually going before you commit. If the trigger is a licence gap, a device posture issue, or a Cloud PC finding that needs a named owner, start with the visibility side of the platform; the action handoff lands back here once someone signs off. EtherAssist gives IT and compliance teams the speed of AI without giving up data control, auditability, or practical governance. It supports troubleshooting, scripting, documentation, policy work, and repeatable internal support workflows. Learn more about EtherAssist Where this fits Service-desk triage where the same client tickets keep landing on senior engineers because the background has to be gathered every time. Remediation work where a tech needs to act fast but you need a record of what changed and who signed off. Recurring work across your client base that your team shouldn't be setting up from scratch every time. Compliance and policy work where the evidence has to exist when the client or auditor asks, not after. When a licence, device, posture, or Cloud PC issue surfaces in a client's environment and someone needs to act on it - with their name on the record. FAQ ## What MSP owners ask before piloting this. The question isn't whether AI saves time. It's whether the time savings show up in your utilisation numbers, and whether you can defend every action it took to a client or an auditor. Does this actually change my revenue-per-technician number? It changes what your L1 and L2 techs can complete without escalating. When repeat tickets stop pulling senior hours into background-gathering, utilisation shifts and you handle more client volume before the headcount line moves. Will it act autonomously inside a client tenant? No. Every action that touches a client environment goes through a named technician's approval. EtherAssist prepares the work; your team owns the outcome. That's deliberate, because the alternative lands on your E&O. How is this different from giving my techs ChatGPT? A general AI tool answers prompts. It doesn't know which tenant it's in, doesn't keep a record, and doesn't ask for approval. If something breaks, you're explaining a chat log to a client. EtherAssist runs inside the estate it was opened for and logs every step as it happens. Where does EtherInsights fit? EtherInsights surfaces what's wrong across your client estates: licence drift, posture issues, Intune, Windows 365, and security findings. EtherAssist takes the ones worth acting on and turns them into a workflow with an owner, an approver, and a record. Microsoft now ships an admin agent natively in Copilot Chat. Why pay for this? The native Microsoft 365 Admin agent is scoped to one admin operating their own tenant, one action at a time, with no MSP multi-tenant model, no named-approval-before-a-client-environment-changes workflow, and no cross-client evidence or run history. EtherAssist is built for the agentic IT operations and AITSM shape an MSP actually runs: the same workflow reused across every client tenant, a named technician's sign-off on anything that touches a client environment, and one audit trail your whole book of business can point to, not one admin's own tenant. How is tenant isolation actually enforced, not just claimed? Each workflow run is scoped to a single client's tenant using the same delegated-access model Microsoft's own tooling relies on for MSPs, granular delegated admin privileges (GDAP), not a shared cross-client session. A workflow reused across clients is the same logic re-applied per tenant, never one run touching more than one estate at once. Does the audit trail actually hold up for a SOC 2 or ISO 27001 review? The run history captures what a reviewer expects: the approver's name, the action taken, and a timestamp, the same shape as the audit logging Microsoft's own Copilot governance model produces for enterprise agents. It's evidence you can hand over, not a substitute for your ISMS or a formal SOC 2 report; certification decisions stay with your auditor. ## Agentic operations governance sources Reviewed 25 August 2026. Microsoft Copilot Studio: Security and governance Microsoft 365 Copilot Control System: Security and governance Microsoft Entra: Cross-tenant delegated administration ## Related solutions IT operations and complianceSupport day-two IT operations faster without losing control. [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/agentic-operations] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/application-modernisation-and-migration # Application Modernisation and Migration - EfficientEther > Capture legacy Windows applications, reduce packaging uncertainty, and move into modern deployment workflows faster. The problem What changes How it works Questions Book a fit check› Try it free› Solution ## Keep legacy applications moving when packaging becomes the blocker. EtherApps Forge-led application modernisation and migration helps Windows estates assess, repackage, and move legacy apps to Windows 11, Intune, MSIX, and App Attach. Try it free› Book a demo› 7-day free trial of the full workflow · licences include training and support No credit card. Capture a real application on day one. The app nobody can reinstall0:45 0:00 / 0:45 Read the transcript 0:00 Every company has one. 0:04 No vendor. No installer. And Windows 10 has ended. 0:08 But it still has to run. 0:10 Forge captures it from the PC where it still runs, in the app, from the command line or with your AI agent. 0:18 One signed MSIX, validated and tested. 0:25 The same app, on Windows 11 and Server 2025. 0:29 The old PC can finally retire. 0:32 We tested Forge on 3,261 app cases. 0:36 More than nine in ten built an MSIX. 0:40 Bring yours. Try Forge free, no card. Capture-first workflow when installer media is missing or incomplete Portfolio-wide migration readiness across the legacy application estate 4 outputs MSIX, MSI, IntuneWin, AppAttach from one capture The problem ## The migration plan is often fine. Application readiness is the blocker. Legacy applications become migration blockers when installer media is missing, packaging routes are unclear, or teams cannot see the real application footprint early enough in the programme. ## Installer media is missing or incomplete Legacy applications often survive long after the clean installer is gone, which means packaging work starts with uncertainty instead of a clear route. Forge can capture the installed footprint from a running system when the original media is missing. ## Packaging decisions are delayed by poor visibility If teams cannot see files, services, registry changes, or AppData dependencies clearly, route decisions become slower and riskier. ## Modern outputs still need an execution path MSIX, Intune, and App Attach may be the destination, but the real blocker is choosing and delivering the route from the live application footprint. The same capture can support MSIX, MSI, IntuneWin, and AppAttach outputs where they fit the target estate. What changes ## Outcome blocks ## Faster application readiness Reduce migration delays caused by missing installer media, packaging backlog, and conversion complexity. Package work can start from a controlled VM or reference machine, then move through review before release. ## Improved delivery predictability Increase confidence in wave planning by reducing unknowns in application preparation earlier. ## Lower operational drag on migration teams Give endpoint and release teams clearer packaging throughput and dependency control. ## Capture from running systems Live-capture wizard: file, registry, AppData, services, and dependency capture from a running Windows system when installer media is missing or incomplete. Start here ## Accelerate migration by resolving app blockers first See this working on your own tenant. Try it free› Book a demo› The modernisation view ## Legacy estate to modern delivery in five clear stages. Discover and inventory the legacy estate, capture each application from a live system (files, registry, dependencies), convert and sign through EtherApps Forge, and route into modern delivery: MSIX for Windows 11, AppAttach for AVD, IntuneWin for Intune, or MSI for legacy targets. Legacy Windows App Files Registry Services Dependencies Installer often missing Live capture EtherApps Forge Capture Fix up Convert and sign One capture, four formats Intune · AVD · Windows 365 MSIXWindows 11 and Intune AppAttachAzure Virtual Desktop IntuneWinEndpoint deployment MSILegacy targets How we deliver it ## Product mapping This route is led by EtherApps Forge as the capture-first route into modern packaging and deployment-ready outputs, with optional support from other portfolio components where wider planning context is needed. Teams can start with a 7-day Forge trial on one real packaging blocker. Capture installed Windows applications, reduce packaging unknowns, and produce modern deployment-ready outputs faster. Try it free› Learn more about EtherApps Forge 7-day free trial of the full workflow · licences include training and support 90.68%1 of 3,261 cases produced an MSIX package Microsoft Marketplace Buy on the Microsoft invoice you already pay ISO 27001, 9001, 42001 Certified for information security, quality, and AI management Questions ## Application modernisation FAQ Short answers for IT, endpoint, and packaging teams planning Windows 11, Intune, MSIX, App Attach, or legacy app migration work. Ask us on a packaging fit check ## What is application modernisation? ## What is application modernisation? Application modernisation is the work of assessing legacy applications, choosing the right package route, and preparing them for current Windows delivery. In this route, EtherApps Forge captures the running application footprint, then helps produce MSIX, MSI, IntuneWin, or AppAttach outputs where suitable for Windows 11, Intune, AVD, or Cloud PC delivery. ## How do I move legacy Windows apps to Windows 11? ## How do I move legacy Windows apps to Windows 11? Start by inventorying the app estate, identifying missing installers and compatibility blockers, then package each app into the route that fits the deployment target. Forge supports capture-first packaging, signing, manifest fix-ups, Intune-ready output, and App Attach paths so Windows 11 migration is not blocked by every legacy application. ## What if the original installer is missing? ## What if the original installer is missing? A missing installer is not always a blocker. Forge can capture a live installation from a working machine or controlled VM, including files, registry, AppData, services, and dependencies. That capture can then be reviewed and turned into modern package outputs without waiting for a vendor re-download. ## What if the app runs on Windows but breaks once it is packaged? ## What if the app runs on Windows but breaks once it is packaged? That is common with older applications, and it is normally a container behaviour problem rather than a broken app. Writing files next to the executable, assuming a fixed install path, or reading a machine registry location all behave differently inside MSIX. Forge stages the Package Support Framework to correct those cases with file and registry redirection and working-directory fix-ups, so the application runs as expected without a code change or a vendor rebuild. ## Does this only cover legacy apps, or can we package software we build ourselves? ## Does this only cover legacy apps, or can we package software we build ourselves? Both. Alongside capture-first packaging for legacy applications, the forge_msix CLI is a drop-in replacement for Microsoft's makeappx.exe, so a development team or software vendor can turn a build folder into a signed, validated MSIX inside an existing CI pipeline. Estates modernising a mix of bought-in and internally built software use the same packaging route for both. ## MSIX or App Attach: which should I use? ## MSIX or App Attach: which should I use? MSIX is the modern package format for Windows delivery, while App Attach is used for Azure Virtual Desktop app delivery where it fits the environment. Forge helps choose the output route per application, with MSIX, MSI, IntuneWin, and AppAttach outputs available from the same capture-led workflow. ## Is there an application packaging tool built for MSPs managing multiple client tenants? ## Is there an application packaging tool built for MSPs managing multiple client tenants? [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/application-modernisation-and-migration] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/azure-vm-right-sizing # Azure VM Right-Sizing Recommendations - EfficientEther > Get free Azure VM right-sizing recommendations: find oversized and idle VMs, estimate savings, and turn compute waste into owner-backed evidence. Solution ## Right-size Azure virtual machines before yesterday's peak becomes tomorrow's bill. Azure VMs are often left sized for migration, launch, or worst-case demand. EtherInsights helps teams spot oversized and idle compute, validate safe changes, and produce savings evidence owners can act on. Review Azure VM sizing› Try it free› See cloud cost optimisation› From £0.79 per active user/month · 14-day free trial Card required to start. Connect your tenant in minutes. 10-20% recurring Azure savings often available from right-sizing and reclaim Owner-led each resize candidate needs a technical owner and decision trail Evidence first utilisation, cost, and dependency context before change Updated 14 August 2026 ## Get a ballpark right-sizing estimate Enter your current monthly Azure VM spend for a rough planning range. The calculator’s default assumption is that right-sizing and reclaim recover 10-20% of VM spend where sizing has never been reviewed, and less where it was reviewed recently; adjust the review answer to match your estate. This is a quick planning number, not an audit: connect your tenant for the real figure, backed by evidence. Current monthly Azure VM spend £ When were these VMs last reviewed for sizing?Never reviewedReviewed a while agoReviewed recently Enter your monthly spend above to see an estimate. Illustrative only: the range comes from the calculator’s default assumptions, not from your actual usage, reservations, or discounts. What drives the low and high end is how long your VMs have run without a sizing review and how many unattached disks and stale snapshots have built up. Connect your tenant in EtherInsights to get your real number, with utilisation evidence and an owner-backed action list. Get my real number free› The problem ## Azure VMs stay oversized because nobody wants to break production for a small-looking saving. Azure virtual machines often stay sized for yesterday's peak, an old migration assumption, or a cautious launch window. Finance sees the monthly charge, but IT needs workload evidence, ownership, and a safe action path before resizing compute. ## Sized for an old peak Compute was increased for a migration, launch, test cycle, or seasonal spike, then never reviewed against current utilisation. ## Evidence is split Cost, CPU, memory, uptime, owner, and workload context sit in separate views, so resize decisions take longer than they should. ## Risk slows action Teams hesitate to resize, shut down, or schedule VMs when the dependency picture is unclear or nobody owns the final decision. What changes ## Turn compute waste into controlled actions. ## Prioritised right-size candidates Surface VMs where cost and utilisation suggest the current SKU no longer fits the workload. ## Owner-backed review Attach each candidate to the right technical or service owner before the change becomes a ticket or governance action. ## Savings evidence Keep before-and-after cost, decision notes, and follow-up evidence ready for finance, IT leadership, and MSP review. Start here ## Find the VMs that are still charging for an old assumption. See this working on your own tenant. Review Azure VM sizing› Try it free› Explore EtherInsights› ## Guides and analysis on this topic Step-by-step Azure VM right-sizing guide Why idle Azure resources keep billing Azure budgets, alerts and tags that stick The VM sizing view ## Move from high bills to safe compute decisions. EtherInsights connects cost, utilisation, ownership, and review evidence so VM changes are not treated as blind cost cuts. Resize, schedule, reserve, or keep decisions land with context. Solution brief ## Azure Cost and Waste Solution Brief Two pages on this decision: what to measure, who has to sign it off, and what should be true before you commit. Free, and written to be forwarded. Get the solution brief› Video walkthrough ## See Azure cost evidence in context. Use the cloud cost walkthrough to see how Azure spend, right-sizing evidence, and owner-backed actions fit inside the wider savings review. Identify oversized and idle compute. Separate safe changes from risky assumptions. Keep VM savings inside the wider cost-control rhythm. How we deliver it ## EtherInsights leads the sizing review. Use EtherInsights when Azure VM cost needs more than a bill export: utilisation evidence, owner context, right-size candidates, idle compute signals, and savings reports. Use the broader cloud cost optimisation route when the review also covers licences, storage, Cloud PCs, reservations, or subscription ownership. EtherInsights is the operating view for Microsoft 365, Azure, and Windows 365: day-to-day cost management, licence control, and full Windows 365 Cloud PC lifecycle management, plus tenant, user, security, device, and Intune reporting. Learn more about EtherInsights Where this fits Azure subscriptions with virtual machines sized for old migration or launch assumptions. Development, test, or project VMs that may be idle, oversized, or always-on unnecessarily. MSP or internal FinOps reviews that need owner-backed evidence before resize actions. Finance-led cost reviews where Azure compute spend needs a defensible technical action plan. FAQ ## Questions IT and finance ask about Azure VM sizing. Plain answers on spotting oversized virtual machines, choosing a new SKU with confidence, automating the review, and keeping the evidence an approver will ask for. What is Azure VM right-sizing? Right-sizing means matching each Azure virtual machine to the work it actually does, rather than the size it was first deployed at. Most estates carry VMs picked during a migration or a project peak and never revisited, so they run at a fraction of their capacity while billing at full rate. Right-sizing moves them to a smaller SKU, or shuts down the ones nothing is using. How do I right-size an Azure VM step by step? Collect at least two weeks of CPU, memory, disk and network metrics so a quiet fortnight does not mislead you. Rank instances by the gap between provisioned and used capacity. Pick a candidate SKU in the same family to keep the workload profile predictable. Confirm the change with the application owner, schedule it in a maintenance window, then re-measure after a full business cycle. How do I find oversized Azure VMs? Look for sustained low CPU and memory against provisioned capacity, disks far larger than the data on them, and machines with no recent sign-in or session activity. Azure Advisor surfaces some of this. EtherInsights adds the part that usually stalls the work: it names an owner for each candidate and tracks the saving from recommendation through to approval. Can Azure right-sizing be automated? The analysis can be fully automated, and it should be, because it is a continuous measurement problem rather than a one off audit. The resize itself is better kept human approved. An automatic downsize on a workload with a seasonal peak or an undocumented dependency is how right-sizing programmes lose the trust of application owners. What metrics should I use to size an Azure VM? Percentile values, not averages. A machine averaging twenty percent CPU can still hit ninety five percent at month end, and an average hides that completely. Use P95 for CPU and memory across a full billing cycle, add disk IOPS and throughput for data workloads, and check network for anything chatty. Does right-sizing apply to Azure App Service? Yes, and it is often overlooked because App Service plans are bought once and rarely revisited. Look at the plan tier against actual request volume and memory use, consolidate underused apps onto a shared plan, and scale down non production slots. The method is the same as VMs even though the levers differ. How much can Azure VM right-sizing save? It depends entirely on how much of the estate was sized during a migration and never reviewed, so a headline percentage is not useful. Measure your own tenant instead. The honest way to size the prize is to rank candidates by monthly cost and only count the ones an owner has agreed to change. What is the difference between right-sizing and reserved instances? [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/azure-vm-right-sizing] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/citrix-application-modernisation # Citrix App-V to MSIX Migration - EfficientEther > Modernise your Citrix estate: capture legacy and App-V apps, convert to signed MSIX, and keep native Citrix MSIX app attach delivery. The problem What changes How it works Questions Book a fit check› Try it free› Solution ## Modernise the applications on your Citrix estate, not just the platform. Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops and Citrix DaaS deliver MSIX packages and MSIX app attach natively. The platform side of a Citrix refresh is usually well understood; the applications running on it, some packaged as App-V years ago, others with the installer long gone, are the part that stalls migration. EtherApps Forge captures those applications from a live install, even when the original installer is missing, and produces a signed MSIX or MSI that Citrix delivers the same way it always has. Book a Citrix app review› Try it free› 7-day free trial of the full workflow · licences include training and support No credit card. Capture a real application on day one. Explore EtherApps Forge Citrix apps to MSIX0:31 0:00 / 0:31 Read the transcript 0:00 The Citrix refresh is planned. The apps are not. 0:04 Packaged as App-V years ago, and the installer is long gone. 0:08 Forge captures each app where it still runs. From the app, the command line, or your AI agent. 0:15 One signed MSIX, validated and tested. 0:19 Citrix already delivers MSIX natively, so there is nothing to rebuild. 0:25 Modernise the apps, not just the platform. Try Forge free. No rebuild Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops already delivers MSIX and MSIX app attach natively No installer rescue legacy and App-V apps when installation media is lost or the vendor portal is gated Low cost, self-serve a 7-day Forge trial on one real app instead of a partner-led packaging project The problem ## Why the application backlog survives every Citrix refresh. Plain version: the Citrix environment gets refreshed or consolidated, but several published applications were packaged as App-V years ago, or as a plain native install with the original media long gone, and nobody wants to be the one who breaks a working session-host app. IT version: a Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops or DaaS estate carries a backlog of App-V and native-install applications with unclear dependencies, uncertain behaviour under multi-session isolation, and no fast route to a modern package format. Both versions need the same answer: capture what is actually installed, convert it to a package Citrix already knows how to deliver, and do it without a full repackaging project per app. ## App-V packages are ageing out App-V was Citrix's most common packaging route for years before MSIX became the modern standard. The original sequencer project is often long gone, leaving a working App-V package that nobody can safely rebuild or extend. ## The installer for the underlying app is missing Whether the app was originally delivered as App-V, a native install, or a published desktop app, the source installer frequently disappeared years before anyone needed to repackage it, so a from-scratch rebuild starts with detective work, not packaging. ## Session-host behaviour makes teams cautious An app that works fine in App-V isolation can behave differently once containerised as MSIX on a multi-session VDA, so packaging teams often delay the move rather than risk breaking a published app that hundreds of users depend on. ## Repackaging looks like a bigger project than the platform refresh Teams will happily plan a Citrix version upgrade or DaaS migration, but a parallel repackaging project for every legacy or App-V app on the estate is enough to make the whole migration slip, especially when packaging skills are scarce. What changes ## What good looks like after the assessment ## A real inventory of what each App-V or legacy package actually does Forge captures the application's files, registry, services, and dependencies from a live install, whatever format it currently ships in, giving you a documented footprint instead of a package nobody wants to open. ## A signed MSIX or MSI, ready for Citrix The capture becomes a signed MSIX or MSI package. Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops and Citrix DaaS deliver MSIX and MSIX app attach natively today, so there's no Citrix-specific packaging format to learn. ## A modernisation path that doesn't block the platform refresh Legacy and App-V applications stop being the reason a Citrix version upgrade or DaaS migration gets delayed, because the application side of the work runs on its own track. ## A lower-cost route than a partner-led packaging project A 7-day EtherApps Forge trial on one real application tests the approach before committing to a wider repackaging programme, instead of starting with a quote-only packaging engagement. ## Capture from running systems Live-capture wizard: file, registry, AppData, services, and dependency capture from a running Windows system when installer media is missing or incomplete. Start here ## Stop letting the application backlog hold back the Citrix refresh. See this working on your own tenant. Book a Citrix app review› Try it free› Where Forge fits on a Citrix estate ## Capture the application, not the platform, then let Citrix deliver it as it always has. Forge captures the installed application footprint from a live machine or controlled VM, whether it currently ships as App-V, a native install, or something undocumented. That capture becomes a signed MSIX or MSI, which Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops delivers through its native MSIX and MSIX app attach support, no Citrix-specific packaging format required. App-V / Legacy Install Files Registry Services Dependencies Installer often missing Live capture EtherApps Forge Capture Fix up Convert and sign Signed MSIX or MSI Citrix Virtual Apps / DaaS Native MSIX delivery MSIX app attach No Citrix-specific format Walkthrough1:13 Walkthrough ## See the same capture-first packaging that feeds Citrix, Omnissa App Volumes, and Parallels RAS. A short walkthrough of legacy app capture from a working machine, package output, and a Windows 11 compatibility verdict - the same signed MSI and MSIX output that Citrix, Omnissa App Volumes, and Parallels RAS all deliver natively. How we deliver it ## How EfficientEther covers this route EtherApps Forge leads. Forge captures the application directly from a live install, whatever format it currently ships in (App-V, native install, or an existing published desktop app), and produces a signed MSIX or MSI from that capture. Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops and Citrix DaaS already deliver MSIX and MSIX app attach natively, so the output publishes the same way any other Citrix-delivered application does today, once the Citrix Personalization component is in place on the VDA and the package sits on a UNC, SMB, or Azure File Share. EtherInsights joins where the same programme also needs broader Windows 365 or Azure Virtual Desktop migration planning alongside the Citrix modernisation work. ## Where this route fits best Ageing App-V packages with no available sequencer project: capture from a live install and convert to MSIX or MSI instead of rebuilding the sequence from scratch. Citrix version upgrades or DaaS migrations stalled by application uncertainty: modernise the application backlog on its own track so the platform refresh isn't blocked. Native-install applications published through Citrix with lost installer media: rescue from a working machine the same way as any other legacy app. Multi-session VDA compatibility checks: verify how a captured app behaves under Citrix's shared session-host model before a wider rollout. MSP-managed Citrix estates needing a repeatable, lower-cost packaging pass across several customer tenants. Estates planning a future move to Windows 365 or Azure Virtual Desktop alongside Citrix, where the same MSIX or MSI capture carries forward. Capture installed Windows applications, reduce packaging unknowns, and produce modern deployment-ready outputs faster. Try it free› Learn more about EtherApps Forge 7-day free trial of the full workflow · licences include training and support 90.68%1 of 3,261 cases produced an MSIX package Microsoft Marketplace Buy on the Microsoft invoice you already pay ISO 27001, 9001, 42001 Certified for information security, quality, and AI management [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/citrix-application-modernisation] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/cloud-cost-optimisation # Microsoft 365 and Azure Cost Optimisation - EfficientEther > Microsoft 365 cost optimisation across licences, Azure spend and Cloud PC capacity. Find the waste, name the owner, act on a monthly savings report. Solution ## Microsoft 365 cost optimisation across licences, Azure, and Cloud PCs. You are paying every month for unused licences, oversized Azure resources, cloud storage, and stranded Windows 365 capacity. The bill will not tell you which ones. Each leaver seat and idle VM keeps charging until someone finds it, prices it, and owns the fix. EtherInsights finds the waste, names the owner, and turns it into savings you can act on next week. Get my savings report› Try it free› Estimate my reclaimable Azure spend› From £0.79 per active user/month · 14-day free trial Card required to start. Connect your tenant in minutes. Seat by seat every inactive or over-specified licence priced at its own plan rate, not a headline percentage Per resource oversized VMs, unattached disks, and idle services shown with utilisation and before-and-after cost 1 week target from read-only tenant access to your first prioritised savings report Updated 29 August 2026 ## Get a ballpark right-sizing estimate Enter your current monthly Azure VM spend for a rough planning range. The calculator’s default assumption is that right-sizing and reclaim recover 10-20% of VM spend where sizing has never been reviewed, and less where it was reviewed recently; adjust the review answer to match your estate. This is a quick planning number, not an audit: connect your tenant for the real figure, backed by evidence. Current monthly Azure VM spend £ When were these VMs last reviewed for sizing?Never reviewedReviewed a while agoReviewed recently Enter your monthly spend above to see an estimate. Illustrative only: the range comes from the calculator’s default assumptions, not from your actual usage, reservations, or discounts. What drives the low and high end is how long your VMs have run without a sizing review and how many unattached disks and stale snapshots have built up. Connect your tenant in EtherInsights to get your real number, with utilisation evidence and an owner-backed action list. Get my real number free› How it works ## From tenant access to a savings pipeline in one business week. The first pass is deliberately read-only. Nothing changes in your tenant until you have seen the evidence and decided what is worth acting on. 1 ## Connect read-only EtherInsights reads Microsoft 365, Azure, and Windows 365 signals using delegated read permissions. There is no agent to deploy and no change to your tenant configuration. 2 ## Establish the baseline Licence assignment is matched against real activity, Azure resources against utilisation, and Cloud PC capacity against entitlement. The output is a ranked list of what is being paid for but not used. 3 ## Assign owners and act Each opportunity gets a named owner, an estimated monthly impact, and a target date. Reclaim and right-size actions move through a visible queue instead of sitting in a report nobody owns. 4 ## Report and repeat The savings pack shows before and after figures with a change log. The same review runs monthly or quarterly, so waste that comes back is caught on the next cycle rather than at the next audit. Comparison ## Native admin tooling versus EtherInsights The Microsoft 365 admin centre, Azure Advisor, Cost Management, Microsoft Graph, and PowerShell are capable and already included. For a one-off question they are often the fastest answer. The cost shows up when the work has to run every month, across more than one tenant, with someone accountable for each action. Joining the exports by hand is engineer time you pay for every cycle. Use this table as a first pass before deciding whether tooling earns its place. Capability Microsoft-native tooling EtherInsights Finding inactive users Sign-in and per-service activity reports, exported separately and joined by hand Licence assignment matched to real activity across services in one view, refreshed on a schedule Unassigned and inactive counted together Billing shows purchased against assigned seats; activity sits in a different report Both in a single reclaim queue, so a paid seat cannot hide in the gap between two views Azure right-sizing and reclaim Azure Advisor flags underused VMs and Cost Management shows spend by resource, each in its own blade with no owner attached Advisor and utilisation evidence joined to cost, with a named owner, a target date, and before-and-after figures More than one tenant One tenant at a time, repeated per customer Multi-tenant rollup with per-customer filtering and report packs for MSPs Change over time Point-in-time snapshots; trends need a Log Analytics pipeline or a saved spreadsheet history Trended by default, so drift and seasonal patterns are visible without building a pipeline Ownership and follow-through Reports do not carry an assignee or a due date Every opportunity has a named owner, a target date, and evidence that it closed Evidence for finance Raw exports that need reformatting before a budget conversation A savings pack with before and after figures and a change log that stands up in governance review The problem ## Finance sees the total. Ops sees the line items. Nobody sees the waste clearly enough to act. Microsoft 365 licences, Microsoft 365 Apps, Azure resources, cloud storage, and Windows 365 Cloud PCs live in different admin centres with different owners. The cloud bill shows what was charged, but not what should still exist. A spreadsheet catches up once a quarter. In between, every leaver seat and idle VM keeps charging, and the person who could stop it does not know it is there. ## Fragmented views Licence usage sits in the Microsoft 365 admin centre. Resource cost sits in Azure. Cloud PC utilisation and storage growth sit somewhere else again. Each view is partial, and nobody owns the combined picture. ## Savings without owners Opportunities get surfaced, then stall. Reclaim, right-size, and cloud waste removal work needs a named owner, a deadline, and follow-up evidence. Without those, it slips into next quarter. ## One-off spreadsheets A consultant-led savings sprint helps once. What teams need is a repeatable monthly or quarterly rhythm for cloud spend that survives re-orgs, plan changes, and governance pressure. ## Waste that regenerates Leavers, project spin-ups, plan changes, and pilot seats create new waste every month. A one-off cleanup clears the backlog and does nothing about the rate at which it refills. ## No agreed definition of unused Finance, IT, and the service owner often disagree on what counts as an inactive seat or an idle resource. Without a shared rule and a visible history, every reclaim decision restarts the same argument. What changes ## A measurable monthly savings rhythm, not another dashboard. ## Savings pipeline with named owners Every opportunity has an assignee, an estimated monthly impact, and a target close date. Reclaim, right-size, and cloud waste actions move through a visible queue. Managing cloud cost becomes operational work, not a finance complaint. ## M365 licence reclaim in weeks, not quarters Inactive users, underused SKUs, duplicate premium licences, Microsoft 365 Apps waste, and leaver-cleanup gaps are surfaced automatically with reclaim actions ready for IT to run. ## Azure right-sizing with audit evidence Oversized VMs, idle App Services, unattached disks, stale snapshots, and other expensive cloud resources are flagged with before-and-after cost. A change log supports governance review. ## Storage and Cloud PC waste in the same review SharePoint and OneDrive consumption against the included quota, and Cloud PC capacity against entitlement, sit in the same savings pipeline as licences and Azure. Waste that usually falls between two owners finally gets counted. ## A number finance will accept Savings are reported with before and after figures, the date each action closed, and who signed it off. The total that reaches the budget review is traceable, not estimated. Start here ## Start with a savings report, not a sales cycle. See this working on your own tenant. Get my savings report› Try it free› Explore EtherInsights› ## Guides and analysis on this topic Azure VM right-sizing guide How to find unused Microsoft 365 licences [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/cloud-cost-optimisation] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/intune-reporting-and-troubleshooting # Intune Reporting Tool for Microsoft Intune - EfficientEther > Intune reporting tool for scheduled exports, multi-tenant views, software inventory and audit evidence. Compare native Intune reports with EtherInsights. Solution ## Intune reporting tool for Microsoft Intune. Your Intune data is all there. Getting it out is the cost. The weekly service pack means pulling the compliance, app, update, enrolment, and drift views again and pasting them into a spreadsheet. One failing device means opening the compliance, apps, updates, and security panes one by one. When the auditor asks how patching moved over the quarter, most native views only show today. EtherInsights is an Intune reporting tool for IT teams and MSPs. Microsoft Intune stays the management source. EtherInsights adds what native reports do not package: scheduled estate summaries, trends across weeks and months, multi-tenant views, software inventory, a per-device timeline, configuration backup, and drift evidence. Show me which devices are failing and why› Try it free› Get the free Intune reporting workbook› From £0.79 per active user/month · 14-day free trial Card required to start. Connect your tenant in minutes. ~30 Intune report families in one operating view, so nobody rebuilds them from separate panes Per-device timeline for compliance, apps, updates, encryption, and risk, so one failing device is one page, not six MSP-ready multi-tenant reporting, exports, and stakeholder summaries with the same structure every cycle Updated 1 September 2026 At a glance ## How EtherInsights compares to native Intune reports and Power BI Microsoft Intune stays the management source, and its native reports answer point-in-time admin questions well. The effort shows up when the same question has to be answered every week, across several customer tenants, or with a quarter of history behind it. Here is what changes per job. The job Native Intune reports or Power BI route With EtherInsights Find out why one device keeps failing an app install Check the device, apps, updates and security panes in turn, then piece the sequence together by hand. One per-device timeline across compliance, apps, updates, encryption, certificates and risk, so a failing device is one page instead of six. Build the same service pack every week Repeat the exports each cycle, or stand up a Log Analytics or Power BI pipeline that someone has to own. Scheduled estate summaries and recurring stakeholder packs with the same structure every cycle. Report across several customer tenants The admin centre is tenant-focused, so each customer is reviewed and exported on its own. Multi-tenant views, customer-level filtering and MSP report packs from one place. Produce evidence for a compliance review Export the relevant reports to CSV, reformat them, and assemble the evidence pack by hand. Audit-ready packs showing the affected users and devices, the assigned owner, and how the number moved. Spot stale or non-compliant devices before users report them Most native views are point-in-time, so drift surfaces when somebody happens to look. Trend comparison across weeks and months, plus configuration drift against a pinned baseline. Hand a manager a report they can read CSV downloads, or a Power BI model your team builds on the Intune Data Warehouse and keeps maintained. Exportable, stakeholder-ready summaries reused in service reviews and QBRs, with no data model to maintain. Comparison ## Native Intune reports vs EtherInsights Native Intune reporting is strong for point-in-time admin questions. EtherInsights packages the same endpoint signals into scheduled, trended, audit-ready evidence. Use this table as a first-pass comparison for an Intune reporting tool evaluation. Capability Native Intune reports EtherInsights Scheduled exports One-off exports; recurring packs need manual rebuilds or a Log Analytics pipeline Scheduled estate reports and recurring stakeholder packs with the same structure every cycle Multi-tenant reporting Tenant-focused admin centre, one customer at a time Multi-tenant views, customer filtering, and MSP report packs Historical retention Varies by report type; many views are point-in-time Reporting snapshots and trend comparison across weeks and months Software inventory visibility Discovered apps and install status per workload view Software inventory and app deployment reporting connected to devices, users, and next actions Troubleshooting depth Signals spread across separate device, app, update, and security panes Per-device timeline across compliance, apps, updates, encryption, certificates, and risk Audit evidence Manual export, reformatting, and evidence assembly Audit-ready report packs with owner context and trend movement Export formats CSV downloads for most report views Exportable, stakeholder-ready summaries reused across service reviews and QBRs The problem ## Where native Intune reporting stops, and what it costs you each cycle. Native Intune reports are good at point-in-time admin questions. They are not built for the recurring work: the weekly service review, the cross-tenant comparison, the device investigation, and the audit question about what changed. Each of those means repeated exports and manual correlation, and the engineer time goes on the same rebuild every cycle. EtherInsights adds the reporting and evidence layer. Microsoft Intune stays the management source. ## Retention windows limit trend evidence Native Intune reporting is excellent for current status. Retention varies by report type and reporting path. That makes long-running audit preparation hard when you need to show how non-compliance, patch backlog, app failures, or enrolment exceptions moved over several service cycles. EtherInsights keeps repeatable reporting snapshots and review-ready summaries. Teams can compare movement across weeks and months, show whether actions worked, and stop rebuilding trend evidence from old exports. ## MSPs need cross-tenant reporting The Intune admin center is tenant-focused. That works for one customer and creates friction for an MSP supporting many. Operators need to see which customers have the highest non-compliance, which update rings are falling behind, and where the same deployment issue repeats. EtherInsights gives MSP teams a multi-tenant reporting layer, customer-level filtering, common report packs, and consistent evidence they can reuse in QBRs and service reviews. ## Scheduled exports need operational packaging Native exports help during an investigation. Recurring stakeholder reporting turns into spreadsheet assembly. The same compliance, app, update, enrolment, and drift views are pulled again each week, reformatted, and pasted into service packs. EtherInsights turns Intune reporting into scheduled summaries you can share, with the same structure, owner context, trend movement, and next action every time. ## Historical trending needs more than a point-in-time report A point-in-time report shows today's device count. Leadership and service owners ask whether things are getting better. EtherInsights adds historical comparison for non-compliant devices, failed deployments, patch progress, enrolment health, and configuration drift. The report shows direction of travel, highlights cohorts that are improving or stuck, and points effort at the risk that is not moving. ## Per-device troubleshooting needs full context One device issue can involve compliance policy, update state, encryption, managed apps, certificates, Defender posture, CVE exposure, and user assignment. When the helpdesk opens each view separately, triage slows down and escalations lose context. EtherInsights puts those signals on one per-device timeline. The team can see what changed, which policies apply, what failed recently, and which evidence to pass to the next resolver group. ## Configuration drift needs baseline evidence Reporting gaps become risk when policies change and nobody can show what moved. A profile edit, an assignment change, or a Conditional Access tweak can explain a support spike, but the evidence is scattered. EtherInsights combines Intune reporting with configuration backup, pinned baselines, and drift visibility. Teams can compare the approved state with the current state, review the change evidence, and prepare a controlled rollback conversation when needed. What changes [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/intune-reporting-and-troubleshooting] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/iso-compliance-and-audit-readiness # ISO 27001 Controls Mapped to Microsoft 365 - EtherAssist > EtherAssist maps ISO 27001:2022 controls to your Microsoft 365 and Azure estate, then prepares audits with evidence, policy drafting, and review. Solution ## ISO compliance and audit readiness with EtherAssist. Use EtherAssist to structure ISO compliance work, draft reviewer-ready policies and procedures, run assessments, prepare audit evidence, and keep ownership visible across controlled compliance workflows. Try it free› Book a compliance workflow review› Explore EtherAssist› 14-day free trial No credit card. Choose UK, EU, or US hosting on day one. ISO-led support for ISO 27001, ISO 9001, ISO 42001, Cyber Essentials, and internal controls Reviewable policies, procedures, assessments, and evidence prepared for human approval Traceable owners, actions, decisions, and audit notes kept in the workflow record The problem ## Compliance work breaks down when evidence and ownership are disconnected. ISO and audit readiness work often becomes a document chase. Policies drift, procedures age, evidence sits in inboxes, and assessment actions lose their owner before the next review. Teams need a practical way to prepare compliance material without losing control of approvals. ## Policies are hard to keep current Security, quality, AI governance, and operational policies need regular review, but ownership and change history are often unclear by the time an audit arrives. ## Assessments become manual spreadsheets Control checks, gap notes, evidence requests, and action owners are rebuilt repeatedly because the assessment workflow is not connected to day-two work. ## Processes and procedures drift Procedures are written once, then fall behind real operating practice. Teams need a way to update them from actual workflow context. ## Audit evidence needs review Evidence must be complete, current, and explainable. AI can help prepare the pack, but reviewers still need approval points and accountability. What changes ## What changes ## Policy creation and review Draft, update, and route policies for review across ISO 27001, ISO 9001, ISO 42001, Cyber Essentials, and internal control requirements. ## Assessment workflows Prepare control assessments, capture gaps, assign owners, and keep review notes connected to the evidence trail. ## Process and procedure records Turn repeat operational activity into maintained procedures that compliance, operations, and service teams can review together. ## Audit evidence preparation Gather evidence, draft summaries, record decisions, and keep final approval with the responsible team before anything is presented externally. Start here ## Start with one audit-ready workflow. See this working on your own tenant. Try it free› Book a compliance workflow review› Explore EtherAssist› Explore agentic operations› Compliance workflow view ## Policies, procedures, assessments, evidence, and approvals in one controlled trail. EtherAssist helps compliance and IT teams move from scattered documents to a reviewable workflow where controls, owners, evidence, and next actions stay connected. Walkthrough ## See ISO readiness workflow. Watch EtherAssist help draft policies, prepare evidence, and keep reviewer checkpoints visible across ISO readiness work. How we deliver it ## Product mapping This route is led by EtherAssist. Use it when the buyer is asking how to prepare ISO evidence, draft policies, assess controls, keep procedures current, and manage audit readiness without relying on scattered documents. Use agentic operations when the need is broader day-two workflow execution. Use IT operations and compliance when the team is still framing the wider operating model. EtherAssist gives IT and compliance teams the speed of AI without giving up data control, auditability, or practical governance. It supports troubleshooting, scripting, documentation, policy work, and repeatable internal support workflows. Learn more about EtherAssist Where this fits ISO 27001 readiness where security controls, policy ownership, and evidence need a cleaner workflow. ISO 9001 quality-management support where processes, procedures, review records, and improvement actions need structure. ISO 42001 AI management preparation where AI governance policies, risk notes, and review records need control. Cyber Essentials and internal audit preparation where evidence gathering and owner sign-off need to be repeatable. MSP or multi-tenant compliance services where the same assessment and evidence workflow needs to run consistently across customer estates. FAQ ## Questions teams ask before using AI for compliance work. The decision is not whether AI can draft documents. It is whether the workflow keeps policies, assessments, procedures, evidence, and approvals controlled. Does EtherAssist certify us for ISO standards? No. EtherAssist supports compliance preparation, policy work, assessments, procedure drafting, evidence capture, and reviewer workflows. Certification decisions remain with the organisation, auditors, and accredited certification bodies. Which frameworks can this support? The route is designed around repeatable compliance work for frameworks such as ISO 27001, ISO 9001, ISO 42001, Cyber Essentials, and internal control programmes. The workflow can be adapted to the controls, owners, and evidence model the team uses. How is this different from generic document drafting? Generic drafting creates files. EtherAssist is positioned around controlled workflow: policy creation, owner review, assessment notes, process and procedure records, evidence capture, and audit preparation in one traceable operating model. Where does this sit next to agentic operations? Agentic operations covers broader day-two IT workflows. This route is narrower and compliance-led: ISO readiness, audits, policies, procedures, assessments, evidence packs, and reviewer sign-off. Some compliance platforms now claim their AI agent runs the whole programme. Why does EtherAssist keep a human reviewer instead? Unlike compliance tools built to run your programme autonomously, EtherAssist prepares the work and keeps a named reviewer as the final approval on every policy, assessment, and evidence pack, because a compliance decision that turns out wrong is the organisation's liability, not the AI's. The scope is also deliberately narrower and deeper: evidence is pulled from the Microsoft 365, Azure, and Entra estate you already run on, not a separate GRC platform integration project, so audit-ready systems and evidence stay grounded in the tenant an auditor will actually check. Does EtherAssist replace Microsoft Purview Compliance Manager? No, they sit at different layers. Purview Compliance Manager scores your tenant against its own library of regulatory templates and tracks control status natively in Microsoft 365. EtherAssist doesn't replace that scoring engine; it prepares the evidence behind each control, drafting policies, capturing procedure records, and building the reviewer-ready evidence pack, so what you feed into Compliance Manager or hand an auditor directly is current and traceable. Does this only work for ISO 27001, or does it cover ISO 9001 too? The workflow model is framework-agnostic: policy, assessment, procedure record, evidence, reviewer sign-off. That applies to ISO 9001's quality-management requirements the same way it does to ISO 27001's security controls; the controls you're proving change, the workflow that proves them doesn't. ## ISO and audit-readiness sources Reviewed 25 August 2026. ISO: ISO 9001:2015 quality management systems Microsoft Learn: Microsoft Purview Compliance Manager overview Microsoft Learn: Build and manage assessments in Compliance Manager ## Related solutions Microsoft 365 security and conformityAssess Microsoft 365 security baselines and track Secure Score over time. Microsoft 365 tenant backup and driftBack up tenant configuration to storage you own, catch drift with the actor named, and restore a single setting. Microsoft 365 Copilot readinessScore Microsoft 365 Copilot readiness before you roll it out. ## Related glossary terms ISO 27001 ISO 9001 Audit trail Start here ## Start with one audit-ready workflow. [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/iso-compliance-and-audit-readiness] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/it-operations-and-compliance # IT Operations and Compliance - EfficientEther > Use secure AI to support troubleshooting, documentation, workflows, and audit-ready IT operations with stronger control. Solution ## Support day-two IT operations faster without losing control. EtherAssist supports IT operations and compliance teams with controlled AI workflows for triage, documentation, workflow execution, evidence capture, and review. Try it free› Book a demo› 14-day free trial No credit card. Choose UK, EU, or US hosting on day one. Faster first-touch triage with tenant-scoped answers and jump-to-admin links Audit-ready run history with redaction, approvals, and attribution UK / EU / US regional hosting options selectable on day one The problem ## Support pressure usually starts after go-live, not before it. IT and compliance teams face repeat questions, troubleshooting load, documentation gaps, and audit pressure, but generic AI tools create data-control concerns and manual work still absorbs specialist time. ## Repeat work absorbs specialist time Troubleshooting, repeat questions, and documentation gaps create drag because the same work keeps landing on a small number of people. ## Generic AI creates a trust objection Teams want faster support, but unmanaged AI use creates data-control and auditability concerns that block adoption. ## Workflow evidence is weak When tasks, scripts, and knowledge updates are not tied to one controlled execution trail, service quality and reviewability drift apart. What changes ## Outcome blocks ## Lower escalation pressure Give teams faster answers and more consistent handling for repeat operational issues. ## Higher workflow consistency Automate repeatable tasks with controls that preserve reviewability, service quality, and ownership. ## Audit-ready evidence handling Capture and retain operational context that supports policy work, framework readiness, and compliance reporting. Start here ## Turn operational pressure into controlled execution See this working on your own tenant. Try it free› Book a demo› The operating view ## Troubleshooting, workflows, and evidence in one controlled surface. Tickets, logs, and knowledge feed tenant-aware triage, workflow execution, and documentation capture - producing an audit-ready run history with owners, timestamps, and attribution across Microsoft 365, Intune, and Entra surfaces. Walkthrough ## See operations workflows. A tour of EtherAssist for tenant-aware troubleshooting, workflow execution, and reviewable day-two history. How we deliver it ## Product mapping This route is led by EtherAssist and focuses on secure AI for troubleshooting, workflow execution, documentation, and compliance-aware operations. It supports framework preparation work for ISO 27001, ISO 9001, ISO 42001, and Cyber Essentials without making certification guarantees. EtherAssist gives IT and compliance teams the speed of AI without giving up data control, auditability, or practical governance. It supports troubleshooting, scripting, documentation, policy work, and repeatable internal support workflows. Learn more about EtherAssist FAQ ## IT operations and compliance FAQ Short answers for teams evaluating controlled AI support for day-two IT operations, evidence capture, and compliance preparation. What does an IT operations and compliance workflow look like with AI? A controlled workflow starts with a ticket, log, or knowledge request, then uses EtherAssist to support triage, runbook preparation, documentation, and evidence capture. The useful output is a reviewable operating record: what was asked, what was prepared, who owned the action, and what evidence remains for later review. How does EtherAssist keep a human in control? EtherAssist is positioned around reviewable work rather than unchecked automation. It can draft answers, prepare workflows, and organise evidence, but the team keeps approval points, owner visibility, attribution, and run history so operational judgement stays with named people. What evidence do audits need from IT operations? Audits usually need current policies, procedure records, access and change evidence, owner sign-off, timestamps, and proof that actions followed the agreed process. EtherAssist helps collect and structure that material so evidence does not sit across tickets, inboxes, and disconnected documents. Which compliance frameworks does this support? EtherAssist can support preparation work around ISO 27001, ISO 9001, ISO 42001, Cyber Essentials, and internal control programmes. It helps organise policies, assessments, procedures, evidence, and reviewer checkpoints, but certification decisions remain with auditors and accredited certification bodies. Does EtherAssist replace our ISO 27001 ISMS or become our AI management system under ISO 42001? No. ISO/IEC 27001 requires a full information security management system and ISO/IEC 42001 (published December 2023) requires a full AI management system, both assessed by an accredited certification body. EtherAssist does not replace either system - it supports the evidence side: capturing who did what, when, and under whose approval, so your ISMS or AI management system has a reviewable operating record to point to during an audit, rather than fragmented tickets and chat history. How does this fit with Cyber Essentials or Cyber Essentials Plus? Cyber Essentials, run by the NCSC via IASME, is a UK technical-controls scheme covering firewalls, secure configuration, user access control, malware protection, and patch management - from the April 2026 (v3.3) update, multi-factor authentication is mandatory wherever a cloud service supports it, not optional. EtherAssist does not implement those technical controls itself; it supports the operational side of staying certified - tracking access reviews, patch and configuration evidence, and named ownership - so the assessment has current, attributable records behind it. ## IT operations and compliance sources Reviewed 25 August 2026. ISO: ISO/IEC 27001 information security management ISO: ISO/IEC 42001 AI management systems NCSC: Cyber Essentials requirements for IT infrastructure ## Related solutions Agentic operationsRun day-two operations through scoped, auditable AI workflows. Microsoft 365 for MSPsPer-customer cost, licence, and security evidence for MSP teams. SMB AI assistantPractical AI help for small teams that need answers, not more admin. Intune reporting and troubleshootingBring Intune reporting, drift, and device checks into one view. ## Related glossary terms ITSM Tenant drift Start here ## Turn operational pressure into controlled execution Map your service workflows, documentation gaps, and compliance needs to a practical rollout plan. Try it free› Book a demo› EtherAssist supports tenant-aware triage, workflow execution, documentation capture, and reviewable day-two history. Run history can include redaction, approvals, attribution, owners, and timestamps for audit review. Compliance support is framed as evidence preparation for ISO 27001, ISO 9001, ISO 42001, Cyber Essentials, and internal controls, not a certification guarantee. Try it free› Book a demo› --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/legacy-apps # Legacy App Packaging for Windows 11 - EfficientEther > Lost the installers for legacy apps? EfficientEther assesses, repackages them as signed MSIX, MSI, or AppAttach, and proves Windows 11 and Cloud PC readiness. The problem What changes How it works Questions Book a fit check› Try it free› Solution ## Legacy apps: rescue, repackage, and prove Windows 11 + Cloud PC compatibility. An assessment-first route for legacy apps where the installation media is lost, the vendor portal is gated or gone, or nobody is sure whether the app still works on Windows 11 or a Cloud PC. We find what is actually installed, capture from a live installation, and repackage the app for modern Windows delivery. That capture-first technique is sometimes called "reverse packaging", and it lets us validate legacy app compatibility before the migration wave. Book a legacy app review› Try it free› 7-day free trial of the full workflow · licences include training and support No credit card. Capture a real application on day one. Explore EtherApps Forge The app nobody can reinstall0:45 0:00 / 0:45 Read the transcript 0:00 Every company has one. 0:04 No vendor. No installer. And Windows 10 has ended. 0:08 But it still has to run. 0:10 Forge captures it from the PC where it still runs, in the app, from the command line or with your AI agent. 0:18 One signed MSIX, validated and tested. 0:25 The same app, on Windows 11 and Server 2025. 0:29 The old PC can finally retire. 0:32 We tested Forge on 3,261 app cases. 0:36 More than nine in ten built an MSIX. 0:40 Bring yours. Try Forge free, no card. No installer rescue legacy apps when the installation media is lost or the vendor portal is gated 4 outputs MSIX, MSI, IntuneWin, and AppAttach from one capture Win 11 + Cloud PC legacy app compatibility validated before the migration wave App-V end of support ## App-V server support ended on 14 April 2026 Microsoft's extended support for the App-V server components, including Microsoft Application Virtualization Hosting 5.0 for Windows Desktops, ended on 14 April 2026. The App-V client and sequencer that ship inside Windows are a separate case: Microsoft removed their deprecated status in November 2024 and they continue on a fixed extended support lifecycle. So App-V packages keep running. The infrastructure that publishes them no longer has a supported future. Try it free› 7-day free trial of the full workflow · licences include training and support No credit card. Capture a real application on day one. App-V to MSIX0:30 0:00 / 0:30 Read the transcript 0:00 Still resequencing App-V? 0:02 Moving off App-V usually means doing every package again. 0:06 Forge extracts the App-V package, then builds the MSIX. No resequencing, no installer. 0:12 Script it, and convert the whole estate. 0:17 Signed, validated and ready for the platforms you already run. 0:22 No panic. App-V server support runs to 2029. 0:26 Convert your first one free. No card. ## What it means for a 50 to 600 user estate Nothing broke on the day the window closed, and nothing will. What changed is that you are running unsupported publishing infrastructure today: a tier that receives no further fixes, sitting between your users and the applications they need, with an audit question attached every time somebody asks which software is still supported. ## You do not have to convert everything Microsoft's own guidance is that there is no need to migrate away if App-V still meets the need. The decision is about the server tier, not the packages: App-V app attach delivers existing App-V packages through Azure Virtual Desktop without running your own App-V servers, and MSIX is the modern format for the applications worth rebuilding. ## Start with the applications, not the platform Most estates find a short list that converts cleanly to MSIX, a middle group that needs fix-ups, and a tail that should be retired. EtherApps Forge captures each application from a controlled virtual machine, recommends the route, and prepares the package for human review before release. ## Read next App-V to MSIX migration: how to plan the move Legacy to MSIX: converting legacy Windows applications App-V server is ending, App-V is not: what it means for your estate App-V to MSIX: the four things that break every time Microsoft: App-V support policy The problem ## Why legacy apps stay stuck even when teams keep trying. Plain version: the business still depends on apps that were installed years ago, but the original install disc, the download link, or the vendor portal is no longer there. IT version: legacy line-of-business software with missing installation media, gated installer portals, undocumented dependencies, and unknown Windows 11 and Cloud PC compatibility is blocking the next migration wave. Both versions need the same answer: find what is actually installed, repackage an installed application when the installer is no longer available, and prove whether it can move to Windows 11, Intune, AVD, or Windows 365 Cloud PC. ## The installation media is genuinely lost ISO, EXE, and MSI files have been deleted off old shares. CDs are in a cupboard nobody can find. The person who originally installed it left years ago. A workflow that only works with clean installer media does not survive contact with a real legacy estate. ## The vendor installer is gated or gone The vendor has retired the product, moved behind a partner portal, or only ships a subscription replacement. The contract is still valid, the app still runs, but nobody can re-download the original installer without a long, uncertain support ticket. ## Windows 11 and Cloud PC compatibility is unknown Nobody can say whether the app will run on Windows 11, in a Cloud PC, or under Azure Virtual Desktop. Teams default to leaving the legacy device alone and the migration slips. Without a real compatibility check, the risk feels bigger than it usually is. ## Repackaging skills and time are scarce Even when the app can be rescued, turning it into a signed MSIX, MSI, IntuneWin, or AppAttach package needs experienced packagers, and they are busy. Without an assessment-first route, every legacy app looks like a custom project. What changes ## What good looks like after the assessment ## A real inventory of what is actually installed We capture the application footprint from a working machine: files, registry, services, dependencies, and configuration. You get a clear list of what runs, where it runs, and what it depends on, without needing the original installer. ## A signed package, even with no installer EtherApps Forge produces signed MSIX, MSI, IntuneWin, or AppAttach from the same capture. One rescue covers Intune deployment, Azure Virtual Desktop AppAttach, and Windows 365 Cloud PC delivery (Windows 365 uses MSIX or IntuneWin). ## A Windows 11 and Cloud PC compatibility verdict Each legacy app comes back with a clear verdict: ships as-is, ships with Package Support Framework fix-ups, needs a remediation step, or genuinely cannot move yet. That turns legacy app compatibility from a gut feeling into a documented decision the migration board can sign off. ## A clean handoff into MSIX, packaging, or modernisation Once the legacy app is recovered and assessed, the same record routes into MSIX packaging and deployment, agentic app packaging, or application modernisation and migration. You don't restart the work to move from rescue into rollout. ## Capture from running systems Live-capture wizard: file, registry, AppData, services, and dependency capture from a running Windows system when installer media is missing or incomplete. Start here ## Stop letting lost installers stall the migration. See this working on your own tenant. Book a legacy app review› Try it free› ## Guides and analysis on this topic App-V to MSIX migration: plan the move before support ends Legacy to MSIX: converting old Windows applications How to repackage an application when the installer is lost A capture-first path to MSIX for complex applications EtherApps Forge Is Now Listed on Microsoft Marketplace What the rescue looks like ## From a working machine to a signed package and a compatibility decision. [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/legacy-apps] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/microsoft-365-copilot-readiness # Microsoft 365 Copilot Readiness Assessment | EtherInsights > Assess Copilot readiness across licences, sharing, sensitivity labels, Purview and governance. Repeatable for IT teams and MSP customer tenants. Solution ## Assess Microsoft 365 Copilot readiness before deployment, not after. EtherInsights scores readiness across licences, governance, sensitivity labels, sharing and Purview, then gives IT teams and MSPs named actions and review evidence for each tenant. Try it free› Book a Copilot readiness assessment› Explore EtherInsights› From £0.79 per active user/month · 14-day free trial Card required to start. Connect your tenant in minutes. 5 vectors scored: licensing, labels, sharing, Purview, governance 14 days to evaluate EtherInsights, card required to start Repeatable at MSP scale with consistent evidence shape across tenants Updated 15 August 2026 Free self-assessment ## How ready is your Microsoft 365 estate for Copilot? Copilot works within existing permissions, so oversharing and old access gaps that were invisible before can surface in its answers the day it goes live. Answer 7 quick questions about licensing, data governance, and security to see where your estate stands. Takes about two minutes, nothing leaves your browser, and this is a fast self-reported triage step, not a scan of your actual tenant. 0–49% Not yet ready 50–79% Ready for a controlled pilot 80–100% Ready to scale 0 of 7 answered0% 1Do you know exactly how many Microsoft 365 Copilot licences you have, and who they are assigned to? Yes, licences are tracked and assigned to confirmed pilot usersWe have licences but are not sure who is using themWe have not purchased Copilot licences yet 2Have you reviewed and tightened SharePoint and OneDrive sharing permissions before rollout? 3Are sensitivity labels and data loss prevention policies configured in Microsoft Purview? 4Is multi-factor authentication and Conditional Access enforced for every user? 5Do you have a process for archiving or removing stale, duplicate, or outdated SharePoint and Teams content? 6Do you have a plan to train users on Copilot and track adoption? 7Can you currently report on who is using Copilot and whether it is delivering value? The problem ## Copilot readiness is hard because the signals are spread out. A Microsoft 365 Copilot readiness assessment reviews licensing prerequisites, data governance, sensitivity labels, sharing posture and Purview coverage before rollout. EtherInsights combines those signals into a readiness score with named findings, proposed actions and review evidence. The score informs the rollout decision; it does not guarantee that deployment is risk-free. ## Copilot can surface forgotten data Microsoft 365 Copilot works within existing permissions. Overshared or poorly governed documents, mail and chat can still affect its results and make old access gaps more visible. ## Sensitivity labels are often inconsistent Label coverage can vary by site, team, and document type. Measure the real posture before you assume the policy is working. ## Oversharing builds up over time External links, broad site access, and old permissions accumulate over years. The go-live state may not match the written policy. ## Per-seat licensing has to match real users Copilot is licensed per seat. Check likely users before assigning licences so spend and value line up. What changes ## Outcome blocks ## Readiness score across the five vectors A clear readiness score across licences, governance, labels, sharing, and Purview, based on the real tenant state. ## Named owner per gap Each finding has an owner and a proposed fix, so readiness work can move instead of stalling in a spreadsheet. ## Evidence trail for the deployment review A repeatable evidence trail for the rollout review, with the same structure across tenants. Start here ## Make Copilot readiness clear before go-live. See this working on your own tenant. Try it free› Book a Copilot readiness assessment› Explore EtherInsights› ## Guides and analysis on this topic Microsoft 365 Copilot readiness assessment checklist Fix SharePoint and OneDrive oversharing before Copilot Copilot readiness for MSPs The readiness view ## One Copilot readiness score across the five vectors. The assessment checks five areas: licences, data governance, sensitivity labels, sharing, and Purview. The output is a readiness score, owner-backed actions, and evidence for the rollout review. Solution brief ## Microsoft 365 Copilot Readiness Solution Brief Two pages on this decision: what to measure, who has to sign it off, and what should be true before you commit. Free, and written to be forwarded. Get the solution brief› Video walkthrough ## See Copilot readiness evidence. A focused walkthrough of readiness evidence across licensing, governance, labels, sharing posture, and Purview coverage. Assess readiness before deployment. Connect readiness gaps to owners and evidence. Use the security route when conformity is in scope. How we deliver it ## Product mapping EtherInsights leads this route with readiness scoring across licences, governance, labels, sharing, and Purview. EtherAssist can help when teams need workflow support to close gaps. Microsoft 365, Azure, Windows 365, tenant, user, security, device, and Intune evidence. Learn more Controlled AI workflows for IT operations, compliance, documentation, and remediation. Learn more Where this fits Pre-deployment readiness scoring before a Microsoft 365 Copilot rollout. Licence right-sizing so Copilot seats go to likely users. Sensitivity-label checks across sites, teams, and document types. Oversharing and external-access review before users start prompting. MSP readiness reports across many tenants with one evidence format. FAQ ## Questions teams ask before scheduling a Copilot readiness assessment. Keep the evaluation grounded in scope, speed, multi-tenant fit, and how readiness signals translate into owner-led remediation. What is a Copilot readiness assessment? A Copilot readiness assessment checks what needs attention before a Microsoft 365 Copilot rollout. It reviews licences, sensitivity labels, sharing and external access, Purview coverage, and data governance, then returns a readiness score with owner-backed actions for the deployment review. Which licences does Microsoft 365 Copilot require? Microsoft 365 Copilot is included in Microsoft 365 E7 and is available as a per-user add-on for other eligible plans. Eligibility, prerequisites, and some Purview capabilities can change, so confirm the current Microsoft setup guidance. The readiness assessment checks licence context before seats are assigned. How do I check for oversharing before deploying Copilot? Review sharing and access before go-live: broad site permissions, anyone-links, external guests, and stale access that Copilot could surface in a single prompt. EtherInsights measures the real sharing posture across sites, teams, and files, flags the widest exposure, and turns each finding into an owner-backed fix ahead of rollout. Why is Copilot readiness its own assessment? Copilot readiness is different from a standard security baseline. Labels, sharing, Purview, governance, and licences all matter at the same time. A focused assessment helps you fix gaps before users go live. What does it actually check? It checks five areas: Microsoft 365 licences, sensitivity labels, sharing and external access, Purview coverage, and data governance. Each finding includes an owner-backed action, not just a score. What happens after the readiness assessment? The customer or MSP reviews the score, assigns owners, applies the agreed tenant changes and re-checks the evidence before rollout. EtherInsights proposes actions and tracks evidence; it does not apply tenant changes automatically. Can an MSP run this across multiple tenants? Yes. MSPs can run readiness checks across customer tenants with a consistent evidence format. Does EtherInsights remediate or just report? EtherInsights scores readiness and proposes owner-led fixes with evidence. The customer or MSP applies tenant changes. EtherAssist can help when the fix needs a controlled workflow. Is there a Copilot readiness assessment tool UK organisations and MSPs can use to check if a tenant is ready? [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/microsoft-365-copilot-readiness] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/microsoft-365-for-msps # Microsoft 365 Management for MSPs - EfficientEther > Microsoft 365 management for MSPs: per-customer reporting, licence reclaim, security posture evidence, governed AI support, and app packaging capacity. Solution ## MSP Microsoft 365 management that proves value across every customer estate. EfficientEther helps MSPs turn many customer Microsoft 365 estates into clear Microsoft 365 estate management across cost, licence, security, service, and packaging evidence. EtherInsights leads the route, with EtherAssist and EtherApps Forge supporting managed-service delivery. Partner enquiry› Try it free› Explore EtherInsights› From £0.79 per active user/month · 14-day free trial Card required to start. Connect your tenant in minutes. Every customer per-customer cost, licence, posture, and service evidence QBR-ready reports that show value before the renewal conversation 14 days EtherInsights trial, card required to start What the pane of glass actually looks like ## The licence view your technician opens, and the number your customer asks about. This is the Microsoft Licenses panel in EtherInsights, the screen a service desk lead opens per customer tenant: active, inactive and unlicensed users, the annualised savings opportunity, seat allocation, utilisation by licence and the top licences by spend. Run it across the portfolio and the quarterly review stops being a portal export and starts being a number you can defend. Reclaimed seats are the easiest saving to evidence in a renewal conversation, and the evidence arrives before the customer asks for it. EtherInsights is priced per active user, and the rate is published, so you can model a customer tenant before you quote it. Partner commercials are agreed separately through the partner route. See the published plans The problem ## Where MSP Microsoft 365 delivery gets stretched. MSP teams are asked to prove value across renewals, QBRs, security reviews, audit requests, and each Microsoft 365 tenant assessment while customer data sits in separate portals and exports. That portal fatigue, jumping between Intune, Entra, and Purview per customer just to answer one question, is what turns senior engineers into a reporting layer instead of a delivery one. Microsoft 365 management for MSPs needs repeatable evidence, not another spreadsheet rebuilt before every review. The pressure is commercial as well as technical: the MSP principal wants a service line that scales, the service lead wants fewer one-off reporting tasks, and the account team needs a credible story for the next customer conversation. ## Customer context is scattered Each customer has its own licence position, security posture, Intune state, Windows 365 plan, and renewal pressure. Without a repeatable view, senior engineers become the reporting layer. ## Licence waste hides across customers Unused Microsoft 365 licences, inactive users, poor offboarding, and weak ownership add up across the book of business. Reclaim work needs customer-level evidence before it becomes a commercial conversation. ## QBRs need proof, not activity summaries MSP principals and account teams need to show the cost avoided, risks surfaced, posture improved, and service actions completed. Portal screenshots rarely tell that story cleanly. ## Audit and security requests keep arriving Customers ask for security posture, baseline drift, Secure Score movement, device evidence, and policy support. The MSP needs a controlled way to prepare the answer without rebuilding the process each time. What changes ## What changes for MSP operators. ## Per-customer reporting that supports QBRs Use EtherInsights to turn cost, licence, security, Intune, Windows 365, and tenant baseline signals into clearer customer review packs and action lists. ## Cross-customer licence reclaim Find inactive users, unused licences, and allocation drift across the managed estate, then prioritise reclaim work by customer value and renewal pressure. ## Governed AI for repeat service work Use EtherAssist for triage, runbook preparation, documentation, compliance support, and evidence capture where human approval and audit trails matter. ## Packaging capacity for managed projects Use EtherApps Forge when customers need packaging-as-a-service for legacy apps, MSIX, MSI, IntuneWin, AppAttach, Windows 365, or Azure Virtual Desktop work. Start here ## Build the MSP Microsoft 365 service line around evidence. See this working on your own tenant. Partner enquiry› Try it free› Explore EtherInsights› ## Guides and analysis on this topic What MSPs should report every month Copilot readiness for MSPs How to find unused Microsoft 365 licences MSP operating view ## One route for licence waste, QBR reporting, security posture, service desk workflow, and packaging capacity. Use EtherInsights as the lead product for multi-customer visibility. Add EtherAssist where service desk and compliance work needs governed AI support. Add EtherApps Forge when customers need packaging-as-a-service for Windows, Intune, Cloud PC, or Azure Virtual Desktop projects. Product walkthrough ## Four minutes inside the multi-customer operating view Cost, licences, Windows 365, tenant posture, device reporting and user lifecycle evidence, in the order an MSP actually works through them. Watch this before you book a demo, and you will know which questions are worth asking. Per-customer cost and licence evidence without a portal export per tenant. Posture and device reporting in the same view your quarterly review is built from. Reclaim candidates and offboarding evidence you can hand to the customer as-is. How we deliver it ## EtherInsights leads, with EtherAssist and Forge supporting the managed-service motion. This route starts with EtherInsights because MSP Microsoft 365 reporting needs per-customer visibility first: licence cost, user state, security posture, Intune signals, Windows 365 planning, and governance evidence. EtherAssist then helps service desks turn repeat work into controlled AI workflows. EtherApps Forge gives the MSP a packaging path when application readiness blocks endpoint, Cloud PC, or migration projects. The portfolio is designed to support a partner motion as well as direct customer delivery, so MSPs can test the evidence route first and then discuss resale, managed-service fit, and regional coverage through the partner application. EtherInsights is the operating view for Microsoft 365, Azure, and Windows 365: day-to-day cost management, licence control, and full Windows 365 Cloud PC lifecycle management, plus tenant, user, security, device, and Intune reporting. Learn more about EtherInsights EtherAssist gives IT and compliance teams the speed of AI without giving up data control, auditability, or practical governance. It supports troubleshooting, scripting, documentation, policy work, and repeatable internal support workflows. Learn more about EtherAssist EtherApps Forge captures installed Windows applications from running systems, analyses the real application footprint, supports AI-guided packaging decisions, and produces deployment-ready outputs for modern environments. Learn more about EtherApps Forge Where this fits Per-customer cost and licence reports for QBRs and renewal conversations. Cross-customer licence reclaim for inactive users, duplicated allocations, and offboarding gaps. Security posture reporting as a service, including Secure Score movement and baseline evidence. Customer audit and compliance preparation with controlled documentation support. Service desk triage, remediation planning, and runbook preparation with human approval. Packaging-as-a-service for MSIX, MSI, IntuneWin, AppAttach, Windows 365, and Azure Virtual Desktop projects. FAQ ## Questions MSPs usually ask. Short answers for MSP principals, service leads, and Microsoft cloud operators evaluating the partner route. How do MSPs manage Microsoft 365 for multiple customers? MSPs need a repeatable operating model for each customer: cost and licence visibility, security posture evidence, device and Cloud PC signals, owner-backed actions, and review-ready reporting. EtherInsights leads this route by giving each customer estate a clearer evidence view, while EtherAssist and EtherApps Forge support workflow and packaging needs around it. Can I white-label or resell EtherInsights? [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/microsoft-365-for-msps] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/microsoft-365-licence-management-and-offboarding # Microsoft 365 Licence Management & Offboarding - EfficientEther > Manage Microsoft 365 licences, identify reclaim candidates and connect offboarding evidence across one tenant or many with EtherInsights. Solution ## Automate Microsoft 365 offboarding and connect it to licence reclaim. Somewhere in your tenant, licences are still assigned to people who left months ago. Leavers are offboarded in a different order each time, add-on licences stay active, and at renewal nobody can prove which seats are waste. On a first scan, 15-30% of Microsoft 365 licences typically turn out to be inactive or downgradeable, so every month that goes unchecked is money paid for empty seats and access that should be gone. EtherInsights brings licence usage, last sign-in, guest accounts, and reclaim candidates into one view, then runs the offboarding steps against Microsoft Graph when you confirm them, with every run logged. Built for IT teams and MSPs managing 50 to 600 users per tenant, at £0.79 per active user. See what my licences are really costing› Get my licence and offboarding review› Try it free› From £0.79 per active user/month · 14-day free trial Card required to start. Connect your tenant in minutes. 15-30% of Microsoft 365 licences typically inactive or downgradeable on first scan £0.79 / $1 / €1 per active user, with volume pricing on request Multi-tenant review for internal IT teams and managed service providers Updated 29 August 2026 The problem ## Licence waste survives when assignment, activity, and offboarding live in different conversations. Licence assignment, user activity, subscription commitments, and offboarding each live in a different tool. So leavers are secured in the wrong order, an unassigned seat gets counted as a saving it is not, and the decision leaves no evidence. The waste is quiet: it never fails loudly, it just renews. ## Assignment is not the same as real use Teams can see allocated licences. They rarely connect that view to real activity, reclaim timing, or renewal pressure until the invoice lands. ## Lifecycle tasks are split across teams Joiner, mover, and leaver work spans the service desk, identity, and business teams. Each handover weakens control and slows a clean exit. ## Evidence is left until late When offboarding is a ticket task rather than an operating model, access removal and evidence capture vary by person. That is hard to defend in an audit. What changes ## Outcome blocks ## Lower Microsoft 365 waste Match licence allocation to real usage and surface reclaim candidates before renewal, not after. ## Unused Microsoft 365 licences Unused Microsoft 365 licences build up quietly across leavers and inactive accounts. EtherInsights puts licence usage, last sign-in, and inactive-user context side by side, so you can identify reclaim candidates, check ownership, and plan changes before renewal. ## Cleaner user lifecycle control Handle user changes and removals the same way every time, across IT and service operations. ## Better audit readiness Keep clear evidence for offboarding, entitlement changes, and recurring access reviews. ## Automate the offboarding steps manual teams script by hand Confirm the run once and EtherInsights executes it against Microsoft Graph: revoke sessions, block sign-in, reset password and MFA, cancel meetings, set mailbox auto-reply, and remove licences, groups, and admin roles. Each step is logged for audit. Start here ## Find the licences you are paying for and nobody is using. See this working on your own tenant. Get my licence and offboarding review› See what my licences are really costing› Try it free› The lifecycle view ## Joiner / mover / leaver in one controlled record. Tenant users flow into lifecycle review, licence reclaim, and offboarding actions - fed by inactive-licence detection, risky identities, and ownership gaps - and out to reclaimed licences, revocation evidence, and an audit record commercial owners and compliance can review together. Solution brief ## Microsoft 365 Licence Waste Solution Brief Two pages on this decision: what to measure, who has to sign it off, and what should be true before you commit. Free, and written to be forwarded. Get the solution brief› Video walkthrough ## See licence and offboarding control. A focused walkthrough of licence waste, lifecycle evidence, and offboarding control in EtherInsights. Find licence waste before renewal pressure lands. Connect lifecycle evidence to operational action. Use the identity clip for Entra user context. Identity clip ## User lifecycle evidence in context. Use this focused clip when the conversation is about Entra users, groups, risky identities, and offboarding evidence. ## Identity, users, groups, and offboarding Bring Entra operations, user lifecycle evidence, and offboarding controls into one operational record. How we deliver it ## Product mapping EtherInsights leads this route with licence usage, last sign-in, inactive-user context, guest-account visibility, and its in-product Users & Groups offboarding workflow. That workflow does not just report. Once you confirm it, EtherInsights runs the offboarding steps against Microsoft Graph: revoke sessions, block sign-in, reset password and MFA, cancel meetings, set mailbox auto-reply, and remove licences, group memberships, and admin roles, with every run logged for audit. Hybrid accounts synced from on-premises Active Directory get manual remediation guidance instead of a silent skip. EtherAssist can support governed follow-through outside that workflow. EtherInsights pricing is £0.79 / $1 / €1 per active user, with volume pricing on request. Microsoft 365, Azure, Windows 365, tenant, user, security, device, and Intune evidence. Learn more Controlled AI workflows for IT operations, compliance, documentation, and remediation. Learn more Where this fits Microsoft 365 licence reviews for inactive or under-used users Joiner, mover, and leaver process improvement for internal IT teams MSP tenant reviews where licence tracking and offboarding quality both matter Access cleanup and evidence capture ahead of audit or governance reviews ## The manual leaver process vs one confirmed run Both routes end with the same Microsoft Graph actions. The difference is who carries the order, the evidence, and the licence follow-up in their head. ## Today: a ticket, a script, and a reminder The service desk blocks sign-in in the Microsoft 365 admin center. Someone remembers to revoke sessions and reset MFA, or does not. A PowerShell script or Entra lifecycle workflow that a former colleague built handles groups. The licence, the Power BI add-on, and the admin role stay assigned until the next renewal review, if anyone looks. ## With EtherInsights: review, confirm, done The leaver appears as an offboarding candidate with last sign-in and licence context. You confirm once. EtherInsights revokes sessions, blocks sign-in, resets password and MFA, cancels meetings, sets the auto-reply, and removes licences, groups, and admin roles in order, logging each step. Hybrid accounts synced from Active Directory get manual guidance instead of a silent skip. FAQ ## Microsoft 365 licence management FAQ Short answers for IT admins and MSPs reviewing Microsoft 365 licence waste, plan mix, and leaver evidence. How do I find unused Microsoft 365 licences? Start by comparing assigned licences with user activity, inactive accounts, last sign-in, role changes, and renewal pressure. EtherInsights brings those signals together so IT can identify reclaim candidates and review the evidence before making changes. What should a Microsoft 365 offboarding checklist cover? A practical checklist should cover account state, licence removal, access revocation, mailbox and file handover, group membership, device or Cloud PC ownership, and evidence capture. The step most checklists skip is add-on licences bought separately from the base plan: Power BI Pro, Visio, Project, Defender for Office 365, and Teams Phone add-ons are commonly assigned per user outside the main licence review and quietly kept active after someone leaves, because they don't show up when you only check the base Microsoft 365 plan. The goal is not only to remove access, but to leave a record that service desk, compliance, and commercial owners can review. How often should licence usage be reviewed? [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/microsoft-365-licence-management-and-offboarding] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/microsoft-365-security-and-conformity # Microsoft 365 Security and Conformity - EfficientEther > Assess Microsoft 365 tenant posture, assign baselines, track Secure Score, Copilot readiness, and Zero Trust coverage, and keep drift visible between reviews. Solution ## Assess, assign, and track Microsoft 365 security baselines in one operating view. Run a repeatable Microsoft 365 tenant security assessment, pin overlay baselines, and keep Secure Score, Copilot readiness, Zero Trust coverage, and drift visible between reviews. Built for IT leaders, Microsoft admins, security leads, and MSPs who need conformity evidence without rebuilding it each audit cycle. Try it free› Book a security assessment› Explore EtherInsights› From £0.79 per active user/month · 14-day free trial Card required to start. Connect your tenant in minutes. 4 frameworks Microsoft Security Baselines, CISA SCuBA, NSA CISS, Zero Trust Drift-tracked between assessments, not rebuilt each audit cycle One pack of conformity evidence for governance, audit, and MSP customer reviews The problem ## Conformity work stays fragmented because the evidence never sits in one place. Secure Score, Copilot readiness, Zero Trust pillar coverage, and overlay conformity against Microsoft Security Baselines, CISA SCuBA, and NSA CISS are spread across separate admin centres, exports, and spreadsheets. Users and groups, risky identities, and offboarding work sit in another pane again. Teams struggle to prove conformity, and drift between assessment and remediation is rarely visible before an audit, an incident, or a customer review. ## Admin surfaces are fragmented Entra, Intune, Defender, Purview, and the Microsoft 365 admin centre each hold part of the posture picture, so no single pane shows how the tenant stands against published baselines. ## Conformity is run in spreadsheets Teams rebuild the same baseline mappings, Secure Score exports, and Zero Trust scoring in spreadsheets every review, so evidence is slow to produce and hard to trust. ## Security and operations use different evidence Security teams report against frameworks while operations teams act on tickets, so remediation decisions drift away from the same baseline both sides are meant to share. What changes ## Outcome blocks ## Tenant security baseline Run a repeatable Microsoft 365 tenant assessment against Microsoft Security Baselines, CISA SCuBA, NSA CISS, and product-level overlays for Edge, Microsoft 365 Apps, Windows 11, Windows 10, and Windows 365. ## Zero Trust and Copilot coverage Score Zero Trust pillars, track Secure Score over time, and check Copilot readiness before rollout so posture work happens before deployment, not after. ## Owner-backed remediation and reporting Turn assessment findings, overlay gaps, and risky identities into named actions with evidence that holds up in governance reviews, audits, and MSP customer reports. Start here ## Move from fragmented admin centres to a repeatable Microsoft 365 security baseline. See this working on your own tenant. Try it free› Book a security assessment› The conformity view ## Baselines, overlays, and drift in one operating record. Tenant posture scored across Secure Score, Zero Trust pillars, baseline conformity, and overlay coverage (CISA SCuBA / NSA CISS), flowing into drift detection and on to a remediation proposal and pinned baseline. Solution brief ## Microsoft 365 Security Posture Solution Brief Two pages on this decision: what to measure, who has to sign it off, and what should be true before you commit. Free, and written to be forwarded. Get the solution brief› Video walkthrough ## See conformity evidence. A focused walkthrough of Microsoft cloud security posture, conformity evidence, and readiness signals in EtherInsights. Assess posture evidence across the Microsoft estate. Share the record with governance, audit, and MSP teams. Move baseline evidence into remediation planning. How we deliver it ## Product mapping This route is led by EtherInsights for tenant assessment, overlay catalogue coverage, Secure Score and Copilot readiness tracking, Zero Trust pillar scoring, users and groups management, risky identities, offboarding control, and drift detection against the pinned baseline. The same evidence supports governance reporting, MSP customer conversations, and remediation planning. EtherInsights is the operating view for Microsoft 365, Azure, and Windows 365: day-to-day cost management, licence control, and full Windows 365 Cloud PC lifecycle management, plus tenant, user, security, device, and Intune reporting. Learn more about EtherInsights Where this fits Assigning Microsoft Security Baselines, CISA SCuBA, and Zero Trust overlays to a tenant and tracking conformity against each one. Checking Copilot readiness across identity, data, and device posture before a Microsoft 365 Copilot rollout. Producing monthly or quarterly conformity reports for MSP customer reviews without rebuilding the evidence each cycle. Controlling risky identities, users and groups changes, and offboarding with clearer audit evidence. Preparing auditor-ready conformity evidence against published Microsoft and third-party security baselines. FAQ ## Common Microsoft 365 security and conformity questions What teams ask before rolling this out across a tenant or an MSP customer base. What is CISA SCuBA and does it apply to us? CISA's Secure Cloud Business Applications (SCuBA) project publishes minimum viable secure configuration baselines for Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace, built for US federal agencies but published openly and widely adopted as a reference baseline by other organisations. If your estate runs Microsoft 365, the SCuBA baselines are a usable, independently published conformity target regardless of sector, and EtherInsights scores your tenant against them alongside Microsoft's own Security Baselines. How is this different from Microsoft Secure Score alone? Secure Score is one input, not the whole picture. It scores Microsoft's own recommendations but does not check conformity against CISA SCuBA or NSA CISS overlays, does not track drift between review cycles, and does not turn a finding into an owner-assigned remediation task with evidence attached. EtherInsights keeps Secure Score in the same operating view alongside baseline conformity, Zero Trust pillar coverage, and drift detection, so a score becomes a tracked action rather than a number that goes stale. Can this run across MSP customer tenants? Yes. Conformity reporting is built for repeat use across a customer base, producing the same baseline, overlay, and drift evidence per tenant rather than a one-off assessment format that has to be rebuilt manually for every review. How often should conformity be reassessed? Baselines and overlays do not change often, but tenant configuration does, through new licences, changed conditional access policies, app registrations, and admin changes. A monthly or quarterly reassessment catches drift before it becomes an audit finding; EtherInsights tracks drift continuously between formal review cycles rather than only at the point of a scheduled report. Does this replace a penetration test or external audit? No. Baseline and overlay conformity scoring is a continuous configuration-assurance layer, not a substitute for independent penetration testing or a formal external audit. It is designed to make those exercises faster and cheaper by having current, evidenced conformity data ready before the auditor asks for it. What is Microsoft 365 tenant configuration drift, and how do I detect it? Configuration drift is when a tenant's actual settings quietly diverge from the policy or baseline that was originally approved, across Entra, Exchange, Teams, Intune, Defender, and Purview. It builds up through one-off admin changes, partial rollbacks, and settings that get touched during troubleshooting and never get reset. Microsoft's own Unified Tenant Configuration Management APIs (UTCM, in beta on Microsoft Graph since early 2026) are the first native way to baseline a tenant's configuration and monitor it for drift across workloads through one API surface, rather than relying on separate PowerShell scripts per service. EtherInsights tracks configuration drift against your own baseline continuously, so a change is caught and evidenced when it happens rather than at the next scheduled review. [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/microsoft-365-security-and-conformity] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/microsoft-365-tenant-backup-and-drift # Microsoft 365 Tenant Backup and Drift - EfficientEther > Back up Microsoft 365 tenant configuration to immutable storage you own. Drift checks every 6 hours name who changed what. Restore a single setting. Solution ## Microsoft 365 tenant backup and drift, in storage you own. A bad Conditional Access change and a ransomware operator with admin rights have one thing in common: neither deletes your files first. They rewrite your tenant - policies, targeting, app consent. Microsoft's audit log answers the question of who changed what for around 30 days; native policy snapshots keep 7 days. EtherInsights backs up your tenant configuration - Entra, Intune, Exchange, Teams and five more services - to immutable storage you own (Azure Blob Storage in your subscription, or Impossible Cloud, outside the Microsoft cloud entirely), checks for drift every 6 hours with the actor named, and restores anything from a full policy down to a single setting. Built for IT teams and MSPs managing 50 to 600 users per tenant. See what changed in my tenant› Book a tenant backup demo› From £0.79 per active user/month · 14-day free trial Card required to start. Connect your tenant in minutes. 365 days of configuration history in storage you own, against 7-day native snapshots 6 hours default drift check cadence against your pinned baseline, with the actor named 1 setting the smallest restore unit: previewed, typed confirmation, your admin's sign-in 180+ days every restore first takes a recovery point, kept and protected at least 180 days Updated 31 August 2026 The market gap ## Most backup tools stop where the tenant starts. Backup products cover virtual machines, mailboxes and files. Native tooling snapshots some policies for 7 days and logs changes for around 30. The configuration layer - Conditional Access, Intune baselines, protection policies, app consent - is usually nobody's backup. That is the layer a broken change or a compromised admin actually rewrites. What to check Native Microsoft tooling EtherInsights tenant backup Snapshot retention Native configuration snapshots are kept for 7 days Up to 365 days, in Azure storage you own Who made the change The audit log holds the answer for around 30 days, and native drift results carry no actor Actor name, UPN and timestamp stored with each drift result, kept beyond the 30-day window Baseline history Updating a native baseline deletes its previous drift results Baseline history is versioned and kept for audit when a pin is updated Alerting No notification path for native drift results Email, Teams, Slack and webhook alerts, with quiet hours and dedupe Restore Detection only: no restore path from a native drift result Reviewed restore to baseline, down to a single setting, under your admin's sign-in Where the backup lives Snapshots are held service-side for 7 days Your own Azure subscription, under a tenant-scoped prefix, with provider-verified immutability The problem ## It does not delete your files. It rewrites your rules. Every organisation backs up mail and files. Almost nobody backs up the tenant itself: the Conditional Access rules, Intune baselines and protection policies that decide who gets in and what they can do. When one of those is rewritten there is no recycle bin. You are left rebuilding a policy from screenshots and memory while the helpdesk queue grows and the auditor waits. ## A broken change on a Friday One Conditional Access edit can lock out a department or quietly weaken MFA for everyone. The change looked routine in review; the effect shows up as a helpdesk spike, a wave of failed sign-ins, or an audit finding weeks later. ## An admin credential in the wrong hands A ransomware operator with admin rights does not start with your files. They weaken policy first: exclusions added, detections disabled, consent granted. If the only copy of your configuration lives in the tenant they control, it goes with them. ## A 30-day memory Microsoft's audit log answers the question of who changed what for around 30 days. Questions from auditors, insurers and customers arrive months later. Past the window, there is no answer left to give. ## A 7-day snapshot Native configuration snapshots keep 7 days of history, and updating a baseline deletes its earlier drift results. That is a short grace period, not a recovery position. What's protected ## Nine Microsoft services. Over 40 configuration areas. ## Entra ID Conditional Access, named locations, authentication strengths, role assignments, groups, administrative units, app registrations and enterprise app consent. Secret values are never captured or restored. ## Intune Configuration and compliance policies, Autopilot profiles, app protection, update rings, endpoint security and security baselines, plus the assignment filters and scope tags that do the targeting. ## Exchange Online protection Anti-spam, anti-phishing, anti-malware, mail flow rules, Safe Links and Safe Attachments policies. The mail protection layer, not the mail. ## Teams Tenant configuration and the Teams policy family. ## SharePoint and OneDrive Tenant-level sharing and access settings. ## Windows 365 Provisioning policies, user settings and network connections for Cloud PCs. ## Defender Custom indicators and custom detection rules. ## Purview Governance configuration and compliance policy families. ## Microsoft 365 admin Organisation-level report settings. ## What this is not Mail, files and messages are not included. That is content backup, and the tool you already run does it well. This protects the layer that tool never sees: the configuration. Start here ## Know what changed. Prove what did not. See this working on your own tenant. See what changed in my tenant› Book a tenant backup demo› How it works ## From your tenant to storage you own, and back, one reviewed step at a time. Scheduled backups write each snapshot to immutable storage in your own Azure subscription, or to Impossible Cloud S3-compatible storage with Object Lock. Drift checks run every 6 hours against the baseline you pinned, name the actor from Microsoft audit data, and alert email, Teams, Slack or a webhook. Restore previews every step, requires a typed confirmation, and runs under your own admin's sign-in after an automatic pre-restore recovery point is taken. Where your backups live ## Two storage options, both immutable, both yours. Own the storage. Verify the immutability. Keep a copy outside the Microsoft cloud if your risk model calls for it. Those are the decision criteria we would apply to any tenant backup, and here is how the two supported locations answer them. ## Azure Blob Storage (immutable) Locked version-level WORM is applied with the original write, so every snapshot version is immutable from the moment it lands, never locked after the fact. Immutability is verified, not assumed: EtherInsights tries to delete the exact protected version and accepts only Azure's refusal, plus a checksum read-back, as proof. Your subscription, your storage account, one EtherInsights provisions or one you attach, under a tenant-scoped prefix. Residency and contract stay yours. ## Impossible Cloud (immutable, third party) European S3-compatible object storage, fully supported as a second backup location, with Object Lock COMPLIANCE mode on every snapshot version. The same delete-probe verification: the check first proves the credential can delete an unlocked control version, then requires the provider's refusal on the protected one. Keeps your backup outside the Microsoft cloud entirely. If an attacker holds your Microsoft estate, your last good copy sits on a platform they never touched. Not a one-way decision: moving between the two is copy-and-switch, in both directions. Every recovery point is copied and verified at the destination before the switch, and the source is never deleted. Solution brief ## Microsoft 365 Tenant Backup and Drift Solution Brief Two pages on this decision: what to measure, who has to sign it off, and what should be true before you commit. Free, and written to be forwarded. Get the solution brief› How we deliver it ## One product. Your storage. Your admin's sign-in. [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/microsoft-365-tenant-backup-and-drift] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/msix-packaging-and-deployment # Automated MSIX Packaging for IT Teams - EfficientEther > Automated MSIX packaging for IT teams and MSPs. Batch capture, PSF fix-ups and App Attach output from one run, with an evidence report. 7-day trial. The problem What changes How it works Questions Book a fit check› Try it free› Solution ## Automated MSIX packaging for IT teams with hundreds of apps and no spare packaging headcount. Microsoft's MSIX Packaging Tool is free and does a clean job on one application at a time. The problem is the other 199. At the four hours of packager time per package our cost calculator uses by default, a 200-app estate is 800 hours, and that number, not the MSIX format, is what sets your Windows 11 migration date. EtherApps Forge automates the repeat work: batch capture from a machine where the app is already installed and working, Package Support Framework fix-ups staged for you, signing inline, and MSIX, IntuneWin, App Attach and MSI out of one capture, each with an evidence report your change board can read. Built for MSPs and IT teams at 50 to 600 users, for the packaging lead who has to clear the queue and for the IT director who has to put a date and a cost in front of the board. See what my packaging backlog is costing› Try it free› 7-day free trial of the full workflow · licences include training and support No credit card. Capture a real application on day one. Get a packaging plan for my app estate Updated 13 October 2026 The app nobody can reinstall0:45 0:00 / 0:45 Read the transcript 0:00 Every company has one. 0:04 No vendor. No installer. And Windows 10 has ended. 0:08 But it still has to run. 0:10 Forge captures it from the PC where it still runs, in the app, from the command line or with your AI agent. 0:18 One signed MSIX, validated and tested. 0:25 The same app, on Windows 11 and Server 2025. 0:29 The old PC can finally retire. 0:32 We tested Forge on 3,261 app cases. 0:36 More than nine in ten built an MSIX. 0:40 Bring yours. Try Forge free, no card. Oct 2025 Windows 10 support ended, so every unpackaged app now blocks the migration 4 formats MSIX, MSI, IntuneWin, AppAttach from one capture No installer capture from a running machine when the media is lost Free tool or automation ## When the MSIX Packaging Tool is enough, and when it is not Microsoft's MSIX Packaging Tool is free, it is good, and for twenty applications with clean installers and a packager who has time it is the right answer. Volume is what changes the decision. Our packaging cost calculator's default is four hours of packager time per manual package, so 200 applications is 800 hours. Here is the honest split, so you can decide which side of it your estate sits on. What you are deciding Microsoft MSIX Packaging Tool Automated packaging with EtherApps Forge Capture effort per app One application at a time through the wizard, or a scripted run from a saved command line template. Microsoft recommends a clean conversion VM and a revert to checkpoint between packages, so the environment work repeats for every app. Applications are queued and captured in batches, and capture can run from a machine where the app is already installed and working, so a lost installer does not stop the queue. Fix-up handling Package Support Framework fix-ups are supported in the tool and configured per package by a packager who already knows what the application needs. Capture analysis proposes the file, registry and working directory fix-ups per application and stages them into the package. A reviewer changes or rejects them before release. App Attach output Produces the MSIX. Expanding it into a CIM or VHDX image for App Attach is a separate step with the MSIXMGR tool. MSIX, App Attach image, IntuneWin and MSI all come from the same capture, so Azure Virtual Desktop and Intune are not two separate runs. Repackaging on vendor updates Each new vendor build means another conversion. A saved command line template keeps the settings, but the capture runs again from the start. The saved capture recipe re-runs against the new build with the same fix-ups, signing and outputs, so a monthly vendor update is a re-run rather than a re-project. Evidence for change control You get the package. The record of what changed, who checked it and what was approved is whatever your team writes down beside it. Every package carries an evidence report: what was captured, which fix-ups were applied, which route was chosen, who approved it and when. That is the artefact your change board and your auditor ask for. Cost model Free to download. The cost is packager time, and our calculator’s default for the manual route is four hours per package. A licence with training and support included, set against the packager hours removed. The same calculator defaults to 30 minutes per package with EtherApps Forge. Try one real application on a 7-day trial, no card needed. Microsoft Learn: MSIX Packaging Tool overview App-V to MSIX ## App-V to MSIX migration: choosing the right method App-V to MSIX migration means assessing the App-V estate, converting the packages that convert, fixing runtime gaps, then signing, testing, and deploying through Intune. App-V is no longer developed, and App-V server support ended in April 2026, so most estates are planning the move now. Compare the main methods below. Method Best for Watch-outs Manual repackaging Small estates and one-off packages that need full control Slow at scale; every package repeats the same hand-built steps MSIX Packaging Tool conversion App-V 5.1 packages with healthy sources; free Microsoft tooling App-V 4.x is not supported directly; scripts and runtime fixes still need PSF work Scripted batch conversion Large App-V 5.1 estates run through command-line template conversions Needs clean conversion environments and per-package review of failures Capture-first repackaging (EtherApps Forge) App-V 4.x packages, lost installers, and complex apps that resist direct conversion Capture runs need a controlled VM and human review before release The problem ## MSIX stays hard because the blockers sit upstream of the format itself. The MSIX format is not the hard part. The blockers sit before it. Installer media went missing years ago. MSIX skills are scarce and expensive. Signing and manifest errors do not show until deployment. And each target seems to need its own run: Intune takes MSIX or IntuneWin, Azure Virtual Desktop takes AppAttach, and Windows 365 takes MSIX or IntuneWin, since it does not support AppAttach today. Microsoft's MSIX Packaging Tool is free and works well when you have a clean installer. The backlog is made of the apps where you do not. On the manual route, our cost calculator's default is four hours of packager time per package, and that backlog sets your migration date. ## Windows 10 end-of-support has compressed the timeline Windows 10 support ended in October 2025. Migration programmes that once had three years now have months. Packaging work planned across several waves lands on one wave with little slack. ## MSIX packaging skills are in short supply Experienced packagers are rare and in demand. Training a team from scratch pushes the timeline past the cutover date. That is why AI-guided routes and capture-first workflows matter. ## Source material is incomplete Legacy apps often have no installer, no documentation, and undocumented dependencies. Any MSIX workflow that needs clean installer media does not survive contact with a real estate. ## Signing and certificates add MSIX-specific friction Signing, manifest fix-ups, and modification packages are MSIX problems teams hit late. A pipeline that handles them inline is much faster than one that hands off to external signing tools. What changes ## Outcome blocks ## MSIX ready for every modern target One capture produces signed MSIX for Intune, IntuneWin for the legacy Intune path, MSIX AppAttach for Azure Virtual Desktop, and MSI for legacy targets. Windows 365 delivery uses the MSIX or IntuneWin output. ## Signing and certificate handling inline Signing, manifest fix-ups, and modification packages happen inside the workflow, with customer-managed or Microsoft-trusted certificate chains. No separate signing toolchain. ## PSF compatibility fix-ups for legacy apps [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/msix-packaging-and-deployment] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/msix-packaging-for-developers-and-isvs # MSIX Packaging for Developers and ISVs - EfficientEther > For developers and ISVs: turn your Windows build folder into a signed, validated MSIX with forge_msix. Drop-in makeappx replacement inside your CI pipeline. The problem What changes How it works Questions Book a fit check› Try it free› Solution ## Package your Windows app as signed MSIX. Built for developers and ISVs who already compile a working desktop app. Focus on your product, not installer plumbing. The forge_msix CLI from EtherApps Forge turns a build folder into a signed, validated MSIX as a pipeline stage, with no Windows SDK on the agent and without rewriting the script you already run. Try it free› Talk to us about your pipeline› 7-day free trial of the full workflow · licences include training and support No credit card. Capture a real application on day one. Explore EtherApps Forge Signed MSIX from your build0:31 0:00 / 0:31 Read the transcript 0:00 Your build is green. Shipping it is still manual. 0:04 The usual tools want an SDK on every agent. 0:07 forge_msix turns the build folder into a signed package, in one command. 0:14 Then it validates the package, and a bad one fails the build. 0:19 It runs in the pipeline you already have, with no Windows SDK to install. 0:25 Make a signed MSIX part of the build. Try Forge free. No SDK the CLI calls the Windows packaging engine directly on the build agent Licence-free the makeappx-compatible verbs need no licence at all One step create, sign, validate, and smoke-test inside the release pipeline How it works ## Build your MSIX with forge_msix in five steps. You already have the binaries. These are the steps that turn that build into a signed package your customers can install. ## Put forge_msix on the build agent Copy the CLI folder onto PATH. No Windows SDK install, no version-pinning of SDK tooling across agents. The CLI calls the packaging engine that ships with Windows. ## Point it at your published build folder Start from the folder your CI already produces: executables, dependencies, and any files that belong in the package. There is nothing to capture. The build is the source of truth. ## Scaffold the Appx manifest Run forge_msix prepare against the built executable to scaffold a manifest from its version resources and architecture, or keep a reviewed manifest in source control and pass it in. ## Create and sign in one command Run forge_msix create against the build folder with signing from a certificate store by thumbprint, plus an RFC 3161 timestamp. Publisher identity is aligned to the certificate subject so customers get a stable package identity. ## Validate, then ship the signed MSIX Run forge_msix validate and fail the build on an invalid package. Ship the artefact for direct download, Microsoft Intune or Configuration Manager deployment, or generate an app installer update feed for sideloaded customers. Pipeline fit ## What a release pipeline needs, and where the default tooling stops Packaging a build as MSIX is not one task. It is manifest, package, sign, validate, test, and publish an update path. Compared by stage rather than by product: Pipeline stage Default Windows SDK tooling forge_msix Build agent setup Windows SDK installed and version-pinned on every agent A copy of the CLI folder on PATH. It calls the packaging engine that ships with Windows Manifest Hand-authored and kept in step with the build by hand Scaffolded from the built executable's version resources, or committed to source control and passed in Package and sign Separate tools, signing bolted on after packaging One command, with the publisher identity aligned to the certificate subject Fail the build Exit codes do not separate an invalid package from a failed run Validation returns a distinct code for analysed-but-invalid, so the gate is unambiguous Sideload updates App installer manifest written and maintained by hand Generated from the signed package's real identity, bundle aware The problem ## Why developers and ISVs still wrestle with MSIX packaging. Developers and ISVs are not stuck on the same problem as a migration team. There is no lost installer and nothing to capture: the build already works. The friction is everything after it. MSIX packaging has meant a Windows SDK dependency on the build agent, a signing step bolted on afterwards, certificate handling nobody owns, and no reliable way to fail a build when the package is wrong. Packaging becomes a manual job at release time, which is exactly where mistakes reach customers. ## Installer detail eats development time Independent software vendors and product teams spend too long learning Windows packaging quirks instead of shipping product features. MSIX should be a release step, not a side project. ## The build agent carries tooling it should not need Packaging with the standard tool means installing and version-pinning the Windows SDK on every agent. That is a heavy dependency for one step, and it drifts between agents in a way that only shows up on a release day. ## Enterprise buyers ask for a clean package Customers who deploy with Intune or Configuration Manager often need a signed MSIX before they will buy. If packaging is slow or manual, it becomes a commercial blocker rather than a technical one. ## A bad package fails quietly Without a validation gate that distinguishes an invalid package from a failed run, a broken package can pass through the pipeline and reach a customer, where it fails at install time rather than at build time. What changes ## What changes for developers and ISVs ## Drop-in replacement for makeappx The packaging verbs take the same switches as makeappx.exe, so an existing script keeps working when the binary is swapped. Those verbs are licence-free, so adoption does not start with a procurement conversation, and the engine is the operating system component rather than a reimplementation. ## Manifest, package, and signature in one step Scaffold a manifest from the built executable's version resources and architecture, or keep one in source control so identity, publisher, and capabilities are reviewed like any other file. Then create and sign in a single command, from a certificate store by thumbprint so no password is written into a build definition, with an RFC 3161 timestamp so signatures outlive the certificate. ## A build gate you can trust Schema validation runs as a preflight, and the validation verb returns a distinct exit code for a package that was analysed and found invalid, separate from a run that simply failed. On a release candidate, a smoke test installs the signed package, launches and closes it, uninstalls it, and writes a JSON report. ## A faster inner loop and an update feed During development, register the build output as a loose package instead of repackaging on every rebuild, then validate, launch, and clean up in one pass. For sideloaded distribution, generate an app installer manifest from the signed package's real identity so installed copies update themselves from an HTTPS location. ## Scriptable from the command line Forge MSIX CLI for build pipelines and MSP packaging factories: capture, sign, and produce a deployment-ready MSIX from a single command. No GUI required. ## Audited every build Forge assesses each MSIX against best-practice signals from the same CLI session: capabilities, publisher alignment, visual assets, and trust state. Start here ## Make a signed MSIX an artefact of the build, not a job somebody does at release time. See this working on your own tenant. Try it free› Talk to us about your pipeline› See estate-wide MSIX packaging› ## Guides and analysis on this topic Build and sign MSIX in CI/CD without the Windows SDK PSF fix-ups and MSIX packaging for developers Package Support Framework risk in MSIX and App Attach The build-to-MSIX pipeline ## From build folder to signed MSIX as one pipeline stage. forge_msix scaffolds a manifest from the built executable, packages and signs in one command, validates the result with a build-failing exit code, and produces a signed MSIX. A short branch publishes an app installer update feed for sideloaded customers. Every stage runs inside the release pipeline you already have. Build Output Executables Dependencies Package files Nothing to capture Build folder EtherApps Forge forge_msix CLI Manifest Package and sign Validate Signed MSIX CI/CD Pipeline [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/msix-packaging-for-developers-and-isvs] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/omnissa-app-volumes-migration # Omnissa App Volumes Application Migration - EfficientEther > Modernise legacy apps running on an ageing Omnissa (VMware) App Volumes estate. Capture, convert to MSI or MSIX, and keep native App Volumes delivery. The problem What changes How it works Questions Book a fit check› Try it free› Solution ## Modernise the applications on your Omnissa App Volumes estate, not just the platform. Omnissa App Volumes (formerly VMware App Volumes) delivers EXE, MSI, MSIX, and ThinApp applications natively. The platform side of a Horizon and App Volumes refresh is usually well understood; the applications sitting on it, often packaged years ago as ThinApp or native installs, are the part that stalls. EtherApps Forge captures those applications from a live install, even when the original installer is gone, and produces a signed MSI or MSIX that App Volumes attaches the same way it always has. Book an App Volumes app review› Try it free› 7-day free trial of the full workflow · licences include training and support No credit card. Capture a real application on day one. Explore EtherApps Forge App Volumes apps to MSIX0:31 0:00 / 0:31 Read the transcript 0:00 The App Volumes refresh is planned. The apps are not. 0:04 Packaged as ThinApp years ago, and the installer is long gone. 0:08 Forge captures each app where it still runs. From the app, the command line, or your AI agent. 0:15 One signed MSIX, validated and tested. 0:19 App Volumes already attaches MSIX natively, so there is nothing to rebuild. 0:25 Modernise the apps, not just the platform. Try Forge free. No rebuild App Volumes already delivers EXE, MSI, MSIX, and ThinApp natively No installer rescue legacy apps when the installation media is lost or the vendor portal is gated Low cost, self-serve a 7-day Forge trial on one real app instead of a partner-led packaging project The problem ## Why the application backlog survives every platform refresh. Plain version: the Horizon and App Volumes environment gets refreshed, but the applications on it are years old, several were packaged as ThinApp before that format fell out of favour, and nobody is confident repackaging them from scratch. IT version: an ageing App Volumes estate carries a backlog of ThinApp and native-install applications with unclear dependencies, uncertain compatibility with a current App Volumes release, and no fast route to a modern package format. Both versions need the same answer: capture what is actually installed, convert it to a package App Volumes already knows how to deliver, and do it without a full repackaging project per app. ## ThinApp packages are ageing out ThinApp was a common App Volumes packaging route for years. The original build environment, the sequencer project, and the person who built it are often long gone, leaving a working ThinApp package that nobody can safely rebuild or update. ## The installer for the underlying app is missing Whether the app was originally delivered as ThinApp, a native install, or an AppStack, the source installer frequently disappeared years before anyone needed to repackage it, so a from-scratch rebuild starts with detective work, not packaging. ## Repackaging looks like a bigger project than the platform refresh Teams will happily plan a Horizon or App Volumes version upgrade, but a parallel repackaging project for every legacy app on the estate is enough to make the whole migration slip, especially when packaging skills are scarce. ## Nobody wants to touch a package that still works A working ThinApp or old AppStack that nobody wants to risk breaking becomes the reason the underlying platform can't be upgraded cleanly, even though the platform itself is ready to move. What changes ## What good looks like after the assessment ## A real inventory of what each legacy package actually does Forge captures the application's files, registry, services, and dependencies from a live install, whatever format it currently ships in, giving you a documented footprint instead of a package nobody wants to open. ## A signed MSI or MSIX, ready for App Volumes The capture becomes a signed MSI or MSIX package. Omnissa App Volumes delivers both formats natively today, so there's no proprietary rebuild step and no separate App Volumes-specific packaging tool to learn. ## A modernisation path that doesn't block the platform refresh Legacy ThinApp and native-install applications stop being the reason a Horizon or App Volumes version upgrade gets delayed, because the application side of the work runs on its own track. ## A lower-cost route than a partner-led packaging project A 7-day EtherApps Forge trial on one real application tests the approach before committing to a wider repackaging programme, instead of starting with a quote-only packaging engagement. ## Capture from running systems Live-capture wizard: file, registry, AppData, services, and dependency capture from a running Windows system when installer media is missing or incomplete. Start here ## Stop letting the application backlog hold back the platform refresh. See this working on your own tenant. Book an App Volumes app review› Try it free› Where Forge fits on an App Volumes estate ## Capture the application, not the platform, then let App Volumes deliver it as it always has. Forge captures the installed application footprint from a live machine or controlled VM, whether it was originally packaged as ThinApp, a native install, or something undocumented. That capture becomes a signed MSI or MSIX, which Omnissa App Volumes attaches the same way it delivers any other MSI, MSIX, EXE, or ThinApp package today, no proprietary AppStack rebuild required. ThinApp / Native Install Files Registry Services Dependencies Installer often missing Live capture EtherApps Forge Capture Fix up Convert and sign Signed MSI or MSIX Omnissa App Volumes Native MSI and MSIX delivery Attached like any package No AppStack rebuild Walkthrough1:13 Walkthrough ## See the same capture-first packaging that feeds App Volumes, Citrix, and Parallels RAS. A short walkthrough of legacy app capture from a working machine, package output, and a Windows 11 compatibility verdict - the same signed MSI and MSIX output that Omnissa App Volumes, Citrix, and Parallels RAS all deliver natively. How we deliver it ## How EfficientEther covers this route EtherApps Forge leads. Forge captures the application directly from a live install, whatever format it currently ships in (ThinApp, native install, or an existing AppStack), and produces a signed MSI or MSIX from that capture. Omnissa App Volumes already delivers MSI, MSIX, EXE, and ThinApp applications natively, so the output attaches the same way any other App Volumes-delivered application does today. EtherInsights joins where the same programme also needs broader Windows 365 or Azure Virtual Desktop migration planning alongside the App Volumes modernisation work. ## Where this route fits best Ageing ThinApp packages with no available source project: capture from a live install and convert to MSI or MSIX instead of rebuilding the sequence from scratch. Horizon or App Volumes version upgrades stalled by application uncertainty: modernise the application backlog on its own track so the platform refresh isn't blocked. Native-install applications on App Volumes with lost installer media: rescue from a working machine the same way as any other legacy app. Estates consolidating multiple ageing AppStacks into a smaller, better-documented application set before a wider migration. MSP-managed Horizon or App Volumes estates needing a repeatable, lower-cost packaging pass across several customer tenants. Capture installed Windows applications, reduce packaging unknowns, and produce modern deployment-ready outputs faster. Try it free› Learn more about EtherApps Forge 7-day free trial of the full workflow · licences include training and support 90.68%1 of 3,261 cases produced an MSIX package Microsoft Marketplace Buy on the Microsoft invoice you already pay ISO 27001, 9001, 42001 Certified for information security, quality, and AI management Manage Windows 365 day to day, from deployment to configuration, drift, and migration evidence, and find Microsoft 365 and Azure waste and prove savings, all from the same operating view. Learn more about EtherInsights Questions ## Questions buyers usually ask about modernising an App Volumes estate. [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/omnissa-app-volumes-migration] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/parallels-ras-application-packaging # Parallels RAS Application Packaging - EfficientEther > Package legacy Win32 apps into signed MSIX and deliver them through Parallels RAS's native Application Packages and MSIX app attach support. The problem What changes How it works Questions Book a fit check› Try it free› Solution ## Package legacy apps once, deliver them through Parallels RAS the way it already expects. Parallels RAS 19 and later ships Application Packages, a delivery method built on MSIX app attach, extended to VDI in RAS 19.1 and to Azure Virtual Desktop in RAS 19.2. EtherApps Forge captures a legacy Win32 application from a live install, even when the original installer is long gone, and produces a signed MSIX that RAS's own Application Packages feature attaches directly. No separate Parallels-specific packaging step, no proprietary format to learn. Book a Parallels RAS app review› Try it free› 7-day free trial of the full workflow · licences include training and support No credit card. Capture a real application on day one. Explore EtherApps Forge Legacy apps for Parallels RAS0:32 0:00 / 0:32 Read the transcript 0:00 Parallels RAS has Application Packages. Your apps are not packaged yet. 0:05 Installed years ago, and the installer is long gone. 0:09 Forge captures the app where it still runs. From the app, the command line, or your AI agent. 0:15 One signed MSIX, validated and tested. 0:19 Parallels RAS attaches it as an Application Package, on VDI and Azure Virtual Desktop. 0:26 Package once, and deliver through Parallels RAS. Try Forge free. No new format Parallels RAS already delivers MSIX and MSIX app attach natively No installer rescue legacy apps when the installation media is lost or the vendor portal is gated Low cost, self-serve a 7-day Forge trial on one real app instead of a partner-led packaging project The problem ## Why the packaging backlog survives every RAS upgrade. Plain version: the app that's always been delivered through Parallels RAS still runs from an old-style installer nobody wants to touch, and repackaging it into MSIX feels like a project on its own. IT version: a Parallels RAS estate carries legacy Win32 applications that predate RAS's Application Packages feature, with installer media that's frequently missing and no in-house MSIX packaging capacity to close the gap. Both versions need the same answer: capture what's actually installed, convert it to the MSIX format RAS already delivers natively, and do it without a packaging project per app. ## The app predates Application Packages Many apps running through Parallels RAS were published as a traditional installed application long before RAS 19 introduced Application Packages. Nobody has gone back to repackage them into MSIX, so they sit outside the modern delivery path RAS now supports. ## The original installer is missing Installer media, licence keys, and vendor download portals age out faster than the applications themselves. Rebuilding an MSIX package from scratch is hard to justify when the starting point is a running application and nothing else. ## MSIX packaging skills are thin Publishing through RAS's Application Packages feature assumes an MSIX package already exists. Building that package by hand, with the right manifest, signing, and dependency handling, is exactly the skill gap most IT and packaging teams don't have spare capacity for. ## A working app is a risk nobody wants to own An application that still runs, however it's currently delivered, becomes the reason a wider RAS or Windows 11 rollout stalls, because nobody wants to be the one who breaks it trying to modernise it. What changes ## What good looks like after the assessment ## A real capture of what the app actually needs Forge captures the application's files, registry, services, and dependencies from a live install or controlled VM, giving you a documented footprint instead of guesswork about what a repackage would require. ## A signed MSIX, ready for RAS Application Packages The capture becomes a signed MSIX package, the same format Parallels RAS's Application Packages feature and MSIX app attach already expect, with no separate Parallels-specific tool to adopt. ## Delivery across VDI and AVD-hosted RAS alike Because Parallels RAS extended Application Packages to VDI in 19.1 and to Azure Virtual Desktop in 19.2, the same MSIX output works whether the estate is on-premises VDI, AVD, or a mix of both. ## A lower-cost route than a partner-led packaging project A 7-day EtherApps Forge trial on one real application tests the approach before committing to a wider MSIX packaging programme, instead of starting with a quote-only packaging engagement. ## Capture from running systems Live-capture wizard: file, registry, AppData, services, and dependency capture from a running Windows system when installer media is missing or incomplete. Start here ## Stop letting missing installers hold back your Application Packages rollout. See this working on your own tenant. Book a Parallels RAS app review› Try it free› Where Forge fits on a Parallels RAS estate ## Capture the application once, then let Parallels RAS deliver it the way it's built to. Forge captures the installed application footprint from a live machine or controlled VM, whatever format it currently runs in. That capture becomes a signed MSIX, which Parallels RAS's Application Packages feature attaches through its own native MSIX app attach support, across VDI and AVD-hosted RAS deployments, no separate Parallels-specific packaging tool required. Legacy Win32 App Files Registry Services Dependencies Installer often missing Live capture EtherApps Forge Capture Fix up Convert and sign Signed MSIX Parallels RAS Application Packages MSIX app attach VDI and AVD-hosted RAS Walkthrough1:13 Walkthrough ## See the same capture-first packaging that feeds Parallels RAS, Citrix, and Omnissa App Volumes. A short walkthrough of legacy app capture from a working machine, package output, and a Windows 11 compatibility verdict - the same signed MSIX output that Parallels RAS, Citrix, and Omnissa App Volumes all deliver natively. How we deliver it ## How EfficientEther covers this route EtherApps Forge leads. Forge captures the legacy Win32 application directly from a live install or controlled VM and produces a signed MSIX from that capture. Parallels RAS's own Application Packages feature, built on MSIX app attach and extended to VDI and Azure Virtual Desktop, delivers that MSIX the way it delivers any other application package today. EtherInsights joins where the same programme also needs broader Windows 365 or Azure Virtual Desktop migration planning alongside the RAS application modernisation work. ## Where this route fits best Legacy Win32 apps delivered through Parallels RAS with no MSIX package yet: capture from a live install and produce a signed MSIX for Application Packages. Missing installer media: rescue the application from a working machine rather than chasing down licence keys and vendor downloads. Mixed VDI and Azure Virtual Desktop RAS estates: package once, deliver the same MSIX through Application Packages on either environment. Windows 10 end-of-support driven Windows 11 migrations where RAS-delivered apps need a compatibility verdict before the cutover. MSP-managed Parallels RAS estates needing a repeatable, lower-cost MSIX packaging pass across several customer tenants. Capture installed Windows applications, reduce packaging unknowns, and produce modern deployment-ready outputs faster. Try it free› Learn more about EtherApps Forge 7-day free trial of the full workflow · licences include training and support 90.68%1 of 3,261 cases produced an MSIX package Microsoft Marketplace Buy on the Microsoft invoice you already pay ISO 27001, 9001, 42001 Certified for information security, quality, and AI management Manage Windows 365 day to day, from deployment to configuration, drift, and migration evidence, and find Microsoft 365 and Azure waste and prove savings, all from the same operating view. Learn more about EtherInsights Questions ## Questions buyers usually ask about packaging for Parallels RAS. Plain answers for IT leads and Parallels RAS administrators planning an Application Packages rollout. Ask us on a packaging fit check ## Does Forge integrate directly with Parallels RAS Application Packages? [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/parallels-ras-application-packaging] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/smb-ai-assistant # AI Assistant for Small Businesses - EtherAssist > Use EtherAssist as a practical AI assistant for small businesses: answer repeat questions, draft customer replies, prepare simple policies, and save owner time. Solution ## AI help for small businesses that need answers, not extra admin. EtherAssist helps small teams turn everyday questions, customer replies, notes, policies, and checklists into clear next steps, working from the Microsoft 365 you already pay for, not a separate AI subscription. Start with a free trial and use it on the work that keeps taking time from the business. Try it free› Talk to someone› Explore EtherAssist› 14-day free trial No credit card. Choose UK, EU, or US hosting on day one. 14 days free trial, no credit card Minutes to start asking practical business questions One place for drafts, checklists, answers, and notes your team can reuse The problem ## The pressure usually comes from everyday work, not one big system. A small business owner is often the person everyone asks: what should we send, what should the policy say, what did we agree, what happens next? That work matters, but it pulls time away from customers, sales, delivery, and cash flow. ## The same questions keep coming back Staff, customers, suppliers, and partners often need similar answers. When those answers are not captured clearly, the owner keeps rewriting them. ## Admin interrupts the work that earns money Policies, notes, checklists, and follow-up emails are important, but they can eat the quiet hours a small team needs for sales and service. ## Useful knowledge sits in someone's head How the business handles refunds, onboarding, handovers, service issues, or customer updates is often known, but not written down in a way the team can reuse. ## General AI still needs a clear route Open-ended AI tools can be helpful, but busy owners need practical prompts, clearer outputs, and a path to turn answers into useful business material. What changes ## What EtherAssist helps a small team do. ## Answer repeat questions faster Turn common customer, staff, and supplier questions into clearer responses the team can reuse. ## Draft useful business material Prepare first drafts of policies, procedures, checklists, email replies, and simple guides without starting from a blank page. ## Keep work moving when the owner is busy Give the team a place to create sensible next steps instead of waiting for one person to write every answer. ## Start small and prove value Use the free trial on real work first, then decide whether a wider rollout or guided setup is worth it. Start here ## Try EtherAssist on the task that keeps coming back. See this working on your own tenant. Try it free› Talk to someone› Explore EtherAssist› Simple business help ## Ask a question. Get a usable draft. Turn it into something the team can reuse. Use EtherAssist for customer replies, staff guidance, policies, checklists, meeting notes, and repeat questions without starting a technical project. Video walkthrough ## See EtherAssist for small business work. Watch how a small team can use EtherAssist to turn a question into a clear answer, draft, or next step. Start from the question or task in front of you. Create clearer drafts, checklists, and replies. Use the free trial before booking a longer discussion. How we deliver it ## EtherAssist is the product for this route. This page is for owners and small teams who want practical AI help without technical setup language. Start with EtherAssist, try it on real questions, and move to a call only if you want help shaping the best use cases for your business. EtherAssist gives IT and compliance teams the speed of AI without giving up data control, auditability, or practical governance. It supports troubleshooting, scripting, documentation, policy work, and repeatable internal support workflows. Learn more about EtherAssist Where this fits Draft a customer reply that sounds clear and professional. Turn a repeated staff question into a short internal guide. Prepare a simple policy or checklist before review. Summarise meeting notes into actions and owners. Create a reusable answer for onboarding, handovers, or service issues. FAQ ## Questions small businesses usually ask. Keep the decision simple: what it helps with, how to start, and when to talk to someone. Do I need to be technical to use EtherAssist? No. This route is for small-business users who want clear help with questions, drafts, checklists, notes, and everyday admin. You can start by typing the task in plain English. What should I try first? Pick one task you already repeat: a customer reply, a staff guide, a short policy, a checklist, or a meeting follow-up. If EtherAssist saves time there, you will quickly see where else it fits. Is the trial really the best first step? Yes. The page is designed so small businesses can try EtherAssist before booking a meeting. Use the trial on real work, then speak to us if you want help setting up stronger workflows. How is this different from a general AI assistant I could already use? A general assistant does not know your business: it has not seen your policies, your checklists, or your Microsoft 365 files, so every answer needs re-explaining from scratch. EtherAssist works from the Microsoft 365 tenant your business already runs on, so replies, drafts, and checklists reflect your actual documents and past work, not a blank-slate conversation, and there is no separate AI subscription to buy on top of what you already pay for. Is my business's data safe with EtherAssist? EtherAssist works from the Microsoft 365 tenant your business already runs, not a separate data store, and you choose UK, EU, or US hosting for where that work happens. Redaction and admin oversight are built in, and every run is logged with an owner and a timestamp, so a small team can see exactly what was asked and what was produced, not just trust that it happened. What happens after the 14-day free trial? You decide. Nothing is locked in during the trial, and there is no obligation to book a call afterwards - if the answers were useful, keep using it; if you want help widening it into more of the business, talk to us then, not before. ## SMB AI assistant sources Reviewed 26 August 2026. Microsoft Learn: Data, privacy, and security for Microsoft 365 Copilot Microsoft Learn: Microsoft 365 Copilot licensing Microsoft Learn: Microsoft 365 Copilot readiness reporting Glossary: Copilot ## Related solutions IT operations and complianceSupport day-two IT operations faster without losing control. Agentic operationsRun day-two operations through scoped, auditable AI workflows. Microsoft 365 for MSPsPer-customer cost, licence, and security evidence for MSP teams. Intune reporting and troubleshootingBring Intune reporting, drift, and device checks into one view. ## Related glossary terms Copilot Agentic AI Start here ## Try EtherAssist on the task that keeps coming back. Start the free trial, ask one real business question, and see whether the answer is useful enough to save time this week. Try it free› Talk to someone› Explore EtherAssist› The free trial lets a small team test real business tasks before a sales conversation. The page keeps the language plain, so owners can judge value without technical setup detail. EtherAssist can grow from simple answers into stronger documentation, policy, and workflow support when the business is ready. Try it free› Explore EtherAssist› --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/windows-365-and-cloud-pc # MSP Multi-Tenant Windows 365 Management - EfficientEther > Secure Windows 365 Cloud PC management for MSPs and IT teams: size Cloud PCs, compare AVD baselines, catch drift, and prove cost. Book a free assessment. Solution ## Windows 365 Cloud PC management across every tenant you run, from planning to day two. Your Windows 365 rollout is finished, but the Cloud PC estate now lives in four admin centres: Intune, the Microsoft 365 admin center, the Azure portal, and Windows 365 itself. Every wave review starts with a spreadsheet. If you run several customer tenants, that is one spreadsheet per tenant. Drift shows up one ticket at a time. And nobody can prove what a cohort costs against the old Azure Virtual Desktop baseline. Each month that stays true costs your team hours of reconciliation and leaves the business case unproven at renewal. EtherInsights puts Windows 365 design, deployment waves, configuration drift, and day-two evidence in one operating view, with your Azure Virtual Desktop or VDI baseline on the same record. Best fit: MSPs and IT teams running 50 to 600 users who want persistent, per-user Cloud PCs. Pooled or session-based desktops still belong on Azure Virtual Desktop. Get my free Windows 365 cost estimate› Get my free Windows 365 assessment› Try it free› From £0.79 per active user/month · 14-day free trial Card required to start. Connect your tenant in minutes. 1 view replaces four admin centres across design, deploy, configure, and run AVD & VDI baselines sit on the same record as each Cloud PC cohort Pinned baseline drift flagged as it happens, with per-object restore Updated 1 September 2026 Free practitioner ebook ## From Legacy VDI and AVD to Windows 365 Assess which VDI and AVD user groups fit Windows 365, build a defensible TCO case, prepare legacy applications, and migrate without losing day-two ownership. Includes practical examples, decision frameworks, diagrams, a 90-day operating plan, a glossary, and source references. Get the free handbook› Windows 365 vs AVD ## Windows 365 vs Azure Virtual Desktop, side by side Both run on Microsoft's Cloud PC and virtual desktop stack, but the operating model is different. Use this table for a first-pass read before an assessment; EtherInsights maps your current AVD or VDI baseline against the Windows 365 model in detail. Decision factor Windows 365 Azure Virtual Desktop Persistence A dedicated, 1:1 Cloud PC per user Pooled or shared session hosts, with 1:1 personal desktops also possible Admin surface Microsoft Intune and the Microsoft 365 admin center Azure portal for host pools and session hosts, plus Intune for device management FSLogix profiles Not required for most personal Cloud PC assignments Commonly required to manage user profiles across pooled or shared desktops Pricing model Fixed per-user Cloud PC licence, sized by vCPU, RAM, and storage Consumption-based Azure compute and storage, scales with session-host usage UK data residency Provisioning policy sets the Azure region a Cloud PC is created in Host pool region choice gives the same Azure region control The problem ## Windows 365 stalls when Cloud PC management is split across four admin centres. If you run Windows 365 today, you already know where the time goes. Cohort design was compressed, so Cloud PC sizes were guessed and licences over-bought. Wave reviews are rebuilt in spreadsheets from Intune, the Microsoft 365 admin center, and the Azure portal. Configuration drifted after go-live, and the first sign was a user ticket. The Azure Virtual Desktop baseline that justified the move never reached the same record, so the saving cannot be proven at renewal. None of this is a gap in Windows 365 itself. It is the cost of running four consoles with no shared operating view. ## Design is squeezed, so sizing is guessed Cohort design, image choice, network and storage planning, Windows 365 Business or Enterprise licensing, and reservation planning get compressed or skipped. The result is a cloud desktop service with unclear assumptions and a disputed cost after rollout. ## Deployment is where programmes stall Rollout waves, device connection, user assignment, and provisioning checks need Intune, the Microsoft 365 admin center, Windows 365, and sometimes the Azure portal. When those views do not join up, wave visibility gets rebuilt in a spreadsheet. ## Configuration drifts silently after cutover Cloud PC settings, MDM baseline assignment, images, and policies drift once the estate is live. Without a pinned baseline there is nothing to measure against and nothing to restore from. ## Day-two visibility is fragmented Connection health, reliability, user-level insight, remote access evidence, and per-device troubleshooting sit in separate panes. Problems surface one device at a time instead of at cohort level. What changes ## Outcome blocks ## Design, licensing, and migration baselining Size cohorts, choose images, plan network and storage, check Microsoft 365 E3/E5 dependencies, and plan user licences and reservations before waves roll. Where it applies, the Azure Virtual Desktop baseline sits alongside from day one. ## Deployment execution and validation Run rollout waves, device connection, user assignment, and provisioning checks with evidence that closes wave-by-wave questions in the programme review. ## Configuration and baseline alignment Manage Cloud PC configuration, MDM baseline assignment, images, and policies against a pinned baseline. Drift is flagged, and any object can be restored when something moves. ## Day-two operating control Connection health, user and device insight, side-blade troubleshooting, remote work evidence, and cohort-level fixes instead of per-device firefighting. Start here ## Prove what your Cloud PC estate costs, in one view instead of four. See this working on your own tenant. Get my free Windows 365 assessment› Try it free› Get my free Windows 365 cost estimate› ## Guides and analysis on this topic AVD to Windows 365 migration cost Windows 365 desktop segmentation model Free Windows 365 TCO calculator Windows 365 at five: what comes next for Cloud PC management Windows 365 vs AVD compared The lifecycle view ## Design, deployment waves, and day-two drift in one record. A Cloud PC fleet - with Azure Virtual Desktop baseline, older VDI baseline, or existing endpoints as migration starting points - flows through cohort design, deployment waves, configuration management, and day-two support, all tracked against a pinned Cloud PC baseline with drift detection, producing an operating record with owners and next actions. Solution brief ## Windows 365 Management Solution Brief Two pages on this decision: what to measure, who has to sign it off, and what should be true before you commit. Free, and written to be forwarded. Get the solution brief› Video walkthrough ## See Cloud PC lifecycle evidence. A focused walkthrough of Cloud PC planning, migration, configuration, and day-two evidence in EtherInsights. Keep lifecycle evidence in one operating view. Connect migration assumptions to Cloud PC state. Use the overview for wider Microsoft estate context. How we deliver it ## Product mapping EtherInsights leads this route: Windows 365 design, deployment, configuration, and day-two management, with migration baselines from Azure Virtual Desktop or older VDI where they apply. It fits whether your team says Windows 365, W365, Cloud PC, CloudPC, or cloud desktops. EtherApps Forge covers application readiness and packaging. EtherAssist supports controlled day-two operations and troubleshooting once Cloud PCs are live. EtherInsights is the operating view for Microsoft 365, Azure, and Windows 365: day-to-day cost management, licence control, and full Windows 365 Cloud PC lifecycle management, plus tenant, user, security, device, and Intune reporting. Learn more about EtherInsights EtherAssist gives IT and compliance teams the speed of AI without giving up data control, auditability, or practical governance. It supports troubleshooting, scripting, documentation, policy work, and repeatable internal support workflows. Learn more about EtherAssist EtherApps Forge captures installed Windows applications from running systems, analyses the real application footprint, supports AI-guided packaging decisions, and produces deployment-ready outputs for modern environments. [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/windows-365-and-cloud-pc] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/windows-365-migration # Windows 365 Cloud PC Migration UK from AVD - EfficientEther > Plan a Windows 365 migration in the UK from AVD, legacy VDI or eligible Azure VMs. Assess cohorts, TCO, pilot waves and day-two operations with EtherInsights. Solution ## Plan a Windows 365 Cloud PC migration from AVD and legacy VDI. For UK IT teams and MSPs, EtherInsights turns AVD and legacy VDI estates into sized cohorts, pilots, controlled migration waves and day-two evidence. If you meant mailbox or tenant data migration rather than Cloud PCs, start with our Microsoft 365 licence management and offboarding page, or contact us. Plan a Windows 365 migration› Compare AVD and Cloud PC cost per user› Try it free› Explore EtherInsights› From £0.79 per active user/month · 14-day free trial Card required to start. Connect your tenant in minutes. AVD + VDI migration planning for Azure Virtual Desktop, older VDI, and eligible Azure VM paths API-led built around Microsoft's Windows 365 migration API and Graph-based status visibility Tracked schedule, import, migration history, statistics, and cleanup in the same motion Updated 1 September 2026 Size it in three minutes Know the cost per user before you commit to a migration wave. Three inputs, no sign-up, no account: what you spend running Azure Virtual Desktop today against Windows 365 Enterprise and Windows 365 Flex, per user per month. Take the directional number into the business case first, then run the same comparison against the real tenant on a trial. Migration plans stall because nobody can answer the cost question in the room, not because the technical path is unclear. Compare AVD and Cloud PC cost per user› Try it free› Free practitioner ebook ## From Legacy VDI and AVD to Windows 365 Assess which VDI and AVD user groups fit Windows 365, build a defensible TCO case, prepare legacy applications, and migrate without losing day-two ownership. Includes practical examples, decision frameworks, diagrams, a 90-day operating plan, a glossary, and source references. Get the free handbook› The problem ## Moving from VDI to Windows 365 is rarely blocked by one setting. It is blocked by coordination. For UK IT teams and MSPs, EtherInsights turns AVD and legacy VDI estates into sized cohorts, pilots, controlled migration waves and day-two evidence. If you meant mailbox or tenant data migration rather than Cloud PCs, start with our Microsoft 365 licence management and offboarding page, or contact us. ## Source estates are mixed Some desktops are in Azure Virtual Desktop AVD. Some are standalone Azure VMs. Others come from older virtual desktop infrastructure VDI or custom image paths that need to be prepared before they can follow a supported Windows 365 import route. ## Manual steps create risk User mapping, snapshot preparation, licence assignment, maintenance windows, and cleanup decisions are easy to mis-sequence when every cloud desktop wave is coordinated outside the migration tool. ## Progress is hard to defend Teams need to know what was imported, what succeeded, what failed, how long each stage took, and which actions remain before the next migration wave. ## Cleanup is often delayed Original VMs, network interfaces, disks, and third-party VDI agents can remain behind because nobody wants to remove production dependencies without evidence. How it works ## A guided route from source VM to managed Cloud PC. ## Select and validate the source Start from existing Azure Virtual Desktop personal desktops, eligible Azure VMs, or a prepared custom VM path. Older VDI candidates can be assessed and prepared into a supported Azure VM or VHD snapshot route before import. ## Map the user and prepare the import Match source desktops to target users, check readiness, apply naming rules where needed, and prepare the snapshot-based Windows 365 import without rebuilding every step by hand. ## Schedule the migration window Plan migrations around maintenance windows, licence assignment, high performance user groups, and user impact so the team can move in controlled waves rather than one-off manual jobs. ## Track, review, and clean up Follow import status, migrated Cloud PC history, duration statistics, and post-migration cleanup so the next wave has evidence rather than guesswork. Start here ## Make the migration wave manageable before users move. See this working on your own tenant. Plan a Windows 365 migration› Try it free› ## Guides and analysis on this topic Windows 365 Flex concurrency planning AVD to Windows 365 migration cost Which desktops should move to Windows 365 first EfficientEther Recognised as a Microsoft Windows 365 Partner Windows 365 Turns Five: What Comes Next for Cloud PC Management Migration operating view ## Bring the source estate, target user, schedule, and result into one record. EtherInsights turns the migration into a managed workflow: select eligible AVD or Azure VM sources, map users, prepare snapshot-based imports, track progress, review migrated Cloud PCs, and keep migration statistics ready for the next wave. Solution brief ## Windows 365 Migration API Solution Brief Two pages on this decision: what to measure, who has to sign it off, and what should be true before you commit. Free, and written to be forwarded. Get the solution brief› Product walkthrough ## See Windows 365 migration and Cloud PC control together. The current walkthrough shows the wider Cloud PC operating view. The migration page is designed to take screenshots from the dedicated migration workflow when those assets are ready. Use the migration workflow to select source VMs and target users. Track import and provisioning status rather than managing migrations from spreadsheets. Use history and statistics to plan the next maintenance window. How we deliver it ## EtherInsights leads the migration workflow. This is the Windows 365 Cloud PC migration route for UK IT teams and MSPs assessing AVD, legacy VDI and eligible Azure VM estates. Microsoft snapshot migration supports qualifying Azure-based VMs into Windows 365 Enterprise only. Other sources need cohort design, fresh provisioning or preparation before a pilot. EtherInsights adds TCO, readiness and day-two evidence; EtherApps Forge supports application readiness and EtherAssist supports governed follow-through. EtherInsights is the operating view for Microsoft 365, Azure, and Windows 365: day-to-day cost management, licence control, and full Windows 365 Cloud PC lifecycle management, plus tenant, user, security, device, and Intune reporting. Learn more about EtherInsights EtherApps Forge captures installed Windows applications from running systems, analyses the real application footprint, supports AI-guided packaging decisions, and produces deployment-ready outputs for modern environments. Learn more about EtherApps Forge EtherAssist gives IT and compliance teams the speed of AI without giving up data control, auditability, or practical governance. It supports troubleshooting, scripting, documentation, policy work, and repeatable internal support workflows. Learn more about EtherAssist Where this fits Azure Virtual Desktop personal desktop estates moving to Windows 365 Cloud PCs. Older VDI exits where Citrix, Omnissa, VMware Horizon, or standalone Windows VM paths need discovery and preparation. Azure VM-based desktops that need target-user mapping, scheduling, import tracking, and cleanup. Custom image or custom VM paths that need to become a supported Azure VM/VHD snapshot route before Windows 365 import. Migration waves where leaders need evidence on duration, success, failures, cleanup, and the next maintenance window. ## What's inside the lifecycle readiness checklist The full checklist is a working record with owner fields, evidence sections, and a decision gate for each phase. Here is what each phase actually covers before you download it. ## 1. Migration and source readiness Inventory users, source desktops, applications, profiles, data, peripherals, and dependencies, then group them by workload, location, and target Cloud PC size. Choose a supported route for each source: eligible Azure VM snapshot import, a fresh Cloud PC build, or a designed alternative. Pilot representative users and applications, then document cutover, rollback, and cleanup approval before the next wave. ## 2. Deployment and pilot readiness [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/solutions/windows-365-migration] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/pricing # Pricing - EtherInsights, EtherAssist, EtherApps Forge > EtherInsights is £0.79 per active user per month, EtherAssist £16.00 per user per month, EtherApps Forge £895 per admin user per year. Free trials on all three. Published pricing ## Know what it costs before you book the demo. Someone has asked what this would cost for 250 users, and the answer is due before the next budget meeting. Every price is on this page, so you can do the multiplication yourself and start a trial while the approval runs. See what your estate would cost› Talk to us about volume and MSP pricing› All three products have a free trial. Two of them start without a card. What it costs ## Three products, three published prices. Each product is priced for its own job. Take the one that matches the pressure you are under, or run two together. ## EtherInsights £0.79per active user, per month Billed as $1 or €1 per active user where you are invoiced in US dollars or euros. Volume and MSP pricing on request. What's included Microsoft 365 and Azure cost visibility with savings report Windows 365 design, deployment, configuration, and day-two management Tenant backup, drift detection, and per-policy restore User lifecycle, risky identities, and offboarding evidence Security conformity, Secure Score, and Copilot readiness Intune reporting catalogue and device troubleshooting Try it free› See EtherInsights in detail› 14-day trial. Card required to start. Connect your tenant in minutes. ## EtherAssist £16.00per user, per month Standard subscription, billed monthly, cancel anytime. A metered token-based plan is available for variable usage, with rates shared during demo or onboarding. What's included Full standard feature set for troubleshooting, workflow execution, and documentation support Workflow execution with run history, auditability, and admin controls Compliance work support: gap review, policy drafting, and evidence preparation UK, EU, or US hosting chosen at setup Try it free› See EtherAssist in detail› 14-day trial. No credit card. Choose UK, EU, or US hosting on day one. ## EtherApps Forge £895per admin user, per year Full Licence: desktop application, PowerShell module, and CLI. Prices exclude VAT. Volume discounts on request. Forge is a Windows application you run in your own environment. What's included Unlimited captures, including from older Windows versions MSI and App-V to MSIX conversion, with PSF compatibility fix-ups App Attach and IntuneWin-ready output from the same capture MSIX signing, manifest, and modification packages Training and certification programme, plus support, included Includes 1-year maintenance. AI controller pricing agreed case by case. Try it free› See EtherApps Forge in detail› 7-day trial of the full workflow. No credit card. Capture a real application on day one. How pricing works ## The rules behind the numbers. Four things a budget holder usually asks before signing anything off. ## EtherInsights is priced per active user Not per mailbox, and not per feature module. Multiply £0.79 by your active user count and you have the monthly line for the business case, with the whole platform behind it rather than a starter tier. ## What happens after the trial EtherInsights and EtherAssist trials run 14 days; EtherApps Forge runs 7 days of the full workflow. EtherInsights asks for a card to start, EtherAssist and EtherApps Forge do not. Moving to a paid plan is a decision at the end, not a step at the beginning. ## Volume, MSP, and partner pricing Volume and MSP pricing for EtherInsights, and volume discounts for EtherApps Forge, are agreed on request. Ask before you size the deal so the business case carries the right number the first time. ## Buying and billing EtherInsights and EtherAssist are also available through Microsoft Marketplace. EtherApps Forge prices exclude VAT, and every licence includes training and support, so enablement is not a separate line item. Business case ## Put a real number in front of the budget holder. Multiply the published price by your active user count, then start the trial so the evidence from your own tenant arrives before the approval does. Try EtherInsights free› Talk to us about volume and MSP pricing› FAQ ## Pricing questions Straight answers on price, trials, and partner terms. How much does EtherInsights cost? EtherInsights is £0.79 per active user per month, billed as $1 or €1 per active user where you are invoiced in US dollars or euros. That single price covers the whole platform: Microsoft 365 and Azure cost visibility with a savings report, Windows 365 design, deployment and day-two management, tenant backup, drift detection and per-policy restore, user lifecycle and offboarding evidence, security conformity, Secure Score and Copilot readiness, and the Intune reporting catalogue. Volume and MSP pricing is available on request. A 14-day trial is included, and a card is required to start it. How much does EtherAssist cost? The EtherAssist standard subscription is £16.00 per user per month, billed monthly, cancel anytime. It includes the full standard feature set for troubleshooting, workflow execution and documentation support, with run history, auditability and admin controls. Teams with variable usage can move to a metered, token-based plan instead; token rates are shared during the demo or onboarding rather than published, because they depend on the workload mix. The 14-day free trial gives full access to the standard features and needs no credit card, and you choose UK, EU or US hosting at setup. How much does EtherApps Forge cost? The EtherApps Forge Full Licence is £895 per admin user per year, excluding VAT. That covers the desktop application, the PowerShell module and the CLI, unlimited captures, MSI and App-V to MSIX conversion, PSF compatibility fix-ups, App Attach and IntuneWin-ready output, signing and modification packages, and AI-guided packaging route decisions. Every licence includes training, the certification programme and support, plus one year of maintenance. Volume discounts are agreed on request, and AI controller pricing is agreed case by case based on scope and pipeline integration. Forge is a Windows application you install and run in your own environment. Is there a free trial? Yes, on all three products. EtherInsights runs a 14-day trial against your own tenant and asks for a card to start, so the first scan shows real licence, cost and Cloud PC findings rather than a demo dataset. EtherAssist runs a 14-day trial with no credit card and full access to the standard feature set, with UK, EU or US hosting chosen at setup. EtherApps Forge runs a 7-day trial of the full workflow, not a single capture step and not a free licence, with no credit card, so a real application can be packaged on day one. Do MSPs get partner pricing? Volume and MSP pricing for EtherInsights is available on request rather than published, because it depends on how many customer tenants and active users a partner brings. EtherApps Forge volume discounts work the same way. The entry price is published so a partner can build a margin model before the first call, then agree the volume position once the size of the book is known. If you run Microsoft estates for customers in the 50 to 600-user range, start with the partner route: it covers commercial terms alongside multi-tenant delivery and per-customer reporting. ## Where to go next See EtherInsights in detail See EtherAssist in detail See EtherApps Forge in detail Become a partner Talk to us about pricing Before you ask for budget ## Take the numbers, not a follow-up call. £0.79, $1 or €1 per active user per month for EtherInsights, published rather than quoted £16.00 per user per month for EtherAssist, billed monthly, cancel anytime £895 per admin user per year for the EtherApps Forge Full Licence, excluding VAT Volume and MSP pricing agreed on request, with training and support included on every Forge licence Try EtherInsights free› Talk to us about volume and MSP pricing› --- https://efficientether.co.uk/compare/coreview-alternatives # CoreView Alternatives for SMBs - EfficientEther > Compare CoreView alternatives for smaller Microsoft estates, with pricing transparency, deployment fit, and EtherInsights trial options. Comparison guide ## CoreView Alternatives for SMB and Mid-Market (2026) Renewal is coming, the estate has outgrown one portal, and someone has asked you to bring back options. This page gives you the criteria that decide a Microsoft 365 management platform, then answers every one of them for EtherInsights. Try it free› Explore EtherInsights› 14-day trial. Card required to start. Last reviewed: September 2026. Fairness note: this page makes no claims about any other vendor product, pricing or roadmap. It sets out the evaluation criteria, answers them for EtherInsights only, and leaves you to put the same questions to every option on your shortlist. Why this is back on your desk ## Four pressures that reopen a platform decision Almost nobody re-evaluates a platform out of curiosity. It happens when a date, a bill, or a question from someone senior forces it. ## Renewal is close and the value is unproven A renewal date forces the question nobody enjoys: what did the platform return this year. If the answer lives in screenshots and a quarterly rebuild, re-evaluating costs less than defending it. ## The estate has outgrown the tooling Microsoft 365 reporting alone stops being enough once Azure resources, Cloud PCs, Intune and tenant configuration sit in one bill and one risk register, but in four portals. ## Spend is drifting and nobody can prove where Licences stay assigned to leavers, add-ons stay switched on, Cloud PCs stay oversized. On a first scan, 15 to 30 per cent of Microsoft 365 licences are typically inactive or downgradeable. ## You have been asked to bring back options Finding products is the easy part. The hard part is arriving with criteria a finance owner, a security reviewer and a service lead can each answer from. Decision criteria ## Nine questions to put to every platform on your shortlist Copy these into your own evaluation and apply them to every option, including the tool you already have. The middle column is what to look for. The right column is how EtherInsights answers it. Criteria What to look for How EtherInsights answers it Time to first savings evidence How many days from connecting a tenant to a report you could forward to a budget holder unedited. Connect a tenant on the trial and the first scan returns licence, cost and posture findings in the same session. First scans typically surface 15 to 30 per cent of Microsoft 365 licences as inactive or downgradeable. Pricing transparency and entry price A published per-user price you can put into a business case before a discovery call, and volume terms discussed openly. Published at £0.79 / $1 / €1 per active user per month on the product page, billed per active user, with volume and MSP pricing on request. How far the trial actually goes Whether the trial runs on your own tenant with real data, how long it lasts, and what starting it costs. 14 days on your own tenant, card required to start. The Windows 365 edition is included, so there is no separate Cloud PC licence. Coverage from one console Whether one console genuinely spans Microsoft 365, Azure and endpoint management, or whether coverage means several tools and a spreadsheet joining them. One operating view across Microsoft 365 and Azure cost, licence and user lifecycle, Intune and device reporting, security posture, tenant configuration and Windows 365. Windows 365 and Cloud PC depth Whether Cloud PCs are a reporting line or a managed object: sizing, cost per user group, drift and a defensible migration baseline. Design, deploy, configure and manage Cloud PCs, size them against real usage, and hold migration baselines from Azure Virtual Desktop or legacy VDI, in the same per-user price. Tenant configuration backup and drift How far configuration history reaches, whether drift results name who made the change, and how small the smallest restore unit is. Up to 365 days of configuration history in Azure storage you own, against 7-day native snapshots. Drift checks run every 6 hours by default and name the actor. Restore is granular to a single setting, previewed, confirmed by typing and executed under your own admin sign-in. Multi-tenant support for MSPs How the platform reaches customer tenants, whether access is least-privilege and time-bound, and whether per-customer reporting arrives review-ready. Connects through GDAP rather than a standing admin credential, and produces per-customer cost, licence, posture and Cloud PC evidence for quarterly reviews and renewals. Certification and where your data sits Independently audited certifications, and whether snapshots and evidence sit in storage you control. EfficientEther is certified to ISO 27001, ISO 9001 and ISO/IEC 42001, and holds Cyber Essentials. Tenant snapshots sit in your own Azure subscription with credentials encrypted. Fit for the size of estate you run Whether the product was built for the estate in front of you, or scaled down from an enterprise design. Built for IT teams and MSPs running roughly 50 to 600 users per tenant, self-serve from the trial onward, with volume and MSP pricing as the book of business grows. Two of these criteria, time to first savings evidence and coverage from one console, are usually settled by how a platform handles licences and leavers. The full working behind our answers, reclaim candidates, leaver evidence and the reporting that carries them, sits on Microsoft 365 licence management and offboarding . Test the criteria ## Answer row one on your own tenant this week. Time to first savings evidence is the criterion hardest to fake. Connect a tenant on the 14-day trial and see what your first scan returns. Try EtherInsights free› Book a walkthrough› Shortlist meeting ## What to bring for each person in the room Four people usually have to agree, and each needs a different half of the same evidence. ## For whoever presents the shortlist Take the criteria table rather than a vendor summary. Every option on your list can be held to it, so the meeting argues about answers instead of about which deck was better. ## For the budget holder Bring a number, not a range: the published per-user price multiplied by your active user count, set against what the first scan found in your own tenant. Both halves should be dated. ## For the security and compliance reviewer Bring the certification list, the access model and the storage answer: ISO 27001, ISO 9001 and ISO/IEC 42001, delegated GDAP access, snapshots in your own subscription, restores under your admin sign-in. ## For the service lead or MSP principal Bring the operating question: how much reporting stops being manual next quarter. Per-customer packs, reclaim candidates ranked across customers and drift results that name the actor change a rota, not just a dashboard. Honest fit ## Where EtherInsights wins, and where it is not the answer A shortlist is more credible when it says where the recommendation stops. ## When EtherInsights is the right answer When cost and licence control, Windows 365 lifecycle, tenant backup and drift and posture evidence are all live problems, the estate runs roughly 50 to 600 users per tenant, and the team wants a published price and a working trial before procurement. ## When native Microsoft tooling may be enough When the estate is small and stable, seven days of native configuration snapshots and the 30-day audit window cover your recovery and evidence needs, and nobody is being asked to prove savings or report per customer. ## When the manual route still costs less When one administrator can answer every cost, licence and posture question from portal exports in an afternoon. Price that afternoon honestly, repeat it monthly, then compare it with a published per-user price. Go deeper ## The evidence behind each answer Every claim in the table is documented on this site. ## Pricing, trial terms and capability The published per-active-user price, the 14-day trial terms, and the full operating view. Explore EtherInsights → ## Tenant backup, drift and restore Retention, drift cadence, who made the change, and how a single-setting restore is confirmed. See the backup detail → ## Multi-customer operations [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/compare/coreview-alternatives] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/compare/etherapps-forge-vs-competitors # EtherApps Forge vs Competitors: Packaging - EfficientEther > Compare EtherApps Forge with packaging tooling categories on capture-first workflow, AI-assisted route choice, cost of entry, and delivery at scale. Comparison guide ## EtherApps Forge vs the competition Compare EtherApps Forge against the main categories of application packaging tooling: traditional enterprise packaging suites, manual in-house repackaging, and free capture utilities. Try it free› Explore EtherApps Forge› 7-day trial. No credit card required. Last reviewed: August 2026. EtherApps Forge is capture-first, agentic AI packaging with human review, self-serve low-cost entry, and a 7-day free trial that proves the full capture-to-deployment workflow. It is designed to fit both small and mid-sized teams that need a practical start and enterprise estates that need repeatable modern Windows package outputs. Use this page to compare delivery model, pricing shape, AI support, estate fit, and lost-installer handling across the main tooling categories. Validate current capability directly with each vendor before making a final decision. How to choose ## Choose by capture need, estate shape, budget, and enablement Packaging leads, IT managers, and MSPs need a route that fits the application estate and the team that will own the work. ## Capture needs Prioritise live-system capture when installers are lost, older Windows versions still hold the working application, or clean source media is no longer available. ## Estate shape Match the route to the estate: smaller teams may need a fast self-serve start, while enterprise programmes may need repeatable review and delivery control. ## Budget shape Compare transparent low-cost licensing and a 7-day trial against request-pricing engagements and hidden internal staff cost, and a time-boxed trial of the full workflow tells you more than an unlimited free tier that typically covers one step. ## Skills and support Balance in-house packaging skills against EtherApps Forge training, included support, and specialist services when customers need extra help. Comparison table ## EtherApps Forge and packaging tooling categories side by side The strongest choice depends on whether you need self-serve capture, a formal programme, or manual control. Criteria EtherApps Forge Traditional enterprise packaging suites Manual repackaging in-house Free capture utilities Deployment model Customer-run Win32 application with capture from a controlled VM or running Windows system, including older Windows versions. Often consultancy-led or programme-led, with formal procurement and delivery planning. Internal staff-time, local scripts, packaging know-how, and repeat manual test cycles. Typically a capture utility or narrow tool used before validation, fix-ups, output preparation, and deployment readiness work. Pricing Transparent low-cost entry, a 7-day free trial to prove the full capture-to-deployment workflow, and volume pricing discussions when needed. Request-pricing and commercial validation before teams can model the full programme cost. Hidden internal cost across specialist time, rework, delay, and support effort. Capture may be free to download, but transformation, remediation at scale, and workflow tooling are typically sold separately through an enterprise sales process. Validate what the free tier actually includes. AI and automation Agentic packaging with AI-recommended routes, capture analysis, prepared scripts and metadata, and human review. Varies by suite. Validate current AI and automation capability directly with each vendor. No built-in agentic workflow. Automation depends on local scripts and packager experience. Typically focused on the capture step, with orchestration and at-scale transformation often positioned as separate enterprise products. SMB fit Strong. Self-serve evaluation, a 7-day free trial to prove the full workflow, no credit card requirement, and no minimum consultancy engagement. Can be harder to justify when the first need is one real package and a simple commercial start. Possible for one-off work, but repeatability depends on scarce packaging time. May help a team start capture, but the customer still owns the downstream packaging work and support model. Enterprise fit Strong. MSIX, MSI, PSADT, IntuneWin, Intune-ready, and App Attach paths, VM-based validation, automation, and review gates. Often strong for formal enterprise programmes, depending on current capability and delivery model. Useful for exceptions, but harder to scale across Windows 11, Intune, Azure Virtual Desktop, and Cloud PC programmes. Often best assessed as one part of the tooling chain, not the full package validation and deployment readiness workflow. Lost-installer handling Capture-first workflow from live installations when installer media is lost, incomplete, or no longer usable, including older Windows versions when the original environment still runs them. Varies. Validate whether the route supports live capture without clean installer media. Manual discovery, file and registry inspection, dependency checks, and hand-built packaging decisions. May capture the installed footprint, but runtime fix-ups, signing, output choice, and release readiness remain separate work. Training Training is included with every EtherApps Forge licence. Varies. Enablement may be included, paid, partner-led, or unavailable for a specific route. The customer owns training, documentation, and knowledge transfer for the internal workflow. Typically focused on tool access rather than end-to-end packaging training. Validate the enablement model before relying on it. Support and services Support is included with every EtherApps Forge licence, and specialist services are available on request. Varies by commercial model, service tier, and delivery partner. Support is DIY unless the customer separately funds internal expertise or external help. Capture support may be limited or separate. Specialist help, validation, and deployment readiness support often need to be costed explicitly. EtherApps Forge differentiators ## What EtherApps Forge adds EtherApps Forge is designed for teams that need practical package production, reviewable outputs, and enablement included with the licence. ## Capture-first workflow Capture runs in a controlled VM, or from a live system when needed, so packages reflect a clean, reviewable state rather than whatever an end-user endpoint happens to contain. EtherApps Forge can also capture from older Windows versions when the original environment still runs them. ## Output breadth Prepare MSIX, MSI, PSADT, IntuneWin, and App-V routes from one capture where they fit the application and deployment target. ## Agentic AI with human review The AI Controller runs on an Azure VM inside the customer environment, and reviewer sign-off is required before release. Capturing an application is a long-solved step; the differentiation now is AI-led route choice, dependency inspection, fix-up preparation, and human review before release. ## Training, support, and services Training is included with every EtherApps Forge licence, support is included, and specialist services are available on request. Which fits when ## Choose the route that matches the delivery model The comparison is less about one universal winner and more about whether capture, cost, skills, and support are already covered. ## Choose EtherApps Forge Choose EtherApps Forge when capture-first speed, cost control, and included enablement matter across a small team, MSP workflow, or enterprise estate. ## Choose a traditional enterprise packaging suite Choose this route when a consultancy-led packaging programme is already committed and the wider engagement model is the main requirement. ## Choose manual repackaging Choose manual repackaging when application volumes are tiny and packaging skills already exist in-house. ## Choose free capture utilities Typically choose free capture utilities only when downstream validation, output formats, training, and support are already funded elsewhere. Who it fits ## Self-serve for smaller teams. Controlled enough for enterprise estates. EtherApps Forge is practical when the first proof needs to be quick, and structured when the rollout needs reviewable outputs. ## Small and mid-sized teams [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/compare/etherapps-forge-vs-competitors] --- https://efficientether.co.uk/compare/windows-365-vs-avd # Windows 365 vs AVD: Which Fits Your Users - EfficientEther > Windows 365 vs Azure Virtual Desktop for MSPs and IT teams: operating model, cost shape, admin overhead, and how to tell which users belong where. Comparison guide ## Windows 365 vs AVD: which users belong where? You are being asked whether desktops should move to Cloud PCs, and both answers are Microsoft's own. This page compares the two operating models the way a 50 to 600 user estate has to decide: who needs a persistent machine, what each model bills you for, and who ends up owning the work. Run the TCO comparison› Try EtherInsights free› Book a Windows 365 assessment› From £0.79 per active user/month · 14-day free trial Card required to start. Connect your tenant in minutes. Both products are Microsoft's. Nothing here is a criticism of either one: the expensive mistake is normally a group of users placed on the wrong model, not a bad product. Figures on this page are Microsoft UK list prices checked on 12 August 2026 and are directional rather than a quote. Last reviewed: August 2026. The short answer ## Windows 365 is a desktop you buy. Azure Virtual Desktop is infrastructure you run. Both deliver Windows from Azure, and Windows 365 Enterprise uses Azure Virtual Desktop for remote connectivity underneath, so this is a choice of operating model rather than a choice of technology. Windows 365 gives each user a dedicated Cloud PC for a fixed monthly licence, provisioned and managed from the Microsoft Intune admin centre. The cost is predictable per head and there is no host pool to size. Azure Virtual Desktop gives you multi-session hosts you design, scale and pay for by consumption. It is the cheaper shape at density, and the more expensive one in effort. Most estates between 50 and 600 users end up running both: Windows 365 for the people who need a persistent machine, Azure Virtual Desktop for density and for the workloads that need Azure-native control. Comparison ## Windows 365 Enterprise, Windows 365 Flex and Azure Virtual Desktop Three Microsoft models, one estate. Read down the column that matches the group of users you are placing, not the one that matches the budget you already have. Decision factor Windows 365 Enterprise Windows 365 Flex Azure Virtual Desktop What a user gets A dedicated Cloud PC. The same machine every session, with data that persists. One active session per licence. Dedicated mode provisions up to three Cloud PCs per licence for people who are never online together; shared mode serves a group from one Cloud PC. A session on a pooled multi-session host, or a personal host pool virtual machine where one user keeps one machine. Cost shape Fixed per user, per month, sized by vCPU, RAM and storage. Fixed per licence, pooled at tenant level and sized on peak concurrency rather than headcount. Consumption. You pay Azure for compute, storage and networking on top of the access licence. Where you administer it The Microsoft Intune admin centre. Provisioning policies create Cloud PCs automatically when a licence lands on a user in the right group. The Microsoft Intune admin centre, with licences pooled at tenant level rather than assigned to named users. The Azure portal, CLI, PowerShell or REST for host pools and session hosts, plus Intune for the session hosts you join to it. Azure you have to run None by default. A Microsoft-hosted network needs no Azure subscription; an Azure network connection is only required when you bring your own network. The same as Enterprise. Bring your own network only when line-of-business connectivity needs it. An Azure subscription you size, scale, patch and pay for, including images, profile containers and capacity. Where density comes from It does not. One user, one Cloud PC, and no density gain to chase. Non-concurrent reuse rather than shared sessions: the licence is reused by people who are not signed in at the same time. Windows 11 and Windows 10 Enterprise multi-session, which is exclusive to Azure Virtual Desktop and is where per-user cost falls at scale. Skills the team needs Intune skills. No virtual desktop design work. Intune skills, plus honest concurrency data for the groups you are pooling. Virtual desktop design: host pools, images, profile containers, autoscale rules and capacity planning, kept current. Where it usually wins Knowledge workers, developers and long-term contractors who need a persistent machine, especially where headcount is stable. Shift, seasonal, part-time and occasional users who are never all signed in at once. High-density estates, GPU workloads, published applications rather than full desktops, and anywhere you need Azure-native control of the host. Sizing and cost shape here are directional. They tell you whether a move is worth modelling properly. They are not a quote, and they exclude migration effort and any Azure spend you keep afterwards. Cost model ## What each model actually bills you for The comparison that matters is not licence against licence. It is a fixed per-user licence against a variable Azure bill you already pay, plus the hours your team spends keeping the estate right. ## Windows 365 Enterprise £35.60 per user, per month 2 vCPU / 8 GB RAM / 128 GB storage The baseline for personal desktops, where one person keeps one machine and the cost is predictable per head. ## Windows 365 Flex £86.00 per licence, per month 4 vCPU / 16 GB RAM / 128 GB storage The baseline for shift, seasonal and intermittent users, priced against peak concurrency rather than every named user. ## Azure Virtual Desktop Your current monthly Azure run cost Consumption, not a fixed size There is no list price to compare against. The honest input is the total you already pay each month for compute, storage, images and profiles. Windows 365 baselines are Microsoft UK list prices, excluding VAT and without Windows Hybrid Benefit, checked 12 August 2026. Prices change, so confirm current pricing before committing to a plan. Any figure produced from these baselines is a directional estimator, not a quote. It tells you whether a migration is worth modelling properly. It excludes migration effort, application remediation, and the Azure spend you keep after moving. ## Three things the licence comparison hides Azure Virtual Desktop cost moves with usage, so a quiet month reads as a saving and a busy quarter reads as an overspend. Windows 365 cost does not move, which makes it easier to budget and harder to over-consume. Multi-session density is real, but it is bought with design and operations time: host pool sizing, images, profile containers and autoscale rules that somebody has to keep current. Neither model is cheaper on its own. The estates that save money are the ones that stop paying for persistent capacity for users who never needed it. Start here ## Put your own numbers against it. Three figures and a couple of minutes give you a direction before anyone writes a business case. Run the TCO comparison› Try EtherInsights free› Decision criteria ## Decide per group of users, not per estate Shortlist tests a 50 to 600 user organisation can actually apply. Run them per group; one answer for the whole estate is normally the expensive one. ## Choose Windows 365 Enterprise when Users need the same machine every day, headcount is reasonably stable, and a predictable per-user cost is worth more than a variable one. It is also the right answer when nobody on the team wants to own host pool design. ## Choose Windows 365 Flex when People share a role rather than a desk: shifts, seasonal peaks, part-time and occasional users who are never all signed in at once. Licences are pooled at tenant level and sized on peak concurrency, so the saving comes from people not overlapping. ## Choose Azure Virtual Desktop when You need multi-session density, GPU workloads, published applications rather than full desktops, or Azure-native control of the host. Windows 11 and Windows 10 Enterprise multi-session is exclusive to Azure Virtual Desktop. ## Take this to the decision A Cloud PC decision is rarely one person's: the IT lead who runs it, the finance lead who signs it, and often the MSP who supports it. Bring three things to that conversation: the user groups and their real concurrency, the current monthly Azure run cost, and a directional comparison against the Windows 365 baselines. How the decision runs [Trimmed for length. Full page: https://efficientether.co.uk/compare/windows-365-vs-avd]