My Experience with Microsoft Dev Box
I recently had the opportunity to present to my peers about the benefits of, and my experience with, Microsoft Dev Box, following a trial we ran.
While we hadn’t configured all the fancy IaC automation that was available, I was able to spend a solid month with the Dev Box RDP session as my daily driver. Seeing how simple this was to set up, time to build, and time to dismantle, I can see why this is a solution gaining steam. It was nearly seamless and much smoother than other VDI solutions I’ve used previously.
My Setup
I took an SKU slightly up from the base option, with additional hard disk space, and utilized the Visual Studio 2022 Pro image from the Microsoft marketplace. In the absence of IaC configurations — it was a trial after all — I ran through our standard dev-device setup scripts to get myself going. From requesting my Dev Box to spin up through to our image application and software installs completing, it was under 2 hours. Then I could simply get to work.
I chose to use Dev Box in RDP full-screen mode (vs. browser mode) to make it an immersive experience and have access to all the familiar keyboard shortcuts. It was spread across 3 screens, and I’m working mostly in Visual Studio and VScode, along with our standard software suite, including MS Teams. The things that impressed me most were how snappy it felt, I didn’t notice any lag except for maybe when I was punching out long sentences creating doco.
Mornings consisted of firing up the RDP session, being connected in under a minute, and just getting going where I left off.
Having battled with limited memory and disk space on my local in the preceding month, it was a relief not having to uninstall something to use something else. While it might sound mundane, that can be a pitfall of the ‘standard’ spec machine all employees get.
Coming to the end of the trial, I didn’t want to give it back. I got used to the performance upgrade and simplicity of it.
Use cases where I can see the clear benefits
- Old or under-spec dev machines
Need an upgrade that can’t wait for the hardware lifecycle? Dev Box can be an instant machine upgrade (this was me) - Scaling for the short-term
No inflated procurement cost, you’re paying for usage and can deco mm the machines when the project is complete - Remote and offshore teams
There is zero procurement wait time, and setup and time-to-first-commit could be within a couple of hours of hiring. - Dev-specific machine requirements
Layer the dev installs on top of your existing base image using IaC, save on developer setup time, and even get your repos pre-cloned and ready to go.
Not All Roses
While this all sounds like happy days, I did run into some audio issues. Any video streaming playing (YouTube / Udemy / LinkedIn Learning) had a slight audio delay. Then I ran into some redirection issues with my headset (but not with the built-in speakers, so suspect it’s a me problem). It is also currently only able to create Windows-based images (sorry *nix or MacOS builders)
Putting those issues or limitations aside, I still overwhelmingly want to keep my Dev Box.
Your Experience
Have you had experience with Dev Box or curious about it? I’d love to hear your take, or answer any questions 🙏
Here are some useful resources to get familiar with the service:
Overview: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-au/products/dev-box
Pricing: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-au/pricing/details/dev-box/
Iac: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/templates/microsoft.devcenter/devcenters/devboxdefinitions
