User guide

The target device must be intrinsically able to use the types of USB2-compatible media that
you virtually map. In other words, if the target device does not support a portable USB memory
device, you cannot map that on the client machine as a virtual media drive on the target device.
The user (or user group to which the user belongs) must have permission to establish virtual
media sessions and/or reserved virtual media sessions to the target device. See About Access
Rights on page 163.
Only one virtual media session may be active to a target device at one time.
You may not use the virtual media feature with the DSR Remote Operations software.
Sharing and preemption considerations
The KVM and virtual media sessions are separate; therefore, there are many options for sharing,
reserving or preempting sessions. The DSView software has the flexibility to accommodate the
system needs.
For example, the KVM and virtual media sessions may be locked together. In this mode, when
a KVM session is disconnected, so is the associated virtual media session. If the sessions are
not locked together, the KVM session can be closed but the virtual media session will remain
active. This could be desirable if a user is performing a time-intensive task using the virtual
media session (such as an operating system load), and wants to establish a KVM session with a
different target device to perform other functions while the operating system load progresses.
Once a target device has an active virtual media session without an associated active KVM
session, two situations can occur - the original user (User A) can reconnect or a different user
(User B) can connect to that channel. You may set an option in the Virtual Media dialog box
(Reserved) that allows only the User A to access that channel with a KVM session.
If User B is allowed to access that session (the Reserved option is not enabled), User B could
control the media that is being used in the virtual media session. In some environments, this
may not be desirable.
By using the Reserved option in a tiered environment, only User A could access the lower
switch and the KVM channel between the upper switch and lower switch would be reserved
for User A.
Preemption levels offer additional flexibility of combinations. See Opening an exclusive KVM
session on page 287 and Connecting to an existing session on page 288. The preemption
modes described in those sections also apply to virtual media session.
Virtual Media dialog box
The Virtual Media dialog box is a program that manages the mapping and unmapping of
virtual media. The dialog box displays all the physical drives on the client’s workstation that
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