RDS 2012 R2, Desktop Experience overview

A new article has been released by Microsoft which explains the Desktop Experience feature, usually installed on a RD Session Host to allow to install a variety of applications and features that are provided in the Windows client operating system.

The article contains an overview of the differences between Desktop Experience in Windows Server 2012 and Windows Server 2012 R2.

Article: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn609826.aspx

Announcement by the Microsoft RDV Team: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/rds/archive/2014/02/26/desktop-experience-in-windows-server-2012-r2.aspx

Scaling out RDS in Windows Azure

I’ve been working on a Proof Of Concept recently to use Windows Azure to be able to automatically and dynamically scale a RDS environment (specifically the RD Session Host Servers) up and down as needed.

“…Freek Berson a Remote Desktop Services (RDS) MVP developed this concept model on driving a solution for RDS in Azure. The question we ask when discussing this topic with Freek was: What if you wanted to get all the great enhancements to Remote Desktop Services in Windows Server 2012 R2 to securely enable remote users, but could scale up or down to meet changing demand—without having to pay for the excess capacity unless you were using it? Freek has been working on a proof of concept (POC) with one of his customers to accomplish exactly that…”

Read the article here: http://blogs.technet.com/b/privatecloud/archive/2014/02/21/scaling-out-rds-in-windows-azure.aspx

KB: Cannot remove a RD Session Host from an RDS deployment

Microsoft released a new Kb article related to being unable to remove a RD Session Host or RD Virtualization Host from a RDS 2012 deployment.

“…Assume that you try to remove a Remote Desktop Session Host (RD Session Host) or Remote Desktop Virtualization Host (RD Virtualization Host) server from your Remote Desktop Services (RDS) deployment. If the target server was already deleted from Active Directory, you may receive the following error message:

Could not remove the configuration. Object reference not set to an instance of an object.

This issue occurs because the removal operation tries to contact the server in order to remove the Connection Broker from the RDS Management Servers internal group. The operation fails because the computer object cannot be resolved in Active Directory…”

The advice:

“…To safely remove the server from your RDS deployment, contact Microsoft Customer Support Services. For a complete list of Microsoft Customer Support Services telephone numbers and information about support costs, visit the following Microsoft website:  Contact Us (http://support.microsoft.com/contactus/?ws=support)

Important We do not recommend that you manually edit the database that is used by the RDS deployment…”

Source: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2925854/en-us?sd=rss

KB: Print jobs are lost when you use Remote Desktop Services printer redirection in Windows Server 2012

A new KB article (2925429) has been released in regards to print jobs getting lost on RDS 2012.

“…Consider the following scenario:

• You have a Windows Server 2012-based server that is running Remote Desktop Services.
• You have a client that is running Windows 8.
• You install an XPS-based printer driver to print to a local XPS printer on the Windows 8 client.
• You disable the Remote Desktop Easy Print Group Policy setting on the Remote Desktop Services server and then install the XPS-based printer driver.
• You redirect printing to the local XPS printer on the client.
• You connect to the Remote Desktop Services server that uses the redirected printer and confirm that the redirected printer on the server is using the XPS-based printer driver and not the Remote Desktop Easy Print printer driver.
• You try to print a job.

In this scenario, the print job is lost, and nothing is printed…”

Source & download: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2925429/en-us?sd=rss

KB: A Remote Desktop session may stop responding when you access a remote shared folder by using SMB version 2

A new KB article has been released in regards to an issue with accessing a SMB 2 shared in a RDS session running on Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1.

“…Consider the following scenario:

• You have a server that is running Windows Server 2008 R2 Service Pack 1.
• You start a Remote Desktop session from a client computer to the server.
• Then, you access a remote shared folder by using the Server Message Block (SMB) version 2 protocol from the Remote Desktop session.

In this scenario, if the network between the server and the remote share is not stable, the Remote Desktop session may randomly stop responding.
Note This problem may also randomly occur when you access a file share by using SMB version 2 over a high latency network…”

Source: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2923398/en-us?sd=rss

Presenting at E2E Virtualization Conference 2014, Brussels

I’m co-presenting a session on Remote Desktop Services at the E2E Virtualization Conference 2014 in Brussels, together with fellow RDS-MVP Wilco van Bragt.

Abstract
In this session Wilco van Bragt and Freek Berson will demo some of the differences between Microsoft RDS on Windows Server 2012(R2) and Citrix XenApp/XenDesktop, focusing on Session-Based Desktop Virtualization. Both solutions have their PRO’s and CON’s and we’ll look at some specific functionalities and how both solutions can be used in various Use Cases. An open minded and unbiased demo and discussion.

“…E2EVC Virtualization Conference is a non-commercial, virtualization community Event. Our main goal is to bring the best virtualization experts together to exchange knowledge and to establish new connections. E2EVC is a weekend crammed with presentations, Master Classes and discussions delivered by both virtualization vendors product teams and independent experts…”

More info and registration for the event: http://www.e2evc.com/home/Home/HomeEU.aspx