I've found myself in the same scenario as you. Deploying Remote Desktop on a standalone Server 2012 box is quite hard, because the guys at Microsoft don't let you run this on a domain-less network and if you do, you can't manage all the settings.
So, you can install a workgroup-based-box and get the Remote Desktop roles working on it. We need also to install Remote Desktop Licensing features on the same machine. But, once at this point, even if you have proper RDS CALs installed on the server, when the user logs in, receives the message that the trial period is on.
I've finally managed to get it working, at least something like the good-old Terminal Services we used to know. That's working for me on two production machines of small clients who need RDS but can't afford having two servers on their network.
Here we go:
Install the Remote Desktop Licensing and the Remote Desktop Session Host role services using the following steps:
- Open Server Manager
- Click on Manage and select Add Roles and Features
- Select Role-based or Feature-based installation
- Under Remote Desktop Services, choose Remote Desktop Licensing and Remote Desktop Session Host role services.
- Proceed with installation
Add the License Server to Terminal Server License Servers group and restart the Remote Desktop service (you can use licmgr.exe
)
Add the licenses to the license server.
Configure the Remote Desktop Session Host role with to use the local Remote Desktop Licensing server. Follow these steps:
- Open PowerShell as administrator
- Type the following command on the PS prompt and press Enter:
$obj = gwmi -namespace "Root/CIMV2/TerminalServices" Win32_TerminalServiceSetting
Run the following command to set the licensing mode (Note: Value = 2 for Per device, Value = 4 for Per User, we use per-user)
$obj.ChangeMode(4)
Run the following command to replace the machine name with License Server (mylicenseserver
is the name of your server):
$obj.SetSpecifiedLicenseServerList("mylicenseserver")
Run the following command to verify the settings that are configured using above mentioned steps:
$obj.GetSpecifiedLicenseServerList()
You should see the server name in the output.
Once done this, reboot the system and log in with any user (if using a workgroup, you know your users must be part of the Remote Desktop Users
) and the trial period message will dissapear.
Source of all this mess: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2833839
Managing with Powershell
There are a few things you can manage with Powershell
. To see the commands try:
import-module RemoteDesktop
get-command -module RemoteDesktop
There is a list of commands you can execute via Powershell to manage your box. However, I've tried a few but some of them require you to have some extra features installed, that can't be deployed on the scenario we are talking about.
If none of the above works for you, there is a way to reset the grace period to the initial 120 days. Of course, I don't recommend doing this, as the user will keep noticing the message. Of course, you'll need to purchase proper licenses.
To reset the counter, just delete this registry key:
HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server\RCM\Grace Period
Of course, you'll need extra-privileges to do that, executing regedit
as administrator will not work. Try this:
- Get PSEXEC
- Start a cmd as administrator
- run
psexec -s -i regedit.exe
- delete the desired key
- reboot
Hope some of this works for you. If you do some advances with Powershell and RDS, let us know.
Best Answer
Yes, this is possible and very easy to implement on Google Cloud Platform.
There are many public images available within the platform, including Windows 2012 images, and these can be used to boot a new Windows 2012 instance.
When you create a new project a network "default-allow-rdp" rule is automatically set up which will allow RDP access into your virtual network from external sources for authenticated users.
Similarly, when you create a new Windows instance from one of the publicly available images, RDP is automatically configured. If you have Chrome RDP installed in your browser it's possible to access your new machine from an "RDP" button available in the Google Cloud Platform Console view.
There is a "Set Windows password" option in the Console which allows you to set the user and password before you access the machine for the first time.
You would also have the option of using any other RDP clients to access the VM. This is made simple by downloading an RDP file from the Console and using utilizing it with your chosen RDP client.
There is a good explanation here on how to set up RDP in Google Cloud.