Issue Using RWW to Access the Console Session

[Today's post comes to us courtesy of John Bay]

We wanted to make everyone aware of a minor issue we recently discovered during the testing of Vista Service Pack 1 and Windows Server 2008.

The remote web workplace has the ability to connect to the server console session. This is an optional checkbox exposed under the optional settings link.

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If you use a Vista SP1 or a Windows Server 2008 system to connect to the SBS server, the log on to or resume the console session of the remote computer will no longer work correctly. You will get connected to the server but you will not be connected to the console session. You will instead be connected to a new RDP session. Vista Service Pack 1 and Windows Server 2008 include the new version 6.1 of the RDP client. This new RDP clients uses the /admin switch to connect to the server console session instead of the /console switch. The change in behavior of the console switch is documented in article 947723: Changes to remote administration in Windows Server 2008 https://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;947723 . This change causes our connect to the server console option to not work correctly.

If you wish to connect to the server console and your client machine is running Vista Service Pack 1 or Windows Server 2008, you must use one of the following workarounds:

  1. Use the Remote Web Workplace website and connect to the server or a client machine. Once you are logged on the server or the client run mstsc /console and connect back to the server again. This is assuming of course that the client is not running Vista SP1 or Windows Server 2008. If the client is running either of those OS’s, you must run mstsc /admin and connect to the server.
  2. If you have published the Terminal Server port to the Internet, you can connect directly to the SBS server console without using the remote web workplace. To accomplish this you would run mstsc /admin from the client and specify the external name or IP address of the SBS server.