I’m frequently on the move and switch between devices. I could be working at home one day, at a hotel working, on site at a customer office with no internet, on a plane. I just never know. Part of my workflow is running some of my daily activities on an Azure VM. I can get to it from pretty much anywhere and it doesn’t matter what device I do or don’t have access to, I can always get to what I need and access the Microsoft network.
- To set up a remote desktop in Windows 10, go to Settings System Remote Desktop. Then turn on the slider for Enable Remote Desktop. Next, search Settings for Allow an app through Windows firewall and enable the Remote Desktop app for Private and Public. Note: You can only run the Remote Desktop Connection app if you are using Windows 10.
- Hi Dave, Normally, you can use the Microsoft Remote Desktop app anywhere as long as you have internet connection and both of your devices are turned on. However, please be reminded that remotely accessing your desktop away from your home network may compromise the data or files in your computer since you are going to use the internet to perform the task.
- On Windows 10, the 'Remote Desktop' app is available through the Microsoft Store, and it's been designed to make it easier to connect and control other devices over the local network or internet.
In order to access everything from our corporate network I have joined the computer using Azure Active Directory (Azure AD). Before I show you how to remote desktop to an Azure AD joined VM or computer, let me show the steps to join a computer to Azure AD. This requires the machine to be running Windows 10 version 1709 or later to connect to Azure AD but 1809 or later to remote desktop with Azure AD credentials. This can be a physical computer or a virtual machine.
Remote Desktop Connection is built into Windows but also exists as a Windows 10 Universal app in the Microsoft Store. If you want to access and control a computer from a non-Windows device. To configure your PC for remote access, download and run the Microsoft Remote Desktop Assistant. This assistant updates your system settings to enable remote access, ensures your computer is awake for connections, and checks that your firewall allows Remote Desktop connections. All versions of Windows (Legacy method).
Join a Computer to Azure Active Directory
First, launch the Windows Settings app and navigate to the Accounts section.
Using the left side navigation go to the Access work or school section and click Connect.
On the resulting screen click the link at the bottom of the page labeled Join this device to Azure Active Directory.
Proceed through the wizard by entering your email address, authenticate with your company’s preferred method, and verify the domain information.
Upon completion the work or school access screen will now show that you are connected to your organizations Azure AD along with the account used to connect.
Remote Desktop to Azure AD Joined Computer
Unfortunately, at this time it isn’t quite as easy as “open up a new RDP connection, type in the computer, type my email, and connect”. If it were, this post wouldn’t be here. So let’s look at the steps we need to go through to get connected.
First, open remote desktop as if you were going to connect to any other computer. Type in the computer name or IP address and expand the the Show Options section. Next, click the Save As button to save the RDP file locally. I’m going to place mine on my desktop. At this point you can close the Remote Desktop Connection dialog. It isn’t needed anymore.
Next, open Notepad. Click File -> Open -> location your RDP file that was saved in the previous step. You’ll need to change the document type dropdown from Text Documents (.txt) to All Files (*).
Go to the very bottom of the list of parameters and add the following two lines:
enablecredsspsupport:i:0
authentication level:i:2
Save the changes to the .rdp file. Note that your file may have more or fewer lines in it than mine.
Now you are ready to connect! Double click on the RDP file and fill in the dialog box.
For the user name field should be formatted as .AzureADemail@company.com
(Technically it only needs to be AzureADemail@company.com but there are some strange caching things that happen when the VM autolocks and you go to sign back in. Adding the dot slash (.) at the beginning will save you some headache of having to add AzureAD to the beginning of your user name each time you try to log in.)
There you have it! It’s a bit of a pain, but now you can RDP into a computer with your Azure AD credentials (aka, email address) to an Azure AD joined computer.
I use a free piece of software called Remote Desktop Manager for all my connections. You can’t make the necessary changes to a connection in there (that I can tell anyway), but you can create the RDP file using the instructions here then import that connection into the tool and it will work perfectly.
-->Applies to: Windows 10, Windows Server 2016
When you connect to your PC by using a Remote Desktop client, you're creating a peer-to-peer connection. This means you need direct access to the PC (sometimes called 'the host'). If you need to connect to your PC from outside of the network your PC is running on, you need to enable that access. You have a couple of options: use port forwarding or set up a VPN.
Enable port forwarding on your router
Microsoft Remote Desktop Classic
Port forwarding simply maps the port on your router's IP address (your public IP) to the port and IP address of the PC you want to access.
Specific steps for enabling port forwarding depend on the router you're using, so you'll need to search online for your router's instructions. For a general discussion of the steps, check out wikiHow to Set Up Port Forwarding on a Router.
Remote Desktop Connection Windows 10 Download Free
Before you map the port you'll need the following:
PC internal IP address: Look in Settings > Network & Internet > Status > View your network properties. Find the network configuration with an 'Operational' status and then get the IPv4 address.
Your public IP address (the router's IP). There are many ways to find this - you can search (in Bing or Google) for 'my IP' or view the Wi-Fi network properties (for Windows 10).
Port number being mapped. In most cases this is 3389 - that's the default port used by Remote Desktop connections.
Admin access to your router.
Warning
You're opening your PC up to the internet - make sure you have a strong password set for your PC.
After you map the port, you'll be able to connect to your host PC from outside the local network by connecting to the public IP address of your router (the second bullet above).
The router's IP address can change - your internet service provider (ISP) can assign you a new IP at any time. To avoid running into this issue, consider using Dynamic DNS - this lets you connect to the PC using an easy to remember domain name, instead of the IP address. Your router automatically updates the DDNS service with your new IP address, should it change.
Remote Desktop On Win 10 Home
With most routers you can define which source IP or source network can use port mapping. So, if you know you're only going to connect from work, you can add the IP address for your work network - that lets you avoid opening the port to the entire public internet. If the host you're using to connect uses dynamic IP address, set the source restriction to allow access from the whole range of that particular ISP.
You might also consider setting up a static IP address on your PC so the internal IP address doesn't change. If you do that, then the router's port forwarding will always point to the correct IP address.
Use a VPN
If you connect to your local area network by using a virtual private network (VPN), you don't have to open your PC to the public internet. Instead, when you connect to the VPN, your RD client acts like it's part of the same network and be able to access your PC. There are a number of VPN services available - you can find and use whichever works best for you.