Remote desktop can be enabled/disabled by opening My computer properties and then by changing the settings in the ‘Remote‘ tab. We can do the same by editing registry key settings. This is explained below. Remote desktop is also called Terminal services or TS or RDP. This is an in-built remote desktop software for Windows users.
To enable remote desktop.
- Open registry editor by running regedit from Run.
- Go to the node HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server
- Change the data of the value fDenyTSConnections to 0.
We can enable remote desktop from windows command line by running the following command.
reg add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server" /v fDenyTSConnections /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f
To disable remote desktop we need to run the below command.
reg add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server" /v fDenyTSConnections /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
Reboot or logoff is not required after running the above command. I have tested this on Windows XP and Windows 7 and it has worked fine. It would work fine on Windows Vista too.
To enable Remote assistance:
reg add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server" /v fAllowToGetHelp /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
Relevant Posts:
Run command for Remote Desktop
Remote desktop and Terminal Services : Frequently asked questions
{ 15 comments… read them below or add one }
Thanks for sharing this.. I want to enable and disable remote desktop to test a scenario. I need to do this repeatedly so was looking for command line way of the same.
Thanks so much! This was very helpful. One hint to those that follow – I found that if I copied & pasted directly from this page – the ” symbols were corrupted and gave me a different character set which did not work in the bat file. You have to either paste as text or delete & retype the “s.
Thanks Jo for pointing that out. Now I have placed the commands in a code block ; copy & paste would work fine.
How do you go a step further and add in the trusted users/groups for remote desktop? It puts in administrators by default, but I have to manually go in and add “domain users” to each machine.
Option 1:
You can run the below command for each user you want to allow to connect remotely.
Option 2:
If you have a group of domain users and want to allow the whole group to do remote desktop on the computer, you can do that as well with a single command. Just replace the loginid in the above command with the group name.
example:
Thanx for this cool tip it helped me in creating my batch file which maybe dangerous for my target friends…
great job. thank u
So, i take the given command line to enable or disable the remote access, but it tells me Error: Access denied
what do i do?
I guess you are not running it from elevated command prompt.
I have a question to
Danish November 10, 2011 at 8:35 pm Feed.
How can we determine target machine? By the code posted by Danish.
mstsc /v: /f
Where /f = full screen
/v:–specifies the name of the computer to connect to.
/f–starts the connection in a full screen.
/w:–specifies the width of the remote desktop screen.
/h:–specifies the height of the remote desktop screen
eg
mstsc /v: JD2043614 /f
Thank you for your information..
Awesome…
Thanks man…
How can i add specific IPs to allow remote session?
Regards,
m@s00d