remote desktop reporting

How To View Remote Desktop Sessions In 3 Different Ways

April 13, 2021 By Andy Milford Leave a Comment

You have likely noticed that viewing Remote Desktop sessions and related details has become increasingly difficult. This is largely a result of some recent developments: There was the overhaul of Remote Desktop Services in Windows Server 2012 R2 and later server operating systems. Then, there’s the emergence of Windows Virtual Desktop in Azure.

Microsoft removed the old TSAdmin utility in Windows Server 2012 R2, replacing it with the often cumbersome Remote Desktop Services Manager in the Server Manager utility. It is scarce in detail regarding these sessions, and it does not scale well in larger environments. In addition, attempting to shadow remote desktop sessions with MSTSC often does not work as expected, especially with multiple monitor sessions.

And what about viewing Remote Desktop sessions in Windows Virtual Desktop? Well, you don’t get much of a break there either. Currently, you must use the Windows Virtual Desktop control plane in the Azure Portal, which is even more feature limited than the Remote Desktop Services Manager in Server Manager for classic RDS deployments.

At RDPSoft, we identified these pain points many years ago, and created an assortment of free and commercial solutions to solve these problems. Here are three different ways we’ve made viewing Remote Desktop sessions easier.

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Remote Desktop Commander v4.9 Highlights

June 12, 2020 By admin Leave a Comment

Version 4.9+ of the Remote Desktop Commander Suite and Premium Management Features overlay offers:

brand new reports that track things like RDP loss and retransmission rates, hourly load on servers, user reconnection attempts through a Remote Desktop Gateway, and much more
an overhaul of our existing reporting, with a focus on better chart presentation and automatic chart data aggregation in larger environments
the ability to delegate out management tasks and shadowing to Citrix help desk staff members, allowing them a much more streamlined shadowing experience that does not require the use of Citrix Director or Microsoft Remote Assistance
numerous other product enhancements

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Calculating RDP Bandwidth on Windows Server 2012

March 29, 2015 By admin Leave a Comment

As we’ve discussed previously on this blog, we discovered a bug in Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012, and Windows Server 2012 R2 some time ago that prevented our software from being able to calculate RDP bandwidth used per RDS user and per RDS session on these operating systems. We kept an eye on it and along the way provided an update on the issue with calculating RDP bandwidth.

A Hotfix From Microsoft

Microsoft worked diligently with us in 2014, and by the end of that year, had released two hotfixes (one for Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012, the other for Windows 8.1 and Windows Server 2012 R2). These hotfixes are now available for download.

UPDATE: Now, in 2016, these hotfixes have been incorporated into updates for the above operating systems, particularly Windows Server 2012 R2. So, provided your systems are being routinely updated, these bandwidth counters should be functioning again.

Once you apply the above appropriate hotfixes (and/or updates) to your Terminal Server farm, you can then start leveraging Remote Desktop Reporter to track RDP bandwidth consumption in a variety of ways.

A New Family of Reports Targeting RDP Bandwidth

With the release of Version 3.0 of Remote Desktop Reporter, we offer a new RDP Bandwidth report family – Bandwidth Consumption By User.

Remote Desktop Reporter RDP bandwidth report — Report in Remote Desktop Reporter showing bandwidth transferred by user.

This new class of reports can aggregate all of the RDP bandwidth usage by individual users across multiple servers by day, by week, or even by month. It’s great to quickly pinpoint users that are most expensive in terms of the bandwidth they consume. This information also can be useful for MSPs who need to meter bandwidth usage by their clients.

As with all Remote Desktop Reporter reports, it’s easy to filter by user(s), server(s), and/or date and time.

Get Started Today Tracking RDP Bandwidth

So, what are you waiting for? Apply the hotfixes/updates to your Windows 2012 servers, and then start a monthly subscription of our Remote Desktop Commander Suite for only $9 per server per month. In addition to the RDP bandwidth reports above, you will have complete visibility into user activity on your terminal servers, whether it be CPU consumption, memory consumption, session recordings, user time tracking, or even RDP latency/connection quality.

Three New Ways to Report on Remote Desktop Performance

December 15, 2014 By admin Leave a Comment

Last week we explored the addition of the Remote Desktop Reporter Agent and Analysis Client available in Remote Desktop Reporter 2.7. But wait! There’s more when it comes to this most recent release of Remote Desktop Reporter.

New Reports Target Remote Desktop Performance

We’ve also added three new – and frequently requested – reports to our stable of over 60 reports encompassing all aspects of user session activity and performance metric tracking. These three specifically focus on Remote Desktop performance.

Program Run Times By User

This report offers a breakdown of how long different applications are run by different users. Pairing this report up with filters on process names and users, you can quickly determine how long specific programs are being run in sessions compared to others. MSPs can also use this report to create metered billing solutions for the use of specific programs.

Session Reconnect Attempts

Now you can quickly highlight specific users from specific clients that have had frequent reconnection tries to servers in specific hours of the day. Review this report regularly can highlight connectivity issues either on specific servers, or more likely, on specific clients.

CPU and Memory By Session

Ever need to quickly highlight CPU and memory consumption by user session on each server? If not, you will. This report mimics a dashboard in the new Analysis Client, which shows average, maximum, and minimum CPU and memory usage for each recorded session. Use this report to spot outliers (such as high CPU or memory use), which you can further investigate in the Analysis Client to find out what behaviors or applications caused high utilization of CPU and/or memory, in order to prevent them from taking place in the future.

CPU And Memory Use By Session Report — Screenshot from the CPU And Memory Use By Session report.

See These Reports in Action For Yourself

In addition to these three Remote Desktop performance reports, there is so much more now appearing in Remote Desktop Reporter 2.7 and later. Free trial software is available for download from our web site, and pricing remains highly competitive. Do you have a question about other reports available in Remote Desktop Reporter? Just ask below.

About Our Remote Desktop Reporter Agent and Analysis Client

December 10, 2014 By admin Leave a Comment

The centerpiece of Remote Desktop Reporter 2.7 is the addition of the brand new Remote Desktop Reporter Agent, coupled with the new Analysis Client. Past versions of the software have been agentless, and that capability is preserved in the new release for those who do not need the new expanded feature set.

What the Addition of the Remote Desktop Reporter Agent Means

In the past, with its agentless architecture, Remote Desktop Reporter collected and warehoused user session information from Remote Desktop servers, VMWare Horizon View servers, and Citrix XenApp servers.

But, the Remote Desktop Reporter Agent enables the gathering of an enhanced set of metrics as well as collecting the same types of metrics from physical desktops and any desired virtual desktops.

For Example, Remote Desktop Reporter Can Now . . .

The new capabilities made possible by both the Remote Desktop Reporter Agent coupled with the Analysis Client are expansive.

CPU and Memory

Remote Desktop Reporter can now show administrators how much of the CPU and memory individual sessions are consuming. This can be shown both in aggregate and by the minute.

Memory and CPU By Session Dashboard as shown in Remote Desktop Reporter.

Screen Captures

Periodic screen captures can be recorded for later review, so that administrators can see what programs in sessions are connecting to what sites and over what ports they are connecting.

TCP/UDP Connections By Session and By Process

The Remote Desktop Reporter Agent can be configured to capture all open TCP/UDP connections made by applications running in user sessions. Administrators can then search for sessions with activity over a specific port number, and find out exactly what application was the culprit.

Tested, Reliable Database Storage

All of this data is indexed in a database so administrators can search for sessions that match chosen criteria – application name, port usage, or application window title, for example. And just like previous versions, you can leverage the free, built-in Microsoft SQL Server Express DB instance for smaller deployments or scale up to limitless data retention with the full version of Microsoft SQL Server.

Time Tracking Data

Management can get valuable time tracking information based on computing resources that are being used – whether on-premises or cloud.

Root Cause Performance Analysis

Administrators can quickly prepare a root cause analysis on problems that crop up on multiple SBC platforms – enabling them to drill down to a specific program in a user session.

Remote Desktop Reporter Capabilities Expand While Pricing Stays Within Reach

RDPSoft remains committed to putting quality tools in the hands of the SMB community. All the while, pricing remains well within reach. And, free trial software is always available.

Have you worked with the new release of Remote Desktop Reporter yet? Do you have questions about what Remote Desktop Reporter can do for you? Share your thoughts with us . . .