Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) Port Forwarding

One thing that I love about all news windowsyou may cause serious problems that may
products is the remote desktop features. Irequire you to reinstall your operating system.
previously used PCAnywhere but I find thatMicrosoft cannot guarantee that you can solve
remote desktop is now almost as good, would likeproblems that result from using Registry Editor
to see a file transfer like PCAnywhere has, butincorrectly. Use Registry Editor at your own
remote desktop is free so that is a plus for it.Onerisk.You can use the Remote Desktop feature in
of the tasks that I face with my network setupWindows XP Professional to connect to your
is forwarding ports through my router. There arecomputer from another, remote computer.
two issues that I came across when dealing withWARNING: The Remote Assistance feature in
the RDP forwarding. The first was what is theWindows XP may not work properly if you
port number of RDP. With a quick search onchange the listening port. To change the port that
Google I found that the standard RDP port isRemote Desktop listens on:
3389.Now that you have the port number youStart Registry Editor (Regedt32.exe).
can simply go into your router and forward thatLocate the following key in the registry:
port through and after enabling your remote
desktop feature it will work from outside yourberOn the Edit menu, click Modify, click Decimal,
network as long as you either know your IPtype the new port number, and then click OK.
address or have a dynamic dns service like I use.Quit Registry Editor.
To enable remote desktop in Windows XP andNOTE: When you try to connect to this
Windows 2003 go to the start menu, find the mycomputer by using the Remote Desktop
computer icon and right click on it. Select theconnection, you must type the new port.
properties option in the drop down list and thenKeywords: kbhowto kbnetwork KB306759
click on the remote tag in the window thatTechnology: kbrdcMac100 kbrdcsearch
appears. There you will see the two check boxes,kbrdcWin100 kbWinXPPro kbWinXPPro64bit
check the second box, and then click on thekbWinXPProSearch kbWinXPSearch
remote user button. Make sure that the userskbZNotKeyword*****The other option I had was
you want to have access are in the list and thento go into my router and specify another external
click ok until you have exitted all of the windows.port number and then point that port to the 3398
RDP is now enabled on your machine.So thison the IP address of the machine I wanted to go
simple setup would have worked for my networkto. I chose this second option as it was less time
but the issue then became I have several serversconsuming and did the trick for me. One appealing
that I want access to along with my desktop.thing about the ability to change the port number
Now I could just remote to my desktop and thenof RDP is security. If you leave the standard port
remote to the other machines from there sincenumber then anyone will know to check that port
they are all on the local network. This wouldto see if you have Remote Desktop enabled and
create a lot of data that needed to bepotentially compromise your network. Let me
transferred though, with limited upstream speedsknow if there are any issues with the registry fix
on your broadband connection you don't wantthough and if there are I will just remove it from
this, and will cause performance issues with RDP.this article.Jason Fortner is co-founder of Total
So I had two options, I could change the registryProductivity Solutions, a company that specilizes in
entry like was stated in the article. I will pasteSharePoint, Webpart and .NET development. More
that fix here just in case that page has an issuetips on web development visit Total Productivity
at some point:*****Solutions.
WARNING: If you use Registry Editor incorrectly,