Configuring Hyper-V Server for Remote Management

Published 22 October 8 1:31 PM | Charlie Russel

I've seen folks disabling the Windows Firewall on Hyper-V Server and on Windows Server Core in order to get Remote Management to work correctly. Bad idea, and not necessary. Instead, you should enable the appropriate firewall rules to allow Remote Management to work, without disabling the firewall. I covered this setup in both my Windows Server 2008 Administrator's Companion, and again in my upcoming Windows Small Business Server 2008 Administrator's Companion books, complete with scripts for it. But since I'm seeing it more and more on the newsgroups, I'll go ahead and post the firewall script from the SBS book here - it will configure a Hyper-V Server as well. (Full configuration scripts for Server Core are included in the books, and are on the accompanying CD/DVD. This script assumes you've already configured your NICs and set server name, etc. )

echo off
REM initsetup2.cmd
REM
REM initial setup for a Server 2008 Server Core installation.
REM command file 2 of 2 for Hyper-V and SBS
REM
REM Created: 4 September, 2007
REM ModHist: 08/30/08 - added WinRM command
REM
REM Copyright 2007, 2008 Charlie Russel and Sharon Crawford. All rights reserved.
REM   You may freely use this script in your own environment, modifying it
REM   to meet your needs. But you may not re-publish it without permission.

REM Use netsh to enable remote management through the firewall for
REM all profiles. This is the minimum to allow using remote MMCs to work
REM from other computers on the network.

netsh advfirewall set allprofiles settings remotemanagement enable

REM allow remote administration group
netsh advfirewall firewall set rule group="Remote Administration" new enable=yes

REM Allow remote desktop through firewall
netsh advfirewall firewall set rule group="Remote Desktop" new enable=yes

REM Enable Remote Desktop for Administration, and allow
REM downlevel clients to connect
cscript %windir%\system32\scregedit.wsf /AR 0
cscript %windir%\system32\scregedit.wsf /CS 0

REM Now, run the WinRM configuration script. -q is for quiet.
winrm quickconfig -q

 UPDATE:  John Howard has a new tool that will supposedly do the entire job for you. Given what I've seen from him before, I'd definitely give it a try! It's called hvremote and he talks about it on his blog here: http://blogs.technet.com/jhoward/archive/2008/11/14/configure-hyper-v-remote-management-in-seconds.aspx

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Comments

# Harry said on November 4, 2008 5:37 AM:

Great post, however I have run this script on my Hyper-V Server and still can't remotely manage it.

Both the Hyper-V Server and Vista 64 SP1 are in workgroups.

What else do I need to do? This should not be so difficult, I've seen John Howard's posts.  None of them seem to fit where both server and client are in workgroups and it's Hyper-V server.  They are pretty complex too!

# Charlie Russel said on November 4, 2008 12:26 PM:

For Hyper-V Server, follow the instructions in John's posts for Workgroup to Workgroup, and Server Core. Hyper-V Server is essentially Server Core, but with only a single possible Server Role - Hyper-V.

The script in this post is only appropriate for enabling the Windows Firewall to work correctly, and enabling remote administration, not a full and complete configuration script for Server Core or the Hyper-V Server. You need to get all the rest of the pieces right too.

Charlie.

# Russ (SBITS.Biz) said on November 13, 2008 9:33 PM:

Thanks Charlie.

# Zep said on November 14, 2008 10:12 PM:

Just what I was looking for!

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