Rdp Clients For Mac

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In April 2018, Thincast released the first public Beta of Thincast Workstation, a new workstation hypervisor based on Oracle’s VirtualBox.We use FreeRDP’s server implementation to replace VirtualBox’s VRDP extension which is only available with the Oracle VM VirtualBox Extension Pack.Together with our own powerful 3D graphics virtualization inside the guest we provide a smooth and rich user experience, no matter from where you are accessing your virtual machines.

But now let’s take a closer look at where and how FreeRDP comes into play in our product.

  • Today, remote desktop Mac clients have come to a stage that allows you to overtake a computer remotely. Let's have a look at the best Remote Desktop Mac clients to suit your needs.
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Our RDP server resides in a separate, platform independent library that we call “virtual server”. One of the tasks of this library is to serve as a bridge between VirtualBox’sremote desktop extension (VRDE) API and FreeRDP. It provides a full featured RDP server, including clipboard and sound redirection, user management as well as RemoteFX and H.264streaming. The great thing here is that thanks to FreeRDP, all the protocol related work has already been done for us. We don’t have to worry about connection management, packetparsing or data marshalling. Our library just hooks the various callbacks that the FreeRDP API provides (i.e. handling mouse/keyboard input) and passes them into VirtualBox’s VRDE.

Rdp

Linux Clients. Like Mac, there are remote desktop tools available for different flavors of Linux. To use these tools, needless to say, the Linux computer needs to be running in graphical mode. Here are few of the tools to consider. KRDC or KDE Remote Desktop Client is available for Linux distros running K Desktop, like Fedora.

On the other hand our virtual server library receives notifications from VirtualBox i.e. when the display buffer is updated. Using FreeRDP we can easily forward all theseupdates to one, or multiple RDP clients connected to our server. Because RDP is a standardized protocol, the users are able to use any RDP compatible client to connect to theirvirtual machines. On top of that, FreeRDP gives us access to the latest desktop streaming extensions of the RDP protocol like RemoteFX and H.264 remoting.

Thanks to WinPR it was an easy task for us to implement the virtual server library platform independent. Threading, synchronization or file access is all done using the Win32API. Platform specific code parts were reduced to just a handful of lines i.e. for user management. This allows us to have a single code base that we can reuse on multipleplatforms by just linking to WinPR on non-Windows systems.

With H.264 desktop streaming, introduced in RDP 10, we now also have new possibilities to transfer the desktop content to the user. We have developed a special load-balancingalgorithm that adjusts image quality during streaming, based on current network characteristics. FreeRDP’s network characteristics detection (which is part of the RDP corespecification) provides us with all the necessary information about the connection’s latency and bandwidth. Depending on these parameters we dynamically increase or decrease thequality level of the H.264 encoder. An implementation of the software H.264 encoder backend, using OpenH264, is also part of the FreeRDP library.

As explained earlier, Thincast Workstation provides virtual graphics hardware to the guest that exposes full Direct3D11 support. This means all graphical operations in the guestOS are handled and accelerated by the host GPU. As we want to achieve the best performance possible, it would be a pity to do the H.264 encoding of our virtual desktop insoftware. Luckily, thanks to FreeRDP’s modular architecture, we were able to plug-in our own hardware encoders and completely offload this work from the CPU. Because every vendorhas its own multimedia framework we implemented encoders for all major GPU producers including NVidia, AMD and Intel.

Screenshot: Remote session to a virtual machine running UL’s 3DMark benchmark.

Thincast Workstation comes with its own FreeRDP based client called Thincast Viewer. The Viewer is part of the Thincast Client package and offers some advantages over other RDPclients like Microsoft’s Windows client mstsc. The first advantage it offers is an improved performance mode for connections to local virtual machines. In this mode graphicalupdates are not streamed over RDP but directly fetched from the GPU. Thincast Viewer also provides various control options like starting, pausing or shutting down the virtualmachine. These features are implemented using a custom virtual channel that we added to our FreeRDP library. Remote connections to a virtual machine using H.264 desktop streamingwill be decoded on the client side using hardware support. All current GPUs offer hardware H.264 decoding support and especially mobile users will greatly benefit from thesignificantly lower CPU utilization. Again we simply replaced FreeRDP’s default software decoder with our own hardware implementation, without modifying anything in the libraryitself. And last but not least, Thincast Viewer is available on Windows, Linux and macOS.

What is coming to Thincast Workstation in the future? We are thinking about adding some kind of gateway service that serves as a central access point to all virtual machines.Currently each VM listens on its own port for incoming connections which makes management and administration a bit troublesome.

We also keep an eye out for further extensions or changes to the RDP protocol. For instance newer video codecs, i.e. H.265 or AOMedia Video 1 (a.k.a AV1), might become interesting fordesktop streaming in the future.

Apart from these RDP-related improvements we also want to improve the remaining parts of Thincast Workstation. Our current Beta for instance already contains virtual graphicshardware that offers support for Direct3D 12. The implementation is already close to completion but still has some known issues. We have also added Vulkan to our to-do list butwork on this topic is just in its beginnings.

If you want to know more about our products, give them a try or you can just keep in touch by signing up for our newsletter on our website!

Connect to Windows machine in AWS or any cloud from within MacOS, Linux

  • RDP clients on MacOS

This is a tutorial on the different ways to “remote into” a Windows instance from a MacOS or Linux machine.

Remote Desktop Connection on Windows machines

Remote Desktop Connection is installed with by default on all Windows machines.

Within Start Programs > Accessories, is a RDP (Remote Desktop Protocol) client program that can be used without being an Administrator. It uses uses port 3389. The RDP is also known as “Terminal Services”.

If you are running a Windows virtual instance (under VMWare Fusion), etc.,

  1. If you were given a rdp file, click on it because the RDP program is associated with the “rdp” file extension:

    ec2-54-219-170-140.us-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com.rdp

    This way you see the dialog filled in.

Alternately, open the program manually:

Clients
  1. Click the Windows “Start” icon button at the lower left corner (or wherever you moved it).

  2. Click the “Remote Desktop” icon on the Windows 10/2016 Desktop if it’s there:

    Alternately, type enough of Remote to see “Remote Desktop Connection” appear for you to click.

    Alternately, type mstsc to see “Remote Desktop Connection” appear for you to click.

    Either way:

  3. In the “Remote Desktop Connection” dialog, paste into the Computer Name: field the DNS name such as

    ec2-54-219-170-140.us-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com

  4. Click “Show Options” for a pop-up:

  5. Type in User Name “Administrator” if you’re using an Amazon EC2 instance, since Amazon EC2 makes use of PEM files for security.

    Alternately, if you are working within an enterprise environment, you may need to add a network domain name in front of your assigned named, separated by a “backward slash”. This is because enterprises create for the same person different accounts for internal and external use.

  6. Click “Save”
  7. Click “Connect” to see a “Welcome” screen.

  8. Click “OK” on the Welcome screen.

    CAUTION: Remember to Log off, especially if you are sharing a machine with others.

Save rdp file from Amazon

  1. Click the “Connect” icon at the top of the Console.

  2. Click “Download Remote Desktop File” such as:

    ec2-54-219-170-140.us-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com.<strong>rdp</strong>

  3. Double-click on the file to open the RDP client.

    Back to the dialog:

  4. Click “Get Password”.
  5. Click “Browse…” and select Downloads, the .pem file downloaded earlier.
  6. Click “Decrypt Password”.
  7. Double-click on it to highlight it and press Ctrl+C to copy the string to your Windows Clipboard.
  8. Open a Notepad file and paste it there so you won’t lose it.

  9. Click “Close” to dismiss the dialog.

    RDP Client

  10. On Windows Explorer or MacOS Finder, double-click on the .rdp file saved earlier to invoke an RDP client program (if one is installed on Mac, see below).
  11. On the RDP client, click on the Password input field and paste the Clipboard contents.

  12. Leave the Domain blank and click OK to connect.

  13. Click View Instances.
  14. Scroll down to copy the IPv4 Public IP such as 54.219.170.140

Other operating systems

On other operating systems (such as MacOS or Linux), if you have no administrative rights on your corporate Windows laptop, spin up cloud instances in the cloud and access them via a client that uses RDP.

RDP clients on Linux

On Linux machines, there is RDesktop at http://www.rdesktop.org

RDP clients on MacOS

On the Mac, these RDP clients can reach into instances of Amazon EC2 or other cloud that house Windows servers.

A) Royal TS is the enterprise client, at $29 each.

B) Microsoft’s Remote Desktop Client Connection 2.1.1 for Macintosh is gone

B) Microsoft Remote Desktop from Apple AppStore

C) Microsoft Remote Desktop for Mac from HockeyApp

D) Vagrant RDP

E) Chrome RDP Add-on is no longer supported?

F) CoRD from Sourceforge is obsolete

Royal TSX

The licensed client is available for Windows and Mac.

  1. Get to their download page at:

  2. Click the “Download” button for Mac to download a file such as:

    royaltsx_3.2.6.1000.dmg (23.3 MB)

  3. Click the file downloaded to unzip it.

  4. Click the .dmg file to install it.

    As this page says, those without a license can connect up to 10 application instances and a single document per application instance.

  5. Using Finder, go to your Applications folder.
  6. Drage the program to the Launch bar for easy access.
  7. Open the app by clicking on the Launch bar or Applications folder.
  8. Click Apply in the UI that pops up.
  9. Drag the orange logo and drop it on the blue (Applications) folder.
  10. Click Open to the confirmation.
  11. Click the red dot to dismiss the installer pop-up.
  12. Those who buy a perpetual license, have a way to store and retrieve the key string.
  13. Click to apply it.
  14. TODO: Install plugins
  15. TODO: Create document.
  16. TODO: Invoke.

Microsoft Remote Desktop Client gone

Microsoft’s Remote Desktop Client Connection 2.1.1 for Macintosh (installer RDC_2.1.1_ALL.dmg at 9.4 MB) is no longer available for download from here http://www.microsoft.com/mac/downloads.

Image credit: https://hpc.nrel.gov/users/systems/winhpc/getting-started

Microsoft’s Remote Desktop for Mac OSX from Apple

  1. Click this link at the Apple Store.

    NOTE: This is newer than the edition that comes with Microsoft Office for Mac 2011.

  2. Click the blue “View in Mac App Store”.
  3. Within the Mac AppStore app, click Get.
  4. Click Install.

  5. Click Open.

  6. Click + New

BLAH: This UI version is difficult because there are no favorites or sorting by last use, aliases, etc. (that I know of). I now have to scroll down the list every time, and remembering which of many cryptic names I want, which is difficult if you have a lot of servers on the list.

NOTE: http://docs.aws.amazon.com/quickstart/latest/rd-gateway/welcome.htmlQuick Start for Remote Desktop Gateway that explains how to configure RDGW in detail

Microsoft HockeyApp Remote Desktop for Mac

This enables you to run the most powerful of servers from a ChromeBook laptop with minimal RAM and hard disk.

  1. Click this link to the
    Microsoft Remote Desktop for Mac webpage, which is part of the HockeyApp.net used by Xamarin developers for Crash Reporting, User Feedback, User Metrics and In-App Updates.

  2. Click “Download”.

  3. Select “Save” folder to receive file

    Microsoft_Remote_Desktop_Beta.app.zip (it’s 20.4 MB).

    CAUTION: This is in Beta as of August 30, 2017. The history shows weekly builds.

  4. In Finder, navigate to Downloads folder to double-click on that zip file to unzip it.
  5. Scroll to “Microsoft Remote Desktop Beta”.

  6. If you’re the suspicious type, run md5 on the file to see if the hash created matches the one on the website.

  7. Double-click on the unzipped file to invoke it.

  8. If the “Help us make your experience better?” appears, click “not now” or “Yes”.

  9. Click “Add Desktop”

  10. In the Quick Connect dialog, click on the white field and press Ctrl+V to paste the EC2 DNS Addressor click “Skip” if you don’t have an address yet.

    Close and Open again

  11. Click the program name “Microsoft Remote Desktop Beta” at the top and select “Quit”.

  12. In Finder, Downloads folder, right-click and Move to Trash

    • Microsoft_Remote_Desktop Beta
    • Microsoft_Remote_Desktop_Beta.app.zip
  13. Get to the Mac Launcher by squeezing your fingers and thumb together on the Touchpad.

  14. Type “Mi” until you see “Microsoft Remote Desk”, then click it.

    First time

    TODO: Verify this.

  15. Click “Add desktop”.
  16. Click “Connect”.
  17. Copy the password from where you saved earlier.
  18. Click on Password field. Press Ctrl+V to paste it.
  19. Click “Continue” to get see the Windows start-up screen.

  20. Click on the icon (in case you have several instances). You should now see a desktop.

    Success!

  21. In Finder’s Devices left pane under, click the eject button for the “Microsoft Remote Desktop Beta” installer.
  22. In Finder, drag the “Microsoft Remote Desktop Beta” from within Downloads to drop on the Applications folder.

  23. If you are using the program often, drag the “Microsoft Remote Desktop Beta” from within Applications to drop on the Task Bar so that it is visually avaiable.

  24. Click the red “Add desktop” icon.
  25. For User Account, select “Administrator” because that’s what Amazon does.

  26. For PC Name, paste the name such as

  27. Click “Save”.

Vagrant RDP

If you are getting into a Vagrant instance containing Windows:

VIDEO:

  1. Set the communicator and network ports in your Vagrantfile, such as:

  2. On a Terminal:

    vagrant rdp

Chrome Add-on

  1. If you don’t have a Chrome browser, install it from the default Internet Explorer.

  2. Open a Chrome browser to this site.

    PROTIP: The fusionlabs.net web page does not use https. Use http://www.fusionlabs.net (the https on this doesn’t resolve).

    rdpsupport@fusionlabs.net or 214.739.5454

  3. Click the green “Launch App” button at the upper-right.

    CAUTION: I get this running forever:

  4. Highlight the DNS address (such as “ec2-52-53-218-39.us-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com”) and press Ctrl+C to copy it into your Windows Clipboard.

  5. Click on the blank field and press Ctrl+V to paste.

  6. PROTIP: If you can’t connect, make sure RDP port 3389 is open among Inbound port rules.

  7. For Domain:
  8. For UserName:
  9. For Password:

CoRD on Sourceforge

CoRD on Sourceforge, which is for Mac OS X 10.5—10.8 (obsoleted when 10.12 Sierra is out).

CoRD_0.5.7.zip is 3.4 MB

After running this, drag it into your Applications folder.

To add a new server, click on the menu File.

Android Chrome Remote Desktop

Although it has a related named, the Android phone appChrome Remote Desktop securely accesses your computers from your Android device.

Rdp Client For Mac Osx

  1. Set up remote access on desktop computers using the Chrome Remote Desktop app from Chrome Web Store:

    https://chrome.google.com/remotedesktop

    Click Add to Chrome, then Add at the pop-up.

  2. Launch the app.

    Select Remote Assistance providing user-to-user screen sharing for technical support.

  3. On your Android device, open the app and tap on any of your online computers to connect.

Best Rdp Clients For Mac

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