Ideal settings for rdesktop?

Question

For connecting to a Windows 7 virtual machine on a LAN, what would be the ideal settings to specify when using rdesktop in linux so that it feels as close as possible to using a regular Windows 7 machine? And is there anything I should configure on the Windows VM?

score 10 · Answer 1 · answered Nov 10 '10 at 18:14

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It takes some tweaking. The command-line I'm using in a shortcut for my VMWare VM Win7 admin station is :

/usr/local/bin/rdesktop -d $domain -u $username -g 1270x972 -z -r sound:local -P -x l $hostname

Works pretty solidly. I had to compile a newer rdesktop since the one that comes with my distro is a bit old. Pretty snappy. Still not as snappy as talking to XP, but markedly better than it is with no special options.

answered Nov 10 '10 at 18:14

sysadmin1138

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the sound from remote machine is a bit choppy and laggy. – Chenming Zhang Feb 20 '15 at 01:11
There is some discussion of `-P` (bitmap caching) at https://superuser.com/questions/6962/what-does-the-bitmap-caching-option-do-in-the-remote-desktop-client – Elliott Beach Dec 23 '18 at 19:48

score 4 · Answer 2 · edited Mar 14 '14 at 11:03

I came upon this after investigating various sources. Here's what I use:

rdesktop -u USERNAME -d DOMAINNAME -p - -g 1680x1050 -a 24 -z -x 0x80 -D -r clipboard:PRIMARYCLIPBOARD -r sound:remote MACHINENAME

-x 0x80 will allow clear type tuning to work (see here) assuming you have Windows XP SP3, Vista or 7 as the server.

If you get a warning saying 24 bit color depth is not allowed, you will need to use the group policy edtor on the server machine to change the Administrative Templates -> Windows Components -> Terminal Services -> "Limit maximum color depth" setting. (see here)

I forgot to mention, on Windows XP, you will also need to add a DWORD value to your registry: AllowFontAntiAlias with value 1 at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server\WinStations\RDP-Tcp (source) and restart your machine.

The above also removed windows manager decorations and passes all keys (Ctrl+Alt+Del etc.) to the Windows machine. I have the resolution explicitly specified in place of using full screen mode on rdesktop to prevent it from taking over both monitors.

score 3 · Answer 3 · answered Dec 14 '11 at 11:01

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After some grief, I've switched to using xfreerdp - it lacks a lot of the issues rdesktop has with the more modern windows builds, and feels a bit faster (might be wrong here)

answered Dec 14 '11 at 11:01

dyasny

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score 3 · Answer 4 · answered Feb 01 '16 at 19:20

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It looks like all the answers share something like these options in common:

-x lan: Let rdesktop know you have a good connection
-P: Let rdesktop cache bitmaps
-z: Let rdesktop use compression

answered Feb 01 '16 at 19:20

djhaskin987

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score 1 · Answer 5 · answered Nov 19 '18 at 19:46

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I like to add the -f option instead of the -g <dimensions>, as it enables the Full Screen mode.

Then you can use CTRL + ALT + ENTER to toggle Full Screen.

answered Nov 19 '18 at 19:46

isapir

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Ideal settings for rdesktop?

5 Answers5