RDP to computer at home, that is VPNed to work network, drops VPN after RDP login

It is VPN using Juniper to work network. But I have the laptop at home, and I'm trying to RDP to it through my router.

It sees it just fine, logs in fine, but as soon as I try to take the session, it hangs and loses connection.

I figured out that I can only RDP into it while Juniper is connected to the VPN, and as soon as the laptop gives up its session, Juniper disconnects.

I guess the laptop is using a server on the VPN to handle remote connections.

I can't attempt to RDP to the work laptop again until I log back in and Juniper connects.

I'm RDPing so I can share mouse and keyboard with my personal computer. And local RDP would be so much faster than internet options like TeamViewer.

Lee Louviere

Posted 2015-08-07T16:12:36.763

Reputation: 111

In case you're NOT using the console session, this might help: What exactly is the console session in RDP? If you ARE using the console session, please add that to the question?

– Arjan – 2015-08-07T16:38:03.760

It would be great if I could just share the session. Holy hell, that would probably solve my problems. – Lee Louviere – 2015-08-07T16:51:13.877

So, what is keeping you from using the console session then? – Arjan – 2015-08-07T18:01:39.007

Ah, it seems /console might not be supported since years? Dell writes: "It is possible to connect to the local console session through Remote Desktop, but this requires no special parameters when establishing the session; simply supply the credentials of a locally logged-on user, and you will connect to the local console session."

– Arjan – 2015-08-08T08:52:06.787

Answers

May not necessarily be the answer, but I think that a security feature in your VPN connector is that it connects to the VPN using the logged-on user's credentials, hence if you're not logged on you don't get connected to the VPN (and subsequently can't RDP it from work).

If you can reconfigure the software to start as a Windows Service (instead of as "current user") that might help (possibly), but it's likely that the VPN software is configured to disconnect if the workstation is locked (as you mentioned) so this might not help.

It's also possible that the VPN software is altering your computer's routing tables but not restoring them when it disconnects from the VPN.

Tsaukpaetra

Posted 2015-08-07T16:12:36.763

Reputation: 273

It sees it just fine, logs in fine, but as soon as I try to take the session, it hangs and loses connection.

Try lowering MTU for VPN interface.

I've had similar issues, when Linux client would connect to Windows RRAS server via PPTP and then drop VPN connection when trying to SSH over VPN. Lowering MTU on client (1400 → 1372, AFAIK) fixed this issue.

beatcracker

Posted 2015-08-07T16:12:36.763

Reputation: 2 334