Microsoft Virtual Desktop

Infrastructure

Step by Step

Table of Contents Overview ........................................................................................................................................................................... 3

Pre-requisites ................................................................................................................................................................ 3

Hyper-V Server Configuration ........................................................................................................................................... 4

Configuring Windows 7 Virtual Machine ...................................................................................................................... 5

Installing VDI Roles ............................................................................................................................................................ 6

Configure the Session Host Redirector ............................................................................................................................. 9

Configuring the Remote Desktop Session Broker ........................................................................................................... 11

RD Web Access Server ................................................................................................................................................ 12

RD Session Host........................................................................................................................................................... 13

Display Name .............................................................................................................................................................. 13

RD Virtualization Host Servers .................................................................................................................................... 14

Configure For Personal Desktops ................................................................................................................................ 14

Configure a Virtual Desktop Pool ................................................................................................................................ 16

Configure RD Web Access ............................................................................................................................................... 18

Testing your VDI Setup .................................................................................................................................................... 19

Overview Microsoft Virtual Desktop Infrastructure is a set of servers and services that when combined together provide your

users with access to virtual desktops.

The servers involved in Microsoft VDI are:

Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 with Hyper-V

Remote Desktop Session Broker

Remote Desktop Host Redirector

Remote Desktop Web Access

Remote Desktop Virtualization Host

This eBook will go through step by step how to setup the services required for Microsoft VDI as detailed above with

the exception of installing Windows Server 2008 R2 and Hyper-V

An assumption is made that you already understand how to setup Windows Server 2008 R2 and Hyper-V, if you are

unsure then you can find information on my blog at www.edutechnow.com

Pre-requisites To start this step by step you must already have at least one server running Windows Server 2008 R2 with Hyper-V

installed and at least one Windows 7 virtual machine installed.

You will also need another server that is going to provide all of the other VDI services, for this guide I will call this the

VDI server

Hyper-V Server Configuration As explained in the prerequisites you should have a server setup with Hyper-V and at least 1 Windows 7 virtual

machine, we now need to setup this server for VDI

From Server Manager click on Add Roles, select Remote Desktop Services and click Next

In the Role Services select Remote Desktop Virtualization Host and click Next

Finally click Install on the summary screen

Configuring Windows 7 Virtual Machine As default the Windows 7 virtual machines are not configured to accept remote desktop connections, to configure

them you will need to run a PowerShell script which can be downloaded from here

Save the script as Configure-VirtualMachine.ps1 to a folder on the virtual machines and run the following

commands from that folder in PowerShell

Set-ExecutionPolicy remotesigned –force

.\Configure-VirtualMachine.ps1 –RDVHost domain\HyperVServer –RDUsers “domain\domain users”

Note:

Replace the text domain with your domain name and the text HyperVServer with the name of your Hyper-V server

Once the script completes successfully your Windows 7 Virtual machine will be configured for VDI access

Installing VDI Roles On the VDI server open up Server Manager and bring up the Roles screen

Click on Add Roles, from the selection list choose Remote Desktop Services and click Next

Click Next on the introduction screen

On the Select Role Services screen we need to select the following services and click Next

Remote Desktop Session Host

Remote Desktop Connection Broker

Remote Desktop Web Access

When you select the Remote Desktop Web Access services a pop up will appear asking if you want to add the

required roles services, in this case the web server role and services

Click Next on the compatibility screen

The next screen requires you to set the authentication method. Your choice will depend on the version of Remote

Desktop Connection client being used

You will now need to specify the licensing mode, for now we are going to configure it later

You now need to select the users that will have access to the server, in this case I have selected Domain Users, that

way all of our users will have access to the Windows 7 virtual machines

As the users are going to be accessing Windows 7 virtual machines we don’t need to set any of the client experience

settings

After clicking Next you will get some screens on the web server settings, you may keep all the default settings and

click Install at the final screen

Configure the Session Host Redirector We need to now configure the server to redirect all incoming requests, the first step is to add the server to the

correct groups on the local server

Open Server Manager and navigate to Configuration | Local Users and Groups | Groups

Double click the Session Broker Computers group and add the VDI server

Now open up Remote Desktop Session Host Configuration

From the main window double click the RD Connection Broker link

Click on Change Settings

Select Virtual Machine Redirection, enter the name of the Session Broker server in the text box and click OK twice

(Click Yes at the intermediate pop up window)

Configuring the Remote Desktop Session Broker The next step in the process is to setup the Session Broker, to do this launch the Remote Desktop Connection

Manager

The main screen should look like this

We now need to resolve all of the red crosses and yellow triangles

RD Web Access Server Click on Add next to the RD Web Access Servers line

Add the name of the server to the text box and click Add and OK

The red cross should now turn to a green tick

We just need to check that the right servers have been added to the right groups on the local server

Open Server Manager and expand the Configuration node so that you can see the Local Users and Groups

Double click the TS Web Access Computers group and check that the VDI server has been added to the group

RD Session Host Click Configure on the RD Session Host server for redirection line

Enter the name of the VDI server in the text box and click Apply

We aren’t going to use any old RDC versions so click OK

Display Name The Display Name isn’t a critical element of the setup but let’s change it anyway. Click Change on the relevant line

and enter the names you would like to use for the relevant elements

RD Virtualization Host Servers Click on Add on the RD Virtualization Host servers line and type in the name of the Hyper-V server

Clicking Add will add the server and take you to the host servers screen

The Total Virtual Machines will show as zero, to refresh this click on the server in the middle section of the screen

and click Refresh

Configure For Personal Desktops While this wizard is designed to configure the VDI server for personal desktops we are going to run it but skip the

personal desktops setting

Click on Configure on the top line

Click Next at the first screen once you have made sure you meet all the pre-requisites

The Hyper-V server should already be listed, if not then type it in and click Add

Once the server has been added you may click Next

You now need to configure the redirection settings, if the server does not already appear in the screen then add it to

the Server name text box and click Next

The next screen should automatically select the RD Web Access server, if not then simply add the server name and

click Next

Review your settings on the final screen and click Apply

The next screen will allow you to assign personal desktops, in this case remove the tick box and click Finish as we are

going to setup a pool of desktops

Configure a Virtual Desktop Pool From the Actions menu of the RD Connection Manager select Create Virtual Desktop Pool

Click Next on the welcome screen, you should now see a screen that lists the virtual machines on your Hyper-V

server

Select the virtual machines you want to use in your pool and click Next

Enter a display name and pool ID and click Next, then click Finish on the results screen

Configure the Digital Certificate

Click on Specify on the Digital Certificate line

Click on the box to put a tick next to Sign with a digital certificate and the click on Select

This will open up a dialogue box from which you can select the certificate you want to use with the VDI server

Once you have selected the certificate click Apply on the main screen

Configure RD Web Access From a web browser navigate to the fully qualified domain name of your VDI server

Login with a domain administrator based account and click on the Configure tab

Click the option for An RD Connection Broker server, enter the name of your VDI server in the Source Name box and

click OK

The screen will show you a link to the virtual desktop pool

Testing your VDI Setup From a web browser navigate to the fully qualified domain name of your VDI server

Login with a domain user based account

The domain user should now see the link to the desktop pool, clicking on the link will launch the Remote Desktop

Connection client

Click on Connect and if prompted enter the username and password of the domain user account again

As you can see this will log the user into the Windows 7 virtual machine, the user will have access to all of their usual

desktop items and network based drives