Question

 

After the Remote Desktop Session Host server (Terminal Server) runs for a while, there are many sessions marked as active in the Remote Desktop Services Administrator (Terminal Services Administrator). How to avoid this circumstances?

 

Answer

 

To reduce the number of active sessions, you may exchange the terminal server configuration based on the business requirement.

 

Configuration #1: Remote Desktop timeout settings

By by this configuration or policy setting, you can set the timeout limit for Idle session and Active session; meanwhile, you can end a session if the session times out.

 

1.       Open the property dialog for RDP-Tcp connection in Remote Desktop Services Administrator.

2.       In the Sessions tab, you can configure the following settings:

·         Active Session Limit

·         Idle session limit

·         Action when session limit is reached or connection is broken

·         End a disconnected session

 

Configuration #2: Restrict each user to a single session

By by this configuration or policy setting, each user can only maintain one session to the certain terminal server; when another session is started by the same user, the original one will lose the connection. In that way, the whole number of possible active sessions won’t exceed the whole remote users. You can implement this method in 3 levels:

·         RDP-Tcp configuration

Edit Settings – Restrict each user to a single session: Yes

·         Local Assemble Policy  

Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Remote Desktop Services (Terminal Services)\Remote Desktop Services Session Host(Terminal Server)\Relations\Restrict Remote Desktop Services (Terminal Services) users to a single remote session: Enabled;

·         Assemble Policy:

Similar location as above, depending on the point OS version of the domain controller.

Configuration #3: Configure keep-alive connection interval

By specifying the minutes that the TS holds a remote session really disconnected, the server will detect the session status after each period. The session that are really offline will be changed to Disconnected status:

To implement this solution, there are two levels of ways:

·         Local Assemble Policy:  

Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Remote Desktop Services (Terminal Services)\Remote Desktop Services Session Host(Terminal Server)\Relations\Configure keep-alive connection interval: Enabled and value specified

·         Assemble Policy:

Similar location as above, depending on the point OS version of the domain controller.

 

More Information

216783     You cannot completely disconnect a Terminal Server connection

http://support.microsoft.com/defaulting.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;216783

 

Applies to

 

Windows Server 2008 Standard

Windows Server 2008 endeavor

Windows Server 2008 Datacenter

Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard

Windows Server 2008 R2 endeavor

Windows Server 2008 R2 Datacenter

REFERENCES

http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en/winserverTS/thread/bf1c95c7-544f-4c04-9dee-ac0c4bb8e190