Remote Assistance vs. Router

[Kevin C.]

I've read the documentation at the KB about getting RA to work with NAT,
unfortunately it's either not explaining things very well or it's just plain
lying.

Indeed, the best clue I have received so far is that, when the request is
made, it is done with the first available port above a certain number, which
for all intents means the port is random and cannot be forwarded, so
basically the connection gets blocked one way or another. This appears
contradictory, however, with the KB info that says you can get RA through a
firewall by opening port 3389.

So, here's the situation. I'm the expert, I'm behind a Linksys router
(supports UPnP). The people that I help are sometimes also behind modern
Linksys/Netgear routers, and it's safe to assume those support UPnP as well.
But the connections still don't work. I've had people simply disconnect the
router and plug directly into their modems and that solves the issue, but
it's starting to get annoying for everyone involved. Is there a *real* way
to make RA work behind routers, if so please provide better directions than
the KB. Other than that, I humbly suggest to Microsoft that they retool the
program so that we can use conventional workarounds like port forwarding.

 

[Shenan Stanley]

I've read the documentation at the KB about getting RA to work with
NAT, unfortunately it's either not explaining things very well or
it's just plain lying.

Indeed, the best clue I have received so far is that, when the
request is made, it is done with the first available port above a
certain number, which for all intents means the port is random and
cannot be forwarded, so basically the connection gets blocked one way
or another. This appears contradictory, however, with the KB info
that says you can get RA through a firewall by opening port 3389.

So, here's the situation. I'm the expert, I'm behind a Linksys router
(supports UPnP). The people that I help are sometimes also behind
modern Linksys/Netgear routers, and it's safe to assume those support
UPnP as well. But the connections still don't work. I've had people
simply disconnect the router and plug directly into their modems and
that solves the issue, but it's starting to get annoying for everyone
involved. Is there a *real* way to make RA work behind routers, if so
please provide better directions than the KB. Other than that, I
humbly suggest to Microsoft that they retool the program so that we
can use conventional workarounds like port forwarding.

For some help:
http://theillustratednetwork.mvps.org/RemoteDesktop/RemoteDesktopSetupandTroubleshooting.html

 

[WTC]

I've read the documentation at the KB about getting RA to work with NAT,
unfortunately it's either not explaining things very well or it's just
plain
lying.

Indeed, the best clue I have received so far is that, when the request is
made, it is done with the first available port above a certain number,
which
for all intents means the port is random and cannot be forwarded, so
basically the connection gets blocked one way or another. This appears
contradictory, however, with the KB info that says you can get RA through
a
firewall by opening port 3389.

So, here's the situation. I'm the expert, I'm behind a Linksys router
(supports UPnP). The people that I help are sometimes also behind modern
Linksys/Netgear routers, and it's safe to assume those support UPnP as
well.
But the connections still don't work. I've had people simply disconnect
the
router and plug directly into their modems and that solves the issue, but
it's starting to get annoying for everyone involved. Is there a *real* way
to make RA work behind routers, if so please provide better directions
than
the KB. Other than that, I humbly suggest to Microsoft that they retool
the
program so that we can use conventional workarounds like port forwarding.

Most Linksys routers support UPnP but it is usually disabled in the Router's
interface. You must enable this yourself.

Enabling UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) in Windows XP
http://tinyurl.com/4tzow

Setting up Port Forwarding on a Linksys Router
http://tinyurl.com/5y46r