RemoteFX is enabled on Windows systems using Group Policy. Parallels recommends to apply Group policies at OU (organizational unit) level in Active Directory environments. Although local Group Policies can be used, it requires to configure necessary settings on every Terminal Server/Remote PC/VDI host in the RAS Farm.

Hint: To edit domain Group Policies, from the Windows Run command, type GPMC.MSC. Once the Group Policy settings are completed, run GPUPDATE /FORCE from the Run command to apply them.

Enable the following options on all Terminal Servers in your farm. Under Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Remote Desktop Services\Remote Desktop Session Host\Remote Session Environment enable the following:

• Configure Compression for RemoteFX Data. Set to Optimize to use less network bandwidth.

• Configure image quality for RemoteFX Adaptive Graphics. Set to Medium.

• Enable RemoteFX encoding for RemoteFX clients designed for Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1

• Configure RemoteFX Adaptive Graphics. Set to Let the system choose the experience for network conditions.

RemoteFX supports two Group Policy settings that give administrators the flexibility to manually choose the best configuration for their scenario. Both policies are under this path: Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Remote Desktop Services\Remote Desktop Session Host\Remote Session Environment.

The first policy setting is Configure image quality for RemoteFX Adaptive Graphics. This policy setting specifies the graphics quality for a remote session. Administrators can use this option to balance network bandwidth usage with graphics quality delivered.

The options are Medium (default), High, and Lossless. The Medium setting consumes the lowest amount of bandwidth, The High setting increases the image quality with a moderate increase in bandwidth consumption, while the Lossless setting uses lossless encoding, which preserves full color and resolution integrity but requires significant increase in bandwidth.

The second policy setting is Configure RemoteFX Adaptive Graphics. This policy setting allows the administrator to choose the encoding configuration to be optimized for server scalability or bandwidth usage. If you enable this policy setting, the RemoteFX experience could be set to one of the following options:

• Let the system choose the experience for the network condition

• Optimize for experience (balanced)

• Optimize to use minimum network bandwidth

By default, the system will choose the best experience based on available network bandwidth.

Enable the following options on all Terminal Servers in your farm. Under Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Remote Desktop Services\Remote Desktop Session Host\Remote Session Environment enable the following:

• Configure RemoteFX

• Optimize visual experience when using RemoteFX. Set to Medium Default.

• Set Compression algorithm for RDP data. Set to Optimize to use less network bandwidth.

• Optimize Visual experience for Remote Desktop Services sessions. Set to Rich Multimedia.

• Configure image quality for RemoteFX Adaptive Graphics (Image Quality set to Medium).

• Configure RemoteFX Adaptive Graphics. Set to Let the system choose experience for network conditions.

This policy setting enables system administrators to change the graphics rendering for all Remote Desktop Services sessions on a Remote Desktop Session Host (RD Session Host) server. If you enable this policy setting, all Remote Desktop Services sessions on the RD Session Host server use the hardware graphics renderer instead of the Microsoft Basic Render Driver as the default adapter. If you disable or skip the configuration of this policy setting, all Remote Desktop Services sessions on the RD Session Host server will use the Microsoft Basic Render Driver as the default adapter.

Audio and video playback allows users to redirect the remote computer audio in a remote session. It provides an improved experience for video playback in remote sessions. By default, audio and video playback is not allowed when connecting to a computer running Windows Server 2008 R2.

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd759165.aspx.

Audio and video playback redirection is allowed by default when connecting to a computer running Windows 7 or newer, or Windows Server 2012 R2 or newer.

If you have users that login from different time zones, you may want to enable this setting. This setting will redirect the local time to the app, remote PC, or VM. Time Zone Redirection is configured in the same Group Policy location as Audio Redirection: Local Computer Policy > Computer Configurations > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Remote Desktop Services > Remote Desktop Session Host > Remote Desktop Session Host > Device and Resource Redirection.

This policy setting allows the administrator to configure RemoteFX graphics for Remote Desktop Session Host or Remote Desktop Virtualization Host servers to be lossless. If you enable this policy setting, RemoteFX graphics will use lossless encoding. The color integrity of the graphics data will stay intact. If you disable or skip the configuration of this policy setting, RemoteFX graphics lossless encoding will be disabled.

In order to allow audio playback and recording redirection, first enable and start “Windows Audio Service” in the Services.msc console and enable server’s playback device, and then enable these functions using group policy. Terminal Servers do not need a sound card to do this.

To enable the sound option on all Terminal Servers, right-click the server’s sound icon in the Windows system tray. You will then be prompted to enable remote audio.

To enable the sound redirection options, navigate to Computer Configurations > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Remote Desktop Services > Remote Desktop Session Host > Remote Desktop Session Host > Device and Resource Redirection and select the following options:

• Allow audio and video playback redirection

• Allow audio recording redirection

• Limit audio playback quality

In order to get Point of Sale / USB Scanning devices to work properly with Windows Server 2008 R2 and higher, you must enable RemoteFX USB redirection on the user Windows devices using GPO. Please note that this policy setting allows you to permit RDP redirection of other supported RemoteFX USB devices from this computer. Make sure that you set RemoteFX USB Redirection Access Rights to Administrators and Users. This is configured by navigating to Computer Configurations > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Remote Desktop Services > Remote Desktop Session Host > Remote Desktop Connection Client:

Generally, device redirection increases how much network bandwidth RD Session Host server connections use because data is exchanged between devices on the client computers and processes that are running in the server session. The extent of the increase is a function of the frequency of operations that are performed by the applications that are running on the server against the redirected devices. Printer redirection and Plug and Play device redirection also increases CPU usage at sign-in.

Parallels recommends to not allow device redirection if not being used since this will result in inefficient bandwidth usage. Local device redirection can be configured from Parallels RAS policies, registry, or Microsoft group policies.

Set the Configure image quality for RemoteFX Adaptive Graphics option to Medium:

Remote FX Settings for Windows 7 SP1. Under Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Remote Desktop Services\Remote Desktop Session Host\Remote Session Environment enable the following options for virtual PC or VDI host which has guest agent installed:

• Enable RemoteFX.

• Set Compression algorithm for RDP data. Set to Optimize to use less network bandwidth.

• Optimize Visual experience for Remote Desktop Services sessions. Set to Rich Multimedia.

• Configure compression for RemoteFX data. Set to Optimize to use less network bandwidth.

• Configure image quality for RemoteFX Adaptive Graphics. Set to Medium.

• Configure RemoteFX Adaptive Graphics. Set to Let the system choose the experience for the network condition.