RDS licencing on Windows

Question

Hello all,

I have a few queries concerning RDS licencing server and thr way it issues out licences so I just need this verified.

Question #1:

A user cal means the user can log into "any" server. This means if we have 2 user cals this means "any" two users can log into "any" server in the domain (providing RDS is installed on that host otherwise no). What if we want two specific people to be allowed at all times? This is not possible as far as I can tell as there is no such thing as a CAL being applied to an account to support that.

Also, I noticed there is no domain policy. I guess whoever set this up set up a local policy only to ensure it gets applied to only one server and it has a local policy to talk to a separate licencing server to avoid others effectively usign them I guess as they want to use them for one server only.

Question #2;

Oddly they have two licencing servers. One with 10 and the other with 2 User cals. The only explanation I have for this is they want that single server to communicate with the separate RDS licencing server so others do not use them or am i missing something because I would normally just add a domain pollicy and apply that way.

Question #3

Just so I stay ontop of this. When you launch the licencing Manager it shows total licences 10. If issued is over this it means more licences right? This is my unerstanding.

Answer 1

Hello,

Q1: When using a Per User CAL, the CAL is allocated when someone logs into the server. This means the CAL is assigned to the first user who logs in, until all CALs are allocated.

The Per User CAL information is stored in your domain, so a domain is necessary if you wish to use Per User CALs.

Q2: It is possible. Each server can specify a license server in its LOCAL POLICY. There's no need to configure them in GPO, as the local policy would be overridden by GPO.

You can find the setting in the documenthttps://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/remote/remote-desktop-services/rds-license-session-hosts

Q3: Correct, if you have more than 10 users, you should purchase additional License CALs.

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Answer 2

Hello,

This is a community forum for technical questions & issues.

For question regarding pricing / licensing please contact a Microsoft sales partner or licensing expert.

Call (1-800-426-9400), Monday through Friday, 6:00 AM to 6:00 PM PST to speak directly to Microsoft licensing specialist.

Answer 3

I guess now everyone thinks this is a pricing question so getting no response

Wonderful!