Shut down a computer remotely with shutown -s

Question

The moderator at answers.microsoft.com sent me here even though this doesn't seem like the right place.
https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-power/shut-down-a-computer-remotely-with-shutown-s/3745d216-aa72-4448-901a-e238d5c1a8c5?messageId=db4b845b-29d6-498a-a8d5-fb1308643458

I recently had to a clean reinstall on my Windows 10 computer.

I added the "Remote Desktop Users" group to "Force shutdown from a remote system" and "Shut down the system" under local security policy, as I want everybody I enable to remote into the computer to also be able to turn it off when they are done.

Yet I'm unable to shut down from either my Windows 7 computer or the old Windows XP computer (hey, I'm troubleshooting). Previously I had no issue shutting down all the computers at once with a simple batch file at night that simply does "shutdown -s -m \computername" for each computer in question.

Trying to trouble shoot, I added my standard user account to "Force shutdown from a remote system" and I still get this error message:

[quote]

C:\Users\Slick>shutdown -s -m \slicks10
slicks10: The entered computer name is not valid or remote shutdown is not suppo
rted on the target computer. Check the name and then try again or contact your s
ystem administrator.(53)

[/quote]

What did I forget to do to make this work? Obviously I forgot to change something to enable shutdown -s -m to work with my standard account on other computers. I had it fixed before I had to start from scratch.

P.S. I am the system administrator, I just use a different user account than the one I was trying to shut down the computer with to wear that hat.

Answer 1

Hi,
Thank you for posting your query. According to your description, you are intended to remotely shut down the computers. Here are some hints for you.
Please verify your firewall settings. Turning off the WINDOWS FIREWALL on one machine would check if it were a fire wall issue. If so, you need to enable Remote Service Management in the following way: Control Panel > Windows Firewall > Allow a program or feature through Windows Firewall > Check 'Domain' field for 'Remote Service Management'. Done.

Additionally, Shutdown tool works using Samba over TCP, which means that remote computer must accept packets on TCP port 445.
So the only thing you need to do is to open Windows Firewall with Advanced Security and enable the rule: File and
Printer Sharing (SMB-In) and shutting down remote computer will start working.

Please try using "shutdown -i". It's less likely to make a mistake.
In Windows 7 and Windows Vista, the UAC strips administrative priveledges from users that are connecting remotely. This is called the Remote UAC LocalAccountTokenFilterPolicy. Instructions can be found at: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/942817/en-us. This applies to both Windows Vista and Windows 7.

Best Regards,
Grace

---If the suggestions above are helpful, please ACCEPT ANSWER. Really appreciate. This will also help others with similar issue to find this post quickly. ---

Answer 2

Oddly enough I tried doing what you said and it worked that night.
However, when I tried again the next night it didn't work.
I checked and somehow the firewall settings had reset.
When I changed the firewall settings the first time, I had been signed on with my standard account and saw the alert about your replay, and just used UAC to elevate when needed.

When I changed them the second time, I was at the other computer playing an old game and not signed in at all on the win 10 computer. I scooted over to the win10 computer and signed in with my administrator account and changed them, then signed out and scooted back to the XP computer to test it.

Any idea why it made a difference doing it the second way?
Or was there a recent update in the last week that might have done it?