VM console access

Question

Hi,

why don't we have access to the virtual machine console for cases when the rdp service doesn't work?

the only option we have is to stop the virtual machine and restart it.

if we are unable to access by rdp, what is the option to fix the problem without losing the virtual machine information?

open called no support azure?

Thank you.

Answer 1

Hi,

You can always change the default RDP port to another port (if port 3389 is not allowed), but if RDP is still not allowed, you can also enable SSH to access your Azure VM.

I would also recommend using just-in-time access:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/security-center/security-center-just-in-time

There is also the Azure Serial Console:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machines/troubleshooting/serial-console-overview

Best regards,
Leon

Answer 2

If this is Azure related, It has nothing to do with RDP or SSH. When I was still working we moved a number of machines into Azure. One critical problem that I found was that there was no way to access the console of a "sick" machine that lost it's network access. We had an occasional problem where our security team would implement rules in a 3rd party AV product that would cripple network access. At the time, the only solutions were to restore the VM to a prior backup, or download the VHD to our datacenter and launch it under VMware, fix the problem, and then upload the VHD back to Azure. The first solution involved potential data loss and the second solution required hours of down time, while the disk was being transferred over the networks.

Being retired, I don't care as much anymore, but I'm still curious to see if this ever got fixed.

To tag along to salves question: How does an admin access the console of an Azure based VM that does not have network connectivity, so that the admin can boot into safe mode and fix whatever is wrong? Is that now possible?