Windows 10 Remote Desktop Operation setup

K5PZ

I can't seem to find the proper combination of the numerous set up parameters to make Windows 10 Pro Remote Desktop work with my Flex 3000.  I can get most everything working ok except the audio.  I get too much noise in the TX audio, and/or, I don't get either the TX or the RX audio through the connection.   ARRRGH!  Can someone who has this setup working send me ALL  of the Remote PC and Local PC settings, as well as, the PowerSDR configuration settings that make this work, please!  73 Pete K5PZ.

Rick - W5FCX

RDP isn’t likely to work well remotely with SmartSDR over slow or latency without choppy audio and display. I’m not familiar with the 3000, but I’ve found in the 6000’s you must reduce the update frequency to about 3 frames per second. You can also reduce the RDP color density and resolution to minimize bandwidth usage to see how much that helps. I recall others using TeamViewer and some other remote access solutions, which may be better than RDP.

Matt NQ6N

I have had problems with Microsoft RDP that have not been present with Google Remote Desktop or TeamViewer.  It seems that even if you set the audio settings in RDP to leave the remote audio alone, it still does something that ends up breaking/disconnecting DAX audio once you disconnect.

This is too bad because RDP has the best quality screen scaling/rendering of the solutions I've tested and feels much more like sitting right in front of a local computer. In fact, I've gotten confused a few times with my local machine not realizing it was actually an RDP session to the shack computer -- I use the same color desktop background, etc. 

It sounds like this is a quirk/oddity with RDP and not a Flex issue, but if there is any interest on Flex's part in testing/debugging RDP with Flex I'd be happy to help as I would prefer it over the other remote desktop solutions for Windows. 

73
Matt NQ6N

W8WD

I have been running CW Skimmer/SDR Bridge/DAX control panel v2.1.33 on a remote computer. Everything works fine until I remotely login using RDP. After login the DAX IQ stream stops working. I found it can be recovered by going back to the remote computer console closing and re-starting DAX.

I have also found that starting DAX from RDP shows driver initialization errors in DAX. I am hoping that Flex would look into the compatibility issue. 

Brian W8WD

Richard McClelland, AA5S

Maybe this new RDP client will work better for Flex remote than the old one does:

https://betanews.com/2018/04/02/microsoft-remote-desktop-html5-web-client-preview/

K5PZ

Thanks Richard for your note.  I looked at the new RDP client description.  Installing it is totally waaay beyond my pay grade ability.   :^)

Bob - W7KWS -

I've had similar difficulties with RDP & DAX and became tired of fighting it.  A successful work around for me was to instead wire the speaker out  and ACC Line-In on my 6300 to a USB sound dongle on my station PC.  This has worked 100% but RDP audio has a little more latency than I like. 

As an alternative I use a separate SIP VOIP audio connection between my laptop and the station PC using the FREE X-Lite VOIP Windows client from Counterpath.com on both ends and the FREE SIP service available from callcentric.com.

To access the station remotely from my Android devices I use the XtraLogic RDP client and Zoiper for the SIP VOIP client.

Craig Williams

See here for the setup. https://www.ke9ns.com/flexpage.html#rdp

Richard McClelland, AA5S

Yes, you're right.  That is a mess of a set-up, not many hams have Windows 2016 servers installed in their shacks.  Hopefully Microsoft will get that cleaned up a bit before they release it as production code.

Uli - DK8NE

Hi Brian,
in RDP make sure, that you clicked "playing audio on the remotecomputer" in the settings local ressources. (i don´t know exactly how this is called on your side - using german here).
with this, your setup skimmer and other audio-related programs should keep on working while you show up via RDP. 
Uli DK8NE

W8WD

HI Uli,
I selected "Play on remote computer" and issue was solved.

Thank you for your help. 

Brian W8WD

Bob - W7KWS -

Glad your solution was such a simple setup parameter. The problem that forced me to the hardwire/VOIP solution was DAX instability when routing audio to RDP. I finally used the method I describe above out of frustration after looking for a fix over the course of several days. It's unclear to me at this point if it was DAX, RDP or some other problem with my PC.

K5PZ

Bob,
I have a question about your comment, "A successful work around for me was to instead wire the speaker out  and ACC Line-In on my 6300 to a USB sound dongle on my station PC." I purchased a pair of USB sound dongles.  The Flex 3000 doesn't have a ACC Line-In, so I made a RJ-45 cable to 3.5MM to connect the front panel microphone input to the sound dongle.  I also connected the rear panel Powered Speaker audio output  over to the dongle.  No joy.  I am unable to configure the software to make my remote pc hear nor talk to the local host/Flex equipment.  How did you configure the audio in PowerSDR and/or the Remote and Local PCs?
Thanks for your time to respond.
Pete

Bob - W7KWS -

Pete, I don't import the sound into the Flex App. It operates separately from the Flex software as a PC to PC VOIP call. My USB dongle came with a driver which created a new sound device in Windows. I then select that sound device in my VOIP App X-Lite from Counterpath.com. Skype is a simpler alternative since it's peer to peer not needing a SIP VOIP service company like I use. Using Skype, just make a call from your remote PC to the host PC. 73!

K5PZ

Hi Bob,
Thanks for your reply.  OK, so I tried to set up SKYPE.  I am at wits end.  I can't make that work either. I have a USB sound dongle on the local station PC.  I set up SKYPE to work with it. I connected the 3000's front panel mic input to the dongle's speaker jack. I connected the audio output jack on the rear panel of the 3000 to the dongle's microphone jack. I set up SKYPE on the station PC to auto-answer when I call from the remote. I can hear rec audio, but TX audio doesn't work.....interestingly the same problem I have with Windows Desktop Remote.  I do have the 3000's mixer set to microphone.  Suggestions?
Pete
K5PZ

Bob - W7KWS -

Pete, In the Windows Control Panel at the radio PC, select "Sound". Check both Playback & Recording tabs to verify audio is registering for both audio in & out. Unfortunately I have no experience with Flex hardware or software pre-6xxx so if you have audio in the "Sound" panel, maybe others with that equipment can be of help. If no audio registers in the Sound dialog, it's probably levels. If not, I'd Google Skype to troubleshoot that. 73

Charlie_KB8CR

Bob - W7KWS -

I've made quite a few changes and improvements from my posts in this thread seven months ago. As before, I only use RDP for the screen and not for audio and I don't use DAX. It's way to much trouble to keep DAX going. Instead I've wired audio, in and out, directly between the 6300 and a USB sound dongle. As I've mentioned earlier, I haven't had any luck with audio using any of the competing remote desktop products. I too think that the screen graphics using Microsoft RDP are much better than any of the others but the sound is terrible on all that I've tried.

For audio I've started using RCForb from www.remotehams.com. It works extremely well over my AT&T hotspot.

To get around the recent problem where opening and closing Remote Desktop disables all the PC's audio drivers including DAX, I've started running RCForb and SmartSDR CAT on a seperate PC than the one running SmartSDR at the station end. RCForb has pretty good audio and its Flex controls are quite good giving me a large PTT button and an on-screen virtual tuning knob that works well. This has made many things at the remote end much easier to manage.

With RCForb I'm using the Kenwood TS-2000 command set to run the Flex since the Flex command set always spawns a 2nd slice. I couldn't figure any other way to get around this. The Kenwood commands work very well.

If this interests you, I've posted more details elsewhere in the Flex Community. Search for "Android, Any Questions". 73