Windows Server 2016 Remote Desktop Services Starting program

Question

I've setup a Windows Server 2016 RDP server and everything works except for the in AD specified Starting program that won't launch.

The program specified exists on the server and it works perfectly on a Windows 2008 R2 RDP server, so I don't understand why it doesn't run on this Windows 2016 RDP server.

What am I doing wrong here? :)

Solution

According to Microsoft this is not a bug but rather a feature introduced with the changes to the Remote Connection Manager (RCM) in Windows Server 2016.

Quoting https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/3200967/changes-to-remote-connection-manager-in-windows-server-2016:

Starting in Windows Server 2016, RCM no longer queries the user’s object in AD DS. If you require RCM to query AD DS because you are using the Remote Desktop Services attributes, you must manually enable RCM. Use either of the following registry values to enable the behavior of RCM in Windows Servers 2012 R2 and earlier versions

...

Use either of the following registry values to enable the behavior of RCM in Windows Servers 2012 R2 and earlier versions:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows NT\Terminal Services 
Name: fQueryUserConfigFromDC
Type: Reg_DWORD
Value: 1

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server\WinStations\RDP-tcp
Name: fQueryUserConfigFromDC
Type: Reg_DWORD
Value: 1

Comments

[SDsolar]

If it works perfectly on a 2008 server but not on a 2016 server, then it might be a problem with the AD itself, or the server's connection to it. Did you upgrade everything, or just add this server, or what? Do other AD functions work correctly on this server? In other words, I think we need more context on this one.

[svh1985]

It's a freshly installed 2016 server that runs natively. This new 2016 server is added to an existing Domain, the server running the AD is a 2003 R2 server. The second RDP server runs 2008 R2 and on this server the startup program executes just fine. I also did a dcdiag and al tests passed.

[SDsolar]

Sounds like you have all the bases covered. So that means it is time to turn to Microsoft for an answer.