January 6, 2009 · General · Email This Post

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VirtualBox, the graphical user interface, has a built-in server for the VirtualBox Remote Desktop Protocol (VRDP). This allows you to see the output of a virtual machine’s window remotely on any other computer and control the virtual machine from there,as if it was running on the remote machine.


VRDP is a backwards-compatible extension to Microsoft’s Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP). Typically graphics updates and audio are sent from the remote machine to the client, while keyboard and mouse events are sent back.

You can use any standard RDP viewer, such as the one that comes with Microsoft Windows (typically found under “Accessories” -> “Communication” -> “Remote Desktop Connection”) or, on Linux system, the standard open-source rdesktop program
to connect to the virtual machine remotely.

You should use the IP address of your host system as the server address. The VRDP server uses the standard RDP TCP port 3389 by default. The port can be changed either in the GUI VM settings or with VBoxManage modifyvm command -vrdpport
option. Note that only one machine can use a given port at a time. Also on Windows hosts the default RDP port (3389) could be already used by the Windows RDP server,in this case you should choose another port for your VM(s).

With VirtualBox, the graphical user interface, the VRDP server is disabled by default, but can easily be enabled on a per-VM basis either with the VirtualBox GUI or with VBoxManage

VBoxManage modifyvm <vmname> -vrdp on

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9 Comments to “VRDP – VirtualBox Remote Desktop Protocol”

  1. Vadi says:

    Very nice.

  2. mashcaster says:

    How about some step by step instructions?

  3. Abdullah says:

    How do you control the access to the virtual machine?

  4. KenBW2 says:

    What’s with the recent interest in VBox?

  5. mashcaster says:

    >> KenBW2 Says: What’s with the recent interest in VBox?

    Visualization is becoming easier, so more people are interested in it.

  6. dlynch says:

    Has anyone tried to use vrdp to connect to a linux vm? When I do I get 2 mouse pointers. One is from the machine that I’m rdping from and the other is from the ubuntu vm.

    Does anyone know how to resolve this so that when the rdesktop window is selected, there is only one mouse pointer?

    Thanks

  7. Not My Real Name says:

    Dlynch – install the Guest Additions, that should take care of the double pointer problem.

  8. jude says:

    I can not get this to work for the life of me. I am using 8.04 and VB 1.5.6. I have remote display enabled in the settings for the client. I have the port set to an alternate port (both in the settings for the client and for the XP machine. I opened the port on the ubuntu machine. Any help would be appreciated!

    PS – Love the blog! Keep it up!

  9. Rico says:

    I have the same problem. Guest Addon is installed but doesn’t help.
    Host & Guest OS: OpenSuSE 11.1 (64bit)
    Trying to access the headless vm from another machine with dual monitors (don’t know if this is causing the problem)

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