Remote Control Disabled
Hopefully this is an easy question, have been searching for the answer to no avail though. I have installed the client on an XP Pro PC with SP3. When I try to run Remote Tools from SCCM on the PC, I get "Remote Control is disabled". If I log onto the PC and look in Control Panel and open "Remote Control" it is grayed out, I can't change it. It is set to None. In SCCM Site Settings > Client Agents > Remote Tools Client Agent it is enabled and "Users cannot change policy or notification settings in the Remote Control Control Panel" is unticked. I tried ticking / unticking. Uninstalled / re-installed the client. Repaired Configmgr Remote Tools Agent in Configuration Manager Properties in Control Panel. It just seems to ignore the SCCM config though. I am using an administrator account to log into the PC. I can RDP to the PC, no problem, but Remote Tools just won't connect. Any ideas?
April 2nd, 2010 4:08pm

I bet is that there is a GPO overridign ConfigMgr. Do a RSOP on the PC.http://www.enhansoft.com/
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
April 2nd, 2010 4:31pm

Thanks for the reply Garth. Hmm, I just spent 4 hours going through the options. I have enabled Terminal Service options but still Remote Control is disabled. Apparently our Group Policy is very basic. I can connect via Remote Assistance with no problem but would like remote tools to work. Any clue as to what in the GP that would be disabling it? It's all still grayed out.
April 6th, 2010 6:09am

Did you ever get this resolved? I am having the same problem, but only on certain machines. When we first installed SCCM 2007, we had this on all the clients, but ran a VB script to change a registry setting. That fixed it, but since upgrading to SCCM 2007 SP2, the problem is back and the setting change does not help. Any one have any ideas?
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
June 30th, 2010 3:56pm

I'd make sure the domain\group or domain\ID is specified. The below is specified in help. I've always used a domain in front of the ID or group that I specify in this area. Not sure if this helps or not Spoondog. SCCM Noob, sorry I didn't respond - I just saw your response actually above. Hopefully you have things working now. Users and user groups who can initiate Remote Tools sessions. These groups are global, not local. You can add these names to the Permitted viewers table. Specify the information in a domain_name\user_name or domain_name\group_name format, or just type the user or group name. The account name is not verified at this point, so ensure that it is typed correctly.
July 1st, 2010 8:24pm

Hi Same problem, after an upgrade from SMS 2003 to SCCM SP1, SP2, R2 idem after a SMS client upgrade or a fresh install [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\SMS\Client\Client Components\Remote Control] "Enabled"=dword:00000000 1) Modifying the key manually to 1 works 2) Value set to 0 again after a push/repair 3) PolicySpy says: boolean Enabled = True under CCM_RemoteToolsConfig 4) Disabling/re-enabling 'Enable Remote Tools on clients' (Remote tools client Agent Properties) modify the Policy... but never change the Registry key 5) Full reset of SMS policy doesn't change anything 6) Modifying the value to 1 manually always work.... It seems that our clients receive the right SMS Policy, but it is never used... and never applied to the registry... Any idea why ?? as we have to upgrade 20'000 SMS Clients... I can imagine that a script or a domain policy would do the job, but I'd like to understand this weird behavior... ThanksMichel
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
July 2nd, 2010 1:41pm

Thanks for the response Jim. The domain groups and rights are set correctly. It does appear that I had to manually go into the registry and flip the DWORD value back to one. For some reason it keeps flipping back to 0 and disabling remote control. I guess I will need to search out why it keeps reverting back. Thanks again!
July 2nd, 2010 3:30pm

Thanks Jim, I'm going to open a MS call... and I will let you know...Michel
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
July 5th, 2010 9:06am

Doutaz Michel, Did you open a call? What's the verdict? Same problem on our end: Upgrade to SP2, "Enabled = 0", manually modify it to = 1, run a repair and it gets set back to 0. SP1 clients are fine. We upgrade them and they are set to 0, disabling remote control. About to call Microsoft, but hoped you already did and I can get the answer here faster. Thanks, -Nick-nick
July 20th, 2010 3:51pm

Good morning, Do you have any update on this problem? We are seeing this on a significant number of machines; we are just finishing up an SMS upgrade to SCCM SP2 R2. Interesting enough, even on machines where remote tools are still working, when we run a dcomperm -ml list, the result is a repeating list as described above. Thanks! Marge
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
September 2nd, 2010 6:00pm

Hi Nick, Yes, I followed your steps and and have similar results. As a work-around, I am thinking of simply forcing the Enabled entry to 1 with a Group Policy. What did you do to work around the issue? Marge
September 8th, 2010 6:28pm

You'll need to get DCOMPERM.exe. Then there are two batch files... one simply starts a separate process to launch the other (for SCCM advertisement purposes). Put the DCOMPerm.exe and the following in the same folder at the same level and create an SCCM package out of it. Batch file number 1: @echo off REM call %0\..\SCCMRAFIX.CMD START CMD /c %0\..\SCCMRAFIX.CMD @EXIT Batch File number 2: @echo off cls ECHO FIXING REMOTE ASSISTANCE STUFF... echo. rem stop SCCM exec service - This will enable the Remote Tools to reconfig and enable echo Stopping SCCM... rem net stop "SMS Agent Host" rem sleep 60 :NOTSTOPPED SLEEP.EXE 10 sc stop ccmexec | find /I "The service has not been started" if ERRORLEVEL 1 goto NOTSTOPPED if ERRORLEVEL 0 goto ITSSTOPPED :ITSSTOPPED echo done. echo. rem delete the registry value for Machine COM object rem HKLM\Software\Microsoft\OLE\MachineLaunchRestriction echo Deleting the Machine COM Object ACLs... reg DELETE HKLM\Software\Microsoft\OLE /v MachineLaunchRestriction /f echo done. echo. rem add the SCCM Remote Control Group into the ACL list for the Machine COM object rem this should add in the "Everyone," "Administrators," and "Offer Remote Assistance Helpers" groups with their proper ACLs echo Adding the SCCM Remote Control Users group to the Machine COM object ACLs... %0\..\dcomperm -ml set "%computername%\ConfigMgr Remote Control Users" permit level:ll,la echo done. echo. rem set the Windows Help and Support COM object ACLs back to their defaults echo Reverting ACLs on the Windows Help and Support COM object... %0\..\dcomperm -al {833E4001-AFF7-4AC3-AAC2-9F24C1457BCE} default rem adding the Offer Remote Assistance Helpers group back, for RA still doesnt work with out it %0\..\dcomperm -al {833E4001-AFF7-4AC3-AAC2-9F24C1457BCE} set "%computername%\Offer Remote Assistance Helpers" permit level:rl,ra %0\..\dcomperm -aa {833E4001-AFF7-4AC3-AAC2-9F24C1457BCE} default echo done. echo. rem start up the SCCM exec service now that we've cleaned up a bit... echo Starting SCCM... net start "SMS Agent Host" sleep 5 echo done. echo. echo. echo ...done!nick
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
September 8th, 2010 8:17pm

This topic is archived. No further replies will be accepted.

Other recent topics Other recent topics