When I use Remote Desktop from Windows 7 PC to connect to Windows 8.1 Enterprise 64bit, in *some* cases sessionremains stuck on start (metro) screen. Mouse can move, I can click on icons but they do not 'open' (even if small click animation is visible). I can press power button and disconnect RDP, but reconnecting result in same case or , if I tried reconnect multiple times, it can result in black screen.
Above does not happen always, in many cases RDP works just fine, so I tested WHEN it happens, and it seems to happenwhen I RDP to Windows 8 woken from sleep, where user is already logged in. As soon as I go to start screen, I can not go out of it. Most usual case when I get this issue is when I put Win8 PC to sleep, then wake it up from remote PC and try RDP. It immediately satisfy both preconditions: it had user already logged in (I put PC to sleep from user session), and it appears at start metro screen (RDP seems to always appear at this screen, even if it swap to desktop later). Anyway, in this scenario I remain stuck on start metro screen until I either physically go to PC and login there, or restart that PC (restarted PC is safe to RDP into, since it does not have already logged in user).
BTW, I tried many things often suggested with RDP issues, and none of them helped here:
- uninstalling/reinstalling video driver
- netsh interface tcp set global autotuninglevel=disabled
- HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Parameters\DisableTaskOffload=1
- on client, Remote Desktop Connection -> Experience tab, remove "Detect connection quality automatically"
- on client, Remote Desktop Connection -> change resolution and some other options
Workaround so far is to remotely restart PC, which ensure no user is logged in, and then to do RDP. But is is NOT good long-term solution.