Hyper-V Enhanced Session Mode - Turn On or Off

How to Turn On or Off Hyper-V Enhanced Session Mode in Windows 8.1​

   Information

Enhanced Session Mode allows your Hyper-V virtual machines to access local resources from your Hyper-V host (your PC). You will not need a network connection to the Virtual Machine as it uses the VMbus. The following are a list of local resources Enhanced Session Mode supports:

• Display configuration
• Audio
• Printers
• Clipboard
• Smart cards
• USB devices
• Drives
• Supported Plug and Play devices

Different operating system will be able to utilize different features. For more information on what is supported, please refer to this blog post: RemoteFX Features for Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 - Blog

This tutorial will show how you how to turn on or off enhanced session mode in a Hyper-V client in Windows 8.1 Pro and Windows 8.1 Enterprise.

   Tip

Remote desktop services within the Hyper-v guest will need to be turned on, also a member of Remote Desktop User group.

How to enable Remote Desktop Services:

1. Press the :winkey: + R keys to open the Run dialog, type services.msc , and click/tap on OK.
NOTE: This is done within the virtual machine you wish to connect to.

2. Make sure in your virtual machine Remote Desktop Services is set to Running

Here's How:


1. Press the :winkey: + R keys to open the Run dialog, type virtmgmt.msc, and click/tap on OK.

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2. In the left pane, right click or press and hold on your Hyper-V Server (ex: HarryLowt2), and click/tap on Hyper-V settings.

NOTE: Alternatively, you could also click/tap on Hyper-V settings under Actions in the far right pane.

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3. Click/tap on Enhanced Session Mode policy in the left pane under Server, and then make sure Allow Enhanced Session Mode is Ticked

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4. Click/tap on Enhanced Session Mode in the left pane under user, and then make sure Use Enhanced Session Mode is Ticked

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5. Right click/hold on one of your Virtual machines under the Virtual Machine pane, and then click/tap on Connect.

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6. This will now bring up your virtual machines connection window, to set the local resources we want available to the virtual machine click/tap Show Options.

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7. Click/tap on the tab Local Resources, then under the section group box Local devices and resources we will choose what can be seen inside the virtual machine, and click/tap on More.

   Note

In this example I am going to show how choose an External Hard Drive attached to my host that I want the remote session to us.

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8. Locate the local device and resource you want, click/tap the relevant box, (Example: My Passport(E: ), and click/tap on OK.

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9. Once you are happy with your selection, click/tap on Connect.

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10. Inside my virtual machine, it can now access the external hard drive on my host machine(HARRYLOWT2).

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Related Tutorials

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• How to Enable and Disable Hyper-V in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Create a Virtual Machine with Hyper-V in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Create a Linux Hyper-V Virtual Machine in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Create a Hyper-V "Remote File Browser" Shortcut in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Add or Remove "Hyper-V Manager" to Control Panel in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Change Default Virtual Hard Disk Location in Hyper-V
• How to Convert Hyper-V Virtual Hard Disk to VHD or VHDX
• How to Create and Use Hyper-V Virtual Switches
• How to Create a Hyper-V Manager Shortcut in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Export and Import a Hyper-V Virtual Machine in Windows 8 and 8.1

 

[Dude]

Great tutorial, going to try this soon.

 

[Harrylowt]

Thank you! hope it comes in helpful

Cheers,
Harry

 

[roachslayer]

Excellent tutorial. However, what happens when you do NOT get the Display/Local Resources dialog to show up? I followed everything here and simply cannot get this dialog to appear when I click Connect.

I do see a menu item on the VM in the View menu called Enhanced Session, but it is grayed out.

 

[Brink]

Hello RoachSlayer, and welcome to Eight Forums.

Turn off the virtual machine to disconnect it, then see if you are able to uncheck it's Enhanced Session option.

 

[roachslayer]

Did that. well, I am trying to turn on enhanced session, not off. But I get no such options or abilities as described above. VM is off.

Also I should point out, as mentioned originally, the Guest Services box is checked in the Integration Services settings (when VM is off) and still no dialogs appear when I then connect to the VM. And Enhanced Session Mode is checked in Hyper-V Settings for server and user as shown in this tutorial.

 

[Brink]

What OS do you have installed to the VM?

 

[roachslayer]

Windows 7 is in the VM, host is Win 8.1.

 

[Brink]

I'm afraid that only the following guest operating systems support enhanced session mode connections:

• Windows Server 2012 R2
• Windows 8.1

Virtual Machine Connection - Enhanced Session Mode Overview

 

[roachslayer]

ok, thanks. wow, it simply just did not occur to me that MS Hyper-V can't support simple things like, well, Windows. I mean, I can use VM Ware or Parallels and get access to USB ports, for example, on the VM client, with Win 7, 8, Ubuntu, and on and on. Very disappointing.

 

[krl01]

Hello and thank you for your precious help
I would like to know why the access to redirected drives is so slow with enhanced session mode, it should be faster through RDP and VMbus to get to \\TSclient\drive !
I am using Win 8.1 pro Client Hyper V, VM is on separate SSD, 4 Gb RAM.
I have only one NIC shared with host, but my previous board had two NIC with one dedicated to VM and it was slow too...
Do you have to wait when using explorer to open a folder containing many files ?
Any setting to change in VMBUs Network Adapter ?

 

[SimonBrunet]

Hello all,

I know this is an up but I could use your help.
I thin I have a similar issue than roachslayer.

I have two VMs in Windows 10, hosted in a Windows 10 workstation. Both appears to have the same configuration (Generation 2, etc.).
However in one of them I can use Enhanced Mode (with audio, copy-paste, etc.) but not on the other.
I did all steps explained previously but I still can't get the Display window to configure Local Resources.

Any idea ?