Remote Desktop Server Farms and Load Balancing-Part 2

In the previous part of this article explain how can install Remote Desktop Services, give access in the appropriate Users or Groups in the Remote Desktop Servers and verify that all works fine. In this article we will continue and Create Remote Desktop Server Farm and configure Loab Balancing between Remote Desktop Servers. Before start i would like to explain what is Load Balancing and why to use it.

Load balancing distributes workloads across multiple computing resources. This means that a user can connect in one Server or another base on the workload of the Serverd. So Servers has better perfomance because workload distributed .We will use Load Balancing for High Availability. If one Server crash users can continue to work with 2nd Server without have downtime. Also if want to do a maintainance in our Servers we can take offline the first Server and when finish start the Server and take offline the second one wihtout any downtime.

If you would like to read the other parts in this article series please go to:

So let's do a recap what will do today.

Create and Configure Remote Dekstop Server Farm
Configure Load Balancing betwen Remote Desktop Servers

Let's start

Install Remote Desktop Connection Broker

RD Connection Broker is is a role service that use it to keep a track of user session in a load-balanced RD Session Host server farm.

For large enviroments it's better to install RD Connection Broker in separate Server.

Click in the Server Manager Icon from the Taskbar.

Click Roles from the left Side
Scroll Down and Click Add Roles Services from the right Side

Click Next

Select Remote Desktop Connection Broker and click Next.

Clck Install.

When finish click Close.

Join Remote Desktop Servers to Farm

I install Remote Desktop Connection Broker. Now it's time to configure Remote Desktop Connection Broker before Join Remote Desktop Servers in the Farm.

Login in the Domain Controller and open Active Directory Users and Computers.
Selec Users and Find the Group Session Broker Computers.

Open the specific Group. Click in Members and Add ther Remote Desktop Servers (RDS1,RDS2 for this scenario) in the Group.

Now We configure the RD Connection Broker and the next step is to Join Remote Desktop Servers in the Farm. The following Steps must be done in all Remote Desktop Servers that you will have in your enviroment. For this scenario we have 2 Servers.

Login in one of the Remote Desktop Servers.
Click Start - - > All Programm - - >Administrative Tools - - > Remote Desktop Services - - > Remote Desktop Session Host Configuration.
From the Right Side go down in RD Connection Broker and double click in Memeber of Farm in RD Conenction Broker.

Select RD Connectio Broker Tab
Click in Button Change Settings.

Select Farn Member.
Fill the RD Connection Broker Name with the FQDN of the Server that you have install the RD Connection Broker.
In the field Farm Name give a general Name that will use it as Name of the Remote Desktop Connection from the Users.
You can add any name that you want. The specific name will be add in DNS Server.
Click OK.

We have few settings that can configure
If you check the Participate in Connection Broker Load Balancing you can set which Server you want to have more workload.
For example If reduce the number Relative weight on this server in the farm from 100 to 60 and leave 100 in the other Server the other server will have more workload. When a use start a connection will prefer to connect first in the Server which has 100 in the Relative Weight and only if found the Server with lot of workload will be redirect in the 2nd Server with Relative weight 60.
The next option Use IP Address redirection is recommended and will not change it.
The Select IP Addresses to used for reconnection is only the IP Address of this server and must check it.

Configure Load Balancing for Remote Desktop Servers.

For Load Balancing we can use lot of options but i will not explain all of them now. If you want to read for other options of load balancing and find what is the best for you can go in http://www.virtualizationadmin.com/articles-tutorials/vdi-articles/general/remote-desktop-server-farms-explained-part1.html .

In this article will use Round Robin DNS. What is Round Robin DNS? Is a load balancing mechanism use by DNS Servers to share and distribute network resource loads. The configuration is very simple and works perfect if you do it right. I will help to configure it with the right way.

Login in in your DNS Server.
Open the DNS Server Console.
Expand Forward Lookup Zones.
Click in <yourdomainname>.local

Right Click and select New Host A or AAAAA.
In the Field Name add the Name that you choose in the Farm Name when was configure the RD Connection Broker.We use askme4tech if you see below in Join Remote Desktop Servers to Farm .
Select the Ip Address for this A Entry.
Check the Create Associated pointer (PTR) Record and click OK.

Now you must verify that have the following entries in your DNS Server

RDS1 with IP Address 192.168.1.10

RDS2 with IP Address 192.168.1.11

askme4tect with IP Address 192.168.1.12

We finish with the configuration and we continue to verify that Farm and Load Balancing works without problems

Verify Farm and Load Balancing that works .

Do the following to verify that the Remote Desktop Servers Farm works

Open a Remote Desktop Connection from your PC. Type in the computer askme4tech (Farm Name) and click Connect.If all works fine you should be initialize remote connection with the Servers and will choose to connect in the Server with fewer workload.

Type your username and password to connect in your Remote Desktop Server.

Do the following to verify that load Balcning works.

Shutdown in one of your Remote Desktop Servers.
Open your Remote Desktop Connection, add askme4tech (Farm Name) in Computer and try to connect.
If the Load Balancing works then you must connect in 2nd Remote Desktop Server.
If you don't then you must check very carefull all the configuration of this article and update your DNS cache in yoru PC with .
ipconfig /flushdns

As Conclusion we create a Remote Desktop Server Farm and configure Load Balancing between the Servers. In the next Part we will continue to configure Roaming Profiles withe Folder Redirection and create best Client Experience.

Have a nice Weekend.

See you next Friday.