How can I enable Terminal Services on a Windows Server 2003 server?

A. You can enable "administrative mode" terminal services, which allows only two sessions, via the System Control Panel applet's Remote tab; for full terminal services, you must enable it by performing these steps:

1. Start the Add or Remove Programs Control Panel applet (Start - Settings - Control Panel - Add or Remove Programs).
2. Click Add/Remove Windows Components.
3. Select the Terminal Server option (and clear Internet Explorer Enhanced Security Configuration), then click Next.
4. For the security mode, select Full or Relaxed, then click Next.
5. Select the licensing server to use or select the option to automatically discover a license server, as the figure shows, then click Next.
6. Select the licensing mode--Per Device or Per User. If you have more users then devices, select Per Device mode; otherwise select Per User. Click Finish.
7. Reboot the computer when prompted.

You must add all users who you want to be able to connect to the terminal server to the Remote Desktop Users group, and you must install all programs via the Add or Remote Programs Control Panel applet.

Members of a terminal server farm must be running Windows 2003 Enterprise Edition. If you want to confirm the licensing server that a terminal server is using, run the lsview.exe utility, which you'll find in the Windows 2003 Resource Kit. The figure shows the results of running the tool.

You can also see the licensing server by navigating to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MSLicensing\Parameters registry key under either the EnterpriseServerMulti or DomainLicenseServerMulti values (depending on the type of the licensing server).