A very common issue on a daily life of a Windows server administrator is that the users complaining about RDP issue. If the issue is with Windows 2008, that’s fine as we can restart the remote desktop services to fix the issue. But the same issue on Windows 2003 is bit annoying.

However, I have found a solution which works perfect.

The fix: (remotely using command prompt)

tasklist /s \\servername /svc /fi “imagename eq svchost.exe” (locate PID for TermService)
taskkill /s \\servername /pid xxxx (may need /f to force, UAC might give problems as well)
sc \\servername start TermService

The Fix: (local, using command prompt)

tasklist /svc /fi “imagename eq svchost.exe” (locate PID for TermService)
taskkill /pid xxxx (may need /f to force, UAC might give problems as well)
sc \\servername start TermService

Detailed Information:

Open a command prompt
Type in: tasklist /svc /fi “imagename eq svchost.exe”
This will list the different instances of svchost.exe and the associated service and PID
Locate TermService and note the PID for it
Open Task Manager and go to the Processes tab. Then click View > Select Columns and check PID, then click OK
Locate the svchost.exe process with the PID noted in step 4, right click it, select End Process
Open services.msc
Start the Terminal Services service

Thanks,
WintelAdmin