Windows 8 for Business : Virtualization (part 3) - Using Hyper-V Virtual Machine Connection

Using Hyper-V Virtual Machine Connection

Hyper-V is a one-stop shop for creating and managing virtual machines and other virtual resources, but sometimes all you need to do is connect to a virtual machine, which can be found on your own PC or in a Hyper-V install on a different PC or server in your environment. When you want to just work with a single virtual machine that’s already created and configured, you can use Hyper-V Virtual Machine Connection (VMC) instead of Hyper-V Manager.

As you can see in Figure 5, VMC looks an awful lot like the desktop version of the Remote Desktop Connection utility from Windows 7 (which can be found in Windows 8 as well).

To connect to a virtual machine, you’ll need to select the server first. This can be a bit tiresome; if you don’t see the server name in the top drop-down list (named Server), choose the option called Browse for more, then click Advanced and then Find Now to search the local network for Hyper-V servers.

Figure 4: Virtual machines are often run in a window so you can access the host machine simultaneously.

Figure 5: Virtual Machine Connection

Then, select the virtual machine you wish to use from the Virtual Machine drop-down list and click OK to connect. When you do, VMC will resemble the Virtual Machine Connection window shown back in Figure 4. This gives you the opportunity to interactively access the virtual OS and its virtual apps and resources in a window on your host PC.