RSAT on Windows 10

While installing the GPMC onto a Windows Server operating system is quick and easy because the files for installation are already pre-built into each instance, launching the GPMC this way still means that you are having to log into a server of some kind anytime that you want to administer Group Policy. For some of us, that isn't a problem at all. I normally have RDP connections open to at least a half-dozen servers at any given time during my workday. But the larger the organization, the more segmented job roles are going to be, and wouldn't it be nice if we could configure Group Policy right from our Windows 10 desktop computer, without ever having to log into a server of any kind?

Yes it would. And that is exactly the purpose of the Remote Server Administration Tools (RSAT) from Microsoft. The RSAT toolset is much more comprehensive than just Group Policy tools, and installing RSAT onto a Windows 10 client is basically the same as having full Server Manager on your desktop. You will have many administration and management tools available natively on your workstation that will negate the need to log into a number of different kinds of servers in the future.

I already have a Windows 10 workstation running inside my test lab network, called LAPTOP1. I am going to download, install, and launch RSAT on LAPTOP1 to show you how easy it is to start using these features today. Every server administrator should give this a shot; I bet it'll save you time at the end of the day!

The current download for RSAT on Windows 10 is here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=45520

However, should this link ever change in the future, simply open https://www.bing.com/ (I know you'll actually use Google, but we're all Microsoft guys here, so you really should be using Bing!) and type download Remote Server Administration Tools for Windows 10 (or whatever the current client-side operating system is at the time of this reading).

Use the Download button on that page to download the installation file that is most appropriate for your Windows 10 workstation. I am running Windows 10 Version 1803, and so I am going to choose the WindowsTH-RSAT_WS_1803-x64.msu file, and run it once downloaded to install RSAT:

After installation is complete, click on your Start menu and you will see a new application installed called Server Manager, right here on your Windows 10 machine! Launching Server Manager brings you to a very familiar looking interface, from which you can utilize the same Tools menu in order to launch Group Policy Management, among many other things:

Keep in mind that getting the GPMC to connect successfully to the DC in order to pull Active Directory information means that you would need to be installing RSAT onto a workstation that is joined to your domain, and the user account that you are using to log into that computer should also be a domain account. This is typically the case with all workstations inside an enterprise organization, but it's worth mentioning for anyone who is trying to install RSAT on a standalone workstation that might not be joined to the domain, and is therefore receiving errors when trying to launch the administrative consoles.

It is very rare that I find server administrators who are making use of RSAT, but I strongly recommend anyone reading this to give it a try. This set of tools can definitively increase productivity, while at the same time increasing the security posture of your servers. Who knows – once you verify that you can handle your daily chores via RSAT, you may be able to do some major restrictions of access to your servers, and maybe even do things like block RDP access since, at that point, you wouldn't have much point logging into them anymore.