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Always on Server 2016 VPN with Windows 8 clients

We are looking to setup Server 2016 Remote access VPN. I see that the Always on VPN only supports Windows 10 clients. Im assuming that is just for as it states, the always on feature. If i set up the Windows VPN server with the always on configuration, can i still use Windows 8.1 machines with this VPN setup? And just connect the Win 8 machines manually?

Rob Williams

I confess I am not familiar with "Always on VPN", so I cannot answer the question as asked, but is it possible to upgrade the win 8/8.1 clients? Unfortunately, those O/S's seem to be considered more obsolete than Win 10.

Having said that you could also consider Direct Access which would support Win 7/8/8.1/10

Just food for thought.

Brandon Nutter

ASKER

Thank you for the response Rob. We did set up Direct Access, but discovered that it is not compatible with our version of Windows 10, which is Win 10 Pro. Direct access requires Enterprise versions of desktop OS to work. Unfortunately upgrades to Windows 10 Enterprise is not in the budget for us.

From all the reading I've done, I don't see any reason we cannot use any OS with the Windows Server VPN. But the Always on VPN portion will only apply to our Win 10 devices. Everything else will need to be manually connected, which is fine. I just posted this question to see if anyone knew for sure or from experience.

Brandon Nutter

ASKER

After setting up the Always on VPN, you can manually configure a Windows 8 machine with the VPN profile.

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION

Brandon Nutter

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