First steps on your Windows VPS: the first-hour checklist

Your Windows VPS comes with Windows Server 2019 or 2022, an activated licence and Remote Desktop enabled. Before you install your bot, business software or .NET application, one hour of preparation avoids most bad surprises: a reboot in the middle of the day, a program stopping when you disconnect, a weak password. Here is the checklist, in order.

1. Get your access details

Once your order is confirmed, the VPS is deployed in under a minute. The connection details are shown in your client area at me.nvhcloud.com, on the service page:

• the IP address of the VPS, used to connect;
• the username, usually Administrator;
• the initial password, which you will change in step 3.

Remote Desktop listens on the standard port 3389: unless you change it, the IP address alone is enough.

2. First Remote Desktop connection

From a Windows PC, open Remote Desktop Connection (type mstsc in the Start menu), enter the IP address, then the username and password. From a Mac, iPhone, iPad or Android device, install Microsoft's official app, Windows App, which replaces the former Remote Desktop app.

On first connection a certificate warning appears: this is normal, the VPS uses a self-signed certificate. Check that the address is your VPS, then accept. Details for each device and fixes for connection errors are in our article connecting to a Windows VPS with Remote Desktop.

3. Change the password

Replace the initial password with a long, unique one: the RDP port of every Windows server on the Internet is constantly probed by bots. Inside the remote session, Ctrl + Alt + Del acts on your own PC; use Ctrl + Alt + End, then Change a password. You can also use PowerShell:

net user Administrator *

The command asks for the new password twice without displaying it. Store it in a password manager before closing the session.

4. Install updates

Open Settings, Windows Update, then Check for updates. The first batch can take a while and require one or two reboots: do it before installing your software, not while you are using the server.

Then set active hours (in Windows Update advanced options) so Windows does not reboot while you need it. If a program must run continuously, make sure it starts again on its own after an update: see step 7.

5. Keyboard, language and time zone

The most annoying everyday problem is a wrong keyboard layout. In Settings, Time & Language, Language, check that your layout is listed first and remove the ones you do not need. The Windows display language is another matter: depending on the installed image, changing it may require an extra language pack.

Also set the time zone, which you need to read logs and schedule tasks at the right time. In PowerShell, for example for London:

tzutil /s "GMT Standard Time"
tzutil /g

6. Browser and software

Windows Server 2022 includes Microsoft Edge. On Windows Server 2019, only Internet Explorer is present, with an enhanced security configuration that blocks most websites. To download another browser, open Server Manager, Local Server, set “IE Enhanced Security Configuration” to Off for the download, then turn it back on.

Then install only what you need. On a 2 or 4 GB VPS, Windows already uses 1.5 to 2 GB of memory: every application launched at startup reduces the headroom for your main program. For a trading robot, follow installing MetaTrader on a Windows VPS.

7. Disconnect without stopping everything

This is the most common mistake: closing the Remote Desktop window disconnects the session but leaves it open on the server, and your programs keep running. Choosing Sign out from the Start menu closes the session and stops every program running in it.

• To keep a program running: simply close the RDP window.
• To restart a service or script after a reboot: create a Task Scheduler task triggered “At startup”, with “Run whether user is logged on or not”.
• Software with a graphical interface, such as a trading terminal, needs an open session: set up automatic sign-in and launch it when the session starts.

8. Windows Firewall

Windows Firewall is on by default and only allows Remote Desktop and a few system services. If your application must be reachable from the Internet (an IIS site, an API, a Windows game server), open only the port it needs, in an administrator PowerShell:

New-NetFirewallRule -DisplayName "My application" -Direction Inbound -Protocol TCP -LocalPort 8080 -Action Allow
Get-NetFirewallRule -DisplayName "My application"

Never turn the firewall off “to test”: a forgotten service would be exposed. The included Anti-DDoS protection filters volumetric attacks before they reach the VPS, but it does not replace a well-configured firewall.

9. Backups and reinstalling

Keep a copy of your important data outside the VPS: configuration files, databases, scripts and software profiles. Syncing to online storage, or regular copies to another server, is enough in most cases.

If something goes badly wrong (unstable system, lost password, infection), you can reinstall Windows Server from your client area. A reinstall starts from a clean system: everything on the disk is lost, which is why an up-to-date backup matters. Still choosing a system? Read Windows 10 or 11 on a VPS: is it possible?

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