Horizon Client for Windows 2106 | 15 July 2021

These release notes cover the following topics:

• Key Features
• What's New in This Release
• Internationalization
• Before You Begin
• Known Issues

Key Features

VMware Horizon Client for Windows makes it easy to access your remote desktops and published applications with the best possible user experience on the Local Area Network (LAN) or across a Wide Area Network (WAN).

• Support for Windows 10 (32-bit and 64-bit), Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows Server 2016, and Windows Server 2019
• Unmatched performance - The adaptive capabilities of the PCoIP display protocol and the VMware Blast display protocol are optimized to deliver the best user experience, even over low-bandwidth and high-latency connections. Your remote desktops and published applications are fast and responsive, regardless of where you are.
• Simple connectivity - Horizon Client for Windows is tightly integrated with VMware Horizon for simple setup and connectivity.
• Secure from any location - At your desk or away from the office, your data is delivered securely to you wherever you are. SSL/TLS encryption is always used to protect user credentials, and enhanced certificate checking is performed on the client device. Horizon Client supports optional RADIUS and RSA SecurID authentication. You can also install Horizon Client so that it runs in FIPS mode.

Top of Page

What's New in This Release

Horizon Client for Windows 2106 includes the following new features:

• Modernized user interface
• The Horizon Client for Windows user interface has a more modern appearance. Some icons are different, some menus and menu items have different names, and some settings are changed from check boxes to toggle switches. The documentation has been updated to reflect the changes to the user interface.
• Dynamic update of redirected audio output devices
  When you configure a preferred speaker for a remote desktop, if you select all the available speakers, the devices are updated dynamically during a remote session. If you select a specific speaker, the changes do not take effect in the remote session. See Select a Preferred Speaker for a Remote Desktop.
• VMware Blast changes
  The Allow High Efficiency Video Decoding (HEVC) option is enabled by default. Previously, it was disabled by default. When this option is selected, performance and image quality are improved if the client machine has a GPU that supports HEVC decoding. If this option is selected but the client machine does not have a GPU that supports HEVC decoding, or the agent does not support HEVC encoding, Horizon Client uses H.264 decoding instead if H.264 is selected. Horizon Client uses Blast Codec decoding if H.264 is not selected. See Configure VMware Blast Options.
• USB device path changes
  In some cases, USB device paths have changed. For example, if you previously configured Exclude Path="bus-1/0/0_port-02", in the 2106 release, you might need to change the value to Exclude Path="bus-1/0_port-01". If you use USB filtering settings, check the device paths generated in the Horizon logs for the correct paths and edit the Exclude Path and Include Path settings if necessary. See Using Group Policy Settings to Configure Horizon Client.
• Smart card authentication with the CNG API
  Horizon Client supports smart card middleware with KSP implemented and a smart card certificate issued with the KSP certificate template. See Smart Card Authentication Requirements.
• Input method editor (IME) enhancements
  If you use non-English keyboards and locales, you can use an IME that is installed in the local client system to send non-English characters to a remote desktop. See Use a Local IME with a Remote Desktop.
• Forever applications
  Beginning with Horizon 2106, administrators can configure the Bypass Session Timeout setting to make application sessions run forever. Forever applications are exempt from idle session and Horizon server timeouts. If you are using a forever session when a timeout occurs, the session will not end. You must manually close forever sessions when you are finished with them. Application sessions that run forever are not supported for unauthenticated users. For information about the Bypass Session Timeout option, see Setting Up Published Desktops and Applications in Horizon.
• VPN MAC addresses are filtered out
  Horizon Client now reports the MAC address of the user's local hardware instead of the MAC address of the VPN. See MAC Address Deny List.
• Windows 10 version 21H1 SAC support
  You can install Horizon Client for Windows 2106 on a Windows system that is running Windows 10 version 21H1 SAC.
• vmware-view command changes
  The -logInAsCurrentUser command has changed to -loginAsCurrentUser. See Running Horizon Client From the Command Line.

For information about new remote desktop features, see Release Notes for VMware Horizon Version 2106.

Internationalization

The user interface and documentation for Horizon Client are available in English, Japanese, French, German, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, Korean, and Spanish.

Before You Begin

• For the Windows operating systems that this release of Horizon Client for Windows supports, see the VMware Horizon Client for Windows Installation and Setup Guide document.
• Horizon Client for Windows is supported with the latest maintenance release of VMware Horizon 7 version 7.13 and later.
• To install Horizon Client for Windows, download the installer from the VMware Horizon Client download page.
• For installation instructions, see the VMware Horizon Client for Windows Installation and Setup Guide document.
• For information about the features that are supported in nested mode, see VMware Knowledge Base (KB) article 67248, "VMware Horizon Guidelines for Nested Mode."
• The Horizon Client for Windows installer requires .NET Framework version 5.0 or later. The installer checks whether .NET Framework version 5.0 or later is installed before installation. If the client machine does not meet this prerequisite, the installer downloads the latest version of .NET Framework automatically.
• Beginning with Horizon Client for Windows 2006, Virtual Printing (also known as ThinPrint) is not supported. Use VMware Integrated Printing instead.

Resolved Issues

The number provided before each resolved issue refers to the VMware internal issues tracking system.

Known Issues

• The serial port redirection group policy setting Bandwidth Limit does not set a limit on the bandwidth.

  Workaround: Use third-party software to limit the bandwidth.

• With serial port redirection, at a high baud rate such as 115200, the performance of VMware Blast is significantly worse than PCoIP, and the connection might sometimes hang.

  Workaround: Use a baud rate of 9600.

• In an IPv6 environment, if you configure IP address mapping for location-based printing, users might encounter a problem accessing the printer because the client can have multiple IPv6 addresses. Anytime the client connects, it can use any one of the addresses.

  Workaround: Use the location-based printing group policy setting IP Range to include the multiple addresses. However, the printing problem might still occur because the client might use a temporary address, which is not in the specified range.

• If you use a touch-enabled screen on your client system to work in a remote desktop, do not use the Enable Relative Mouse feature. This feature provides improved mouse performance for 3D and CAD applications, but for touch-enabled screens and tablets, the mouse coordinates are not translated properly, even in 3D and CAD applications.

• If you have multiple monitors with different screen resolutions and expand Horizon Client to all monitors and then select the Enable Relative Mouse feature, occasionally, the mouse pointer might not be able to move downward beyond a certain position.

  Workaround: Press Ctrl+Alt.

• When a user connects to a desktop using PCoIP shortly after the desktop is powered on, autofit of the desktop window might not work. This issue happens most often if the desktop or network is under stress shortly after power-on (to start multiple applications or to map network drives, for example).

  Workaround: Double-click the desktop window's title to go into window mode and double-click the title bar to go into all-monitor mode.

• On Windows 10, Windows Fax and Scan hangs when using a CardScan 800 device.

  Workaround: None.

• If LockedGuestSize is set to 640x480 on the client machine and you launch a remote desktop in Window - Small mode, the resolution helper tooltip does not appear when you drag the window edge.

  Workaround: None

• If you install Horizon Agent and then install Horizon Client on the same Windows machine (a nested mode installation), and you later uninstall Horizon Agent, the client's "log in as current user" function is lost after Horizon Agent is uninstalled. This problem occurs because the wsnotify.dll file is removed after Horizon Agent is uninstalled.

  Workaround: Reinstall Horizon Agent or Horizon Client to bring back the "log in as current user" function.

• If you connect multiple USB devices to the client system, select Automatically connect at startup in Horizon Client, and then connect, disconnect, and quickly reconnect to a remote desktop, not all of the USB devices are redirected to the remote desktop after you reconnect.

  Workaround: Wait for the USB devices to be redirected back to the client machine (for example, wait for the devices to appear in the device manager) and then reconnect to the remote deskop. Alternatively, you can manually redirect any unredirected USB devices to the remote desktop.

• After you disconnect and reconnect multiple remote desktops, you see an error message that states that an error occurred when connecting a USB device to your remote desktop. This problem typically occurs when multiple USB devices are connected to the client machine and you select Automatically connect at startup in Horizon Client.

  Workaround: Close the error message box and manually redirect the USB devices to the remote desktop.

• If you use the RDP protocol to connect to a published desktop from a physical machine, and then you try to connect to the same published desktop from a zero client, the RDP session ends on the physical machine and the zero client cannot connect.

  Workaround: Relaunch the same desktop pool with RDP from the physical machine, select Options > Disconnect and logoff in the launched RDP session, and then reconnect to the same desktop pool from the zero client.

• A “Pending session expired” error might occur when you try to connect to a remote desktop with the Microsoft RDP display protocol. This problem only occurs in large-scale environments where a Unified Access Gateway appliance is used and virtual printing is enabled.

  Workaround: Establish a connection to the remote desktop without using a Unified Access Gateway appliance, or disable virtual printing and establish a connection using RDP.

• With the clipboard audit feature, the event log reports one byte more than the actual length of the data that was copied from the agent machine to the client machine. For example, if you copy 10 bytes of data from a remote desktop to the client machine, the event log reports "XXX copy 11 bytes CPFORMAT_TEXT data from Horizon Agent to Horizon Client XXX with clipboard." Also, if "\r\n" is in the copied text, the event log records only the length of "\r." For example, if you copy the following text, the audit message records the length as 12 bytes:
  "aaa
  bbb
  ccc"

  Workaround: None.

• With the Browser Redirection feature, the context menu options on right click are limited to open link in new tab, open link in new window, back, and forward.

  Workaround: None.

• If you select Connect USB Device > Automatically Connect at Startup for a camera, Horizon Client stops responding when you start the remote desktop.

  Workaround: None.

• Horizon Client for Windows might quit unexpectedly when launching a remote desktop with multiple monitors at a high resolution.

  Workaround: Check the supported multiple monitor configurations in the documentation to resolve this issue. If you still encounter this issue, consider following workarounds:

  • Align your monitors in a regular layout and limit the total height (pixels) and stacks of the monitors.
  • Try not to launch multiple desktops with multiple monitors in one client instance, but start a new client instance to launch another remote desktop.
  • Use the VMware Blast protocol to start the remote desktop.