Using Intel vPro to Remotely Power Cycle a Client PC

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For those that are accustomed to IPMI 2.0 for their servers, with KVM-over-IP and the ability to remotely reboot a PC, Intel’s vPro platform provides some similar functionality. I have been working with vPro components quite a bit over the past few weeks and decided to try using my Apple iPad to reboot the machine.Admittedly, I am the kind of person that uses an iPad for a lot of remote management activity so I wanted to see if this was possible, and how hard it was using one of my favorite traveling devices. The Intel Management Engine (ME) runs at a hardware layer independent of the operating system. This allows one to manage a PC prior to the operating system loading or in cases where the operating system crashes. I have people write the site weekly after using this feature on IPMI 2.0 based motherboards saying how useful it is.

The first step was very simple. I logged into my network and then navigated to the IP address of the machine (I knew what the IP address was prior to doing this which is why I used that method.) One needs to first connect to port 16992 of the remote machine and log in. The login information is what the administrator sets in the Intel ME setup.

Intel vPro Remote Power Control
Intel vPro Remote Power Control

From there, it was as simple as going to “Remote Control” on the right hand navigation panel and seeing the power cycle features. As one can see by the above, this was done using my iPad. Overall, this does provide a bit more management functionality than a standard PC. I have had PCs crash while I am out of town so being able to reset the machine remotely is a great tool.

4 COMMENTS

  1. A great article would be how to setup IPMI nd alike to use BMC remotely ect.

    thanks for so many great articles

  2. In what way did you initially log into your network? IP of your router or RDP into a machine on the network via port forward and open up a browser on that machine? VPN?

  3. If you dont have vpn
    Use a raspberry pi , use a port forward of your public ip to a high por 22 (222) or something like that. ssh to the pi and create a tunnel to the the ip of your pc with the intel v-pro port. the open your browser and go to LOCALHOST: PLUS THE LOCAL PORT YOU CREATED ON PUTTY

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