How to: Windows 7 VPN server with Internet connectivity

In the following tutorial, we will demonstrate how to setup a VPN connection between your home Windows desktop and a remote Windows-based server, to allow you to browse the Internet as if it was happening from the remote server.

We will use Windows 7 as an example, however all versions of Windows have a similar way to do this.

We, of course, suggest to use ServerPoint's ColossusCloud to deploy a remote Windows server. Please visit https://www.serverpoint.com/en/vps-hosting/ for more information.

To get started, it's recommended to start with a clean Windows 7 install. But if not, it will probably be fine.

A VPN, or Virtual Private Network, allows you to create an encrypted connection over the public Internet to remote networks by way of a secure “tunnel” between your device and the network. A VPN can be very handy if you are the kind of person that travels to different locations such as coffee shops, hotels and other public places and you need a remote access to work files or personal documents and programs. With a VPN you can be sure that all your data and sensitive information are shielded and cannot be accessed by prying eyes on public Wi-Fi.

Before you begin, please make sure that your remote Windows server and your local Windows desktop are up to date, with all Microsoft updates installed, as well as any other software you may use. If you are starting with one of our VPS servers, the updates have already been done for you, so, you are good to go.

Here is a transcript of that video. We strongly suggest, though, that you watch the video for easier execution.

• Open up the control panel
• Click on Network and Internet > Network and Sharing Center.
• On the left hand column click on Change Adapter Settings. There you will find your different network adapters.
• From this window we can create the VPN. On Windows Vista and up Microsoft made the file menu hidden. To get it back, press the Alt key. You will see the file menu appear near the top of the window.
• Go to File and select the New Incoming Connection. This is the VPN creation.
• What you do here is select accounts you want to give access to the VPN. You can create the VPN accounts if you need to by clicking the Add Someone option.
• Click Next and check the Through the Internet checkbox.
• Click the Next button and accept the defaults for the interface protocols.
• After this, you can connect to your VPN and access local resources on the server like file sharing. However, you will notice you cannot access the Internet through the Windows 7 VPN. This is due to the fact that Windows 7 doesn't have the ability to route packets over NAT directly.
• To get around this limitation you need to download a third party software called nat32. You can get it at nat32.com. What this software does is pretends all traffic from the VPN is from the local server's public Internet IP.
• During install, go ahead and accept all the default options; they're fine for our purposes. After the install, nat32 will popup a window. Go ahead and close it. We need to install drivers before we can use it.
• Reboot the server with shutdown /r
• After the server is done rebooting login again via remote desktop, and click on the nat32_cfg icon that is on the desktop.
• Click Continue on the first menu that pops up.
• Find the interface with the public IP, highlight it and select Internet. Now highlight the "remote access server" and select Private.
• Accept the default on the next two pages. After that, your VPN should route traffic thought it when the VPN connections are connected.

We hope you find this guide useful and easy to follow. If you have any questions or require any further assistance, don’t hesitate to contact us at Serverpoint.com. We’ll be happy to help!