Turning Your Stream Host On/Off Remotely: A Guide

[MC Mjolnir]

[Note]: This guide has been updated since it was originally written to make use of Steam Link instead of using myriad command line tools, simplifying the setup considerably.

So here's a little how-to on managing your streaming host without touching it. The requirements are that your host motherboard supports Wake On LAN (WOL) and you have a wired ethernet connection to your host. Fortunately, most boards do.

(It's possible to do this if your host is connected wirelessly with some setups, but I won't be covering that in this guide.)

Part A: The Host

Step 1: Enable WOL in the BIOS.
Press DEL (or whichever key it says on the boot screen) as your computer starts to enter the BIOS setup. Now not all BIOSes are the same, so I can't tell you exactly what you're looking for, but it'll probably be in the Power Management section or something similar. From there, you need to look for a Wake On LAN setting, or possibly Power On By PCI Devices and enable it. If you can't find the setting, google it to find out and make sure it's supported on your board.

Step 2: Enable WOL in Windows
Now open Device Manager from the control panel and find your ethernet adapter. Double click it and open the Power Management tab. Tick the box that says Allow this device to wake the computer and Only allow a magic packet to wake the computer.

Part B: The Client
Install Steam Link for your client device (the device you want to stream games to).
- Windows
Download from this page. The application can be added as a non-steam game.
- Steam Deck
Search "Steam Link" in the Discover Store. The application can be added as a non-steam game.
- Raspberry Pi (Raspbian OS)
Install using

sudo apt update && sudo apt install steamlink

- Other Linux distros
Search for steamlink in your package manager, or install from flathub[flathub.org].
- Apple Devices
Install from the App store[apps.apple.com].
- Android
Install from the Play store[play.google.com].
- Meta Quest
Install from the Meta store[www.meta.com].

The rest of the setup should be fairly self explanatory.

The original instructions from this post can be found below for posterity, but I recommend the above steps.



Part A: The Host

Step 1: Enable WOL in the BIOS.
Press DEL (or whichever key it says on the boot screen) as your computer starts to enter the BIOS setup. Now not all BIOSes are the same, so I can't tell you exactly what you're looking for, but it'll probably be in the Power Management section or something similar. From there, you need to look for a Wake On LAN setting, or possibly Power On By PCI Devices and enable it. If you can't find the setting, google it to find out and make sure it's supported on your board.

Step 2: Enable WOL in Windows
Now open Device Manager from the control panel and find your ethernet adapter. Double click it and open the Power Management tab. Tick the box that says Allow this device to wake the computer and Only allow a magic packet to wake the computer.

Step 3: Find out your MAC address
Open the command prompt, cmd.exe from the start menu. At the prompt, type

ipconfig /all

The MAC address is listed as the Physical Address. Make a note of this, but replace the dashes ( - ) with colons ( : ).

Step 4: Add a Shutdown Shortcut
The last step on the host is to add a shutdown shortcut to Steam. You can do this by opening your Steam Library and adding a non-steam game. Pick any program you want, it doesn't matter, you'll be changing all the content anyway. Open the shortcut's properties, and call it 'Shutdown'. Set the Target to

"C:\Windows\System32\shutdown.exe" -s -t 00

Set Start In to

C:\Windows\System32\

Close the properties, save all your work and test it by running the shortcut. Your system should now shutdown. When streaming, if you Stream the Shutdown shortcut it will power off the host.

Part B: The Client

Linux (Ubuntu/SteamOS) (SteamOS users will need to switch to desktop mode).

First, download wakeonlan by opening a terminal and running

sudo apt-get install wakeonlan

On SteamOS, switch to the steam user by typing

su steam

Next, create a script by running

nano ~/wakestreamhost.sh

and make it look like this:

#!/bin/bash
wakeonlan 00:00:00:00:00:00

Replacing the 0s with the host's MAC address. press Ctrl-O, press Y then Enter to save, and Ctrl-X to exit.
Now make it executable

chmod +x ~/wakestreamhost.sh

Finally, add the script as a non-steam game by finding the script in your home directory under "/home/steam" on SteamOS and your home folder on Ubuntu. You should now be able to start your host from Steam on your client.

Windows

Download WakeMeOnLan.exe from https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/wake_on_lan.html#DownloadLinks. Save it somewhere practical, and then open steam and add a non-steam game like before only this time, on the client. Change the Name to "Wake Host" and in the Target field put

"C:\your\path\to\WakeMeOnLan.exe" /wakeup 00:00:00:00:00:00

replacing the path, and the 0s with the host's MAC address and including the speech marks.
Then change the Start In field to

C:\your\path\to\

again replacing the path. You should now be able to power on your host.

Mac OSX

First of all, download the homebrew package manager by entering the following into the terminal and then following the instructions on-screen:

ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)" 

Homebrew is a package manager (similar to aptitude or yum like you'd find on linux) that allows you to easily download, install and manage programs written by the open source community on your Mac. (If you wish to learn more about it, visit http://brew.sh/.)

Next, use homebrew to download the wakeonlan command line utility:

brew install wakeonlan

Now open steam, add a non-steam game, edit the properties and for the target put

/bin/bash -c "wakeonlan 00:00:00:00:00:00"

replacing the 0s with your host's mac address. Change the Start In field to

/bin/

and close the properties menu. You should now be able to power on your host.


If something doesn't work, please say and I'll amend the guide as I haven't had chance to test everything myself.

[robohathorne]

MC Mjolnir eredeti hozzászólása:

I think I found what was going wrong. It didn't seem to like having the "s around the target field, and I had incorrectly put the " after the command arguments for shutdown. After removing them, it seems to be working fine. (No need to run steam as admin either). I've updated the guide by putting the section in code tags, so it's clear what should be copied now :)

Works perfectly now! You, sir/ma'am, are legend. Thanks!

[J0s3f4n]

MC Mjolnir eredeti hozzászólása:

I'm not sure where you mean, but I may rewrite the linux/steamos section anyway and make them seperate, because the user switching complicates things on steamos; a standard linux install can be simpler.

#!bin/bash
wakeonlan 00:00:00:00:00:00

This part is missing a / before bin.

[MC Mjolnir]

Fixed, thanks :)

[der.kosak]

This works, thanks!

[ramkitty]

the windows app is no longer available for download do other people have suggestions

[MC Mjolnir]

You could try this one from depicus[www.depicus.com]. Works more or less the same by the looks of it, although I don't have a second windows machine to test with atm.

[Breno]

Just a heads up on this: the path that "wakeuponlan" should be ran is determined by `which wakeuponlan`. For instance, in my system I had it on `/usr/local/bin`, therefore my command was `/bin/bash -c "/usr/local/bin/wakeuponlan MAC"`. I'm running on macos, but I belive linux users can also happen to have it working this way.

[DaW3ve]

Hi everyone

I have developed a one-click-solution for the streaming logon problem. It bases on a Windows service and TCP request.
- No RDP or other remoting program needed
- No "always auto logon"
- No admin rights needed for gaming account

Features:
- Logon on remote computer by sending a TCP request (no session like RDP).
- I have only developed a Powershell script for sending the request, but it would also work on a Linux and Steam Link.
- Integrated Wake-On-Lan functionality.
- Could be setup as fully automated solution with just powering up your Steam Link.

Unfortunately, it is a bit more complex to setup but once it is done, the usage is easy.

I have made all (service, scripts) open source, so if you are interested check it out on GitHub:
https://github.com/dwettstein/Steam_AutoLogon_Service

I'm open for any improvement suggestions or pull requests on GitHub.

Cheers

[gorman42]

Very interesting. I'll look into it. Thanks for sharing!

[gorman42]

DaWee... I've read the documentation on GitHub and it almost appears to do what I need, from what I can understand. I'm currently in the trial period for ExpertLogon, that does exactly what's needed but costs money (a bit expensive for what I need it for, to be honest)

I need some more explanation on the reasoning behind some choices.

For instance, why the need for an extra account on the host machine? I'd really prefer to avoid it. Is it to avoid logging in with administrative rights?

The start phrase works as an extra password to avoid sending the user password unencrypted?

What's the explanation for point #9 in the instructions? What does the Remove-Autologon script achieve?

Also, if I'm not mistaken, there's no way to lock the machine once streaming ends, right? You should add it, I think.

I like the fact that it can be setup through firewall rules to work only on local network.

[desolat68]

I'm hoping even though this is a two-year-old thread, that someone can help me. I am following this guide so that my Steam Machine can switch on my windows host via magic packet. However the wakeonlan package is no longer available on SteamOS it looks like. Any idea what repos I should add to get the package? I did a sudo apt-get update and saw all repos had "steampowered.com" in their URLs so I'm guessing Valve doesn't want this package on their OS? Further assuming all I need to do is add some repositories and do another apt-get update. But not sure. Also don't know the exact commands to add repositories. Can someone help?

[MC Mjolnir]

My bad, the guide works for most debian-derived distros out of the box, but on SteamOS you need to add the Debian repos.

This guide should have you covered.

[FeistyTroglodyte]

As this thred has jsut been necroed, I just wanted to share a program for windows users, because the link in the post is dead.
http://wol.aquilatech.com/
Was kind of tricky to set up at first, but after using "search for machines" I found my device and can now easily turn it on and remote into it. You still need that shutdown script and after using RemoteDesktop, you have to push your session to the local console, for which you need the Pro version of windows.

[pwnograffik]

IDK about Mac or Linux but if your host PC runs Windows and you have a Windows or Android phone then you should definitely look into "PC Remove Server" (link: http://pcremoteserver.com/Default.aspx ) it's packed with features and streamlines the entire process so that it's quick and easy.

You install the "server" app onto the host PC (small memory footprint that runs as background service) and then control the computer from the phone app. Wake on LAN, restart / shutdown / sleep / logoff / hibernate, screen on / off, on-screen keyboard, mouse control, Remote Desktop without locking screen, Volume control, windows media center control / itunes / spotify / xmbc / plex / vlc, etc. control, view / open files and folders on pc, transfer files between phone and pc, virtual WiFi hotspot, password protection, encrypted data transmission, domain support, etc.

Cost: $0

I use this exclusively for in-home streaming. Host PC runs Windows 10 on an Intel system (Ethernet) and client is a Windows 10 AMD system (AC WiFi). From within the app I wakeup both computers from sleep (or from powered-off state), stream whatever game that I want to play and then put both systems to sleep (or shutdown) when I'm done. Nice and easy.

[Fabledaemos]

MacOS Sierra works.

I had to adjust the target using Breno's Suggestion... ALSO, the app was renamed "wakeonlan" NOT "wakeUPonlan"...

so, this is what I used in the game shortcut settings...

"Target" ...

/bin/bash -c "/usr/local/bin/wakeonlan 00:00:00:00:00:00"

"Start in"

/bin/

Be sure to use YOUR computers MAC ADDRESS. NOT "00:00:00:00:00:00"
Thanks!!!