OpenVPN on Windows 7 64 bit

In order to work at the InternetTV decoder project at the University of Urbino, I recently needed to setup a VPN connection to the university's network.

Installing OpenVPN on Windows 7 RC 64 bit is trickier thank expected. Fortunately I found an extremely helpful blog post that helped me out.

Installing OpenVPN

The installer above will not work on Windows 7 ("this version of Windows is not supported"). Therefore, you have to open the file properties window, click on "change settings for all users" and then activate the Vista compatibility mode.

Now install OpenVPN as usual. I suggest to uncheck "autostart OpenVPN GUI".

Configuration

After installation, you'll have an OpenVPN GUI link somewhere in your start menu. When you start it, remember to do so using Administrative rights or it won't work.

Before being able to connect, you must setup the vpn configuration files. This depends on your network and you'll find some sample files in %openVPN%/sample-config.

In my case I needed to connect to the UWiC network at Urbino, so I downloaded the OpenVPN client on the UWiC gateway. The client they have on their site is outdated, but contains the necessary .ovpn files. Using the same procedure for the other OpenVPN client, install this client too (this will actually result in a bunch of terrible looking errors because the version is way too old and you already have OpenVPN installed... ignore everything and go ahead ).

Now, in the %ProgramFiles%/UWiC_OpenVPN/config folder you'll find two files you can simply copy to the other OpenVPN installation (usually in %ProgramFiles%/OpenVPN/config).

Connect

Launch OpenVPN GUI as administrator and you should be able to connect to the network via VPN: