Unable to Connect to EC2 Installations

Once you have launched an Amazon EC2 instance it may take some time before it is ready to be accessed. The virtual computer still has to boot like a normal computer and this can mean it can take a few minutes before you can connect.

In the rare case you have waited a number of minutes and still can't connect then the source of the issue will depend on the type of connection you are trying to make.

Verifying your EC2 server's Security Group

The first step you should take is to verify your EC2 server's Security Group settings. The easiest way to do this is to select your EC2 instance, then scroll down to view the item 'Security Groups'. This will list your security groups and also have a link 'View Rules'. Click the 'View Rules' link and a popup should appear. The popup should contain rules like this (note ports 80 and 443 are listed twice, once for TCP and once for UDP):

If your Security Group rules do not look like this for your instance you should reconfigure your Security Group so they match.

Unable to Login over RDP

After verifying your Security Group settings, if you unable to connect to your instance over RDP (e.g. using the Get Windows Password option in EC2) this may indicate that your instance has failed to launch correctly. In this case the simplest fix is to terminate the instance and launch another one.

In some cases this may also be due to your VPC being set up incorrectly and not allowing external access. You can follow this guide to rectify this.

Unable to Access via a Browser

After verifying your Security Group, if you are able to login over RDP but your browser is unable to connect when you enter in your instances Public IP or Elastic IP (if you have configured one) you can login over RDP and launch a browser on the remote server pointing to: http://localhost If the page loads correctly this would indicate a problem with your security group or possibly that the firewall on the remote server needs to be configured. You should check both of these and configure them in the same way as the security group.

If the page fails to load then this would indicate your SimpleHelp server has failed to install correctly. In this case you should terminate the instance and launch a new one.