as for connecting to the windows servers.  there's a few things you need to remember when going thru the wizard.  there's a page where you set your port permissions.  you want to open up tcp port 18018, then you want to open the default rdp port(just one setting on the dropdown menu and the port number is put in for you).  you'll come to a part where you have to download that pem file that paolo was talking about.  remember where it is.  it's the encryption pair for your rdp password.  if you're following the luxrender.net tute.. just ignore the crap about command line stuff and just follow the pages that it shows of the aws site with the addition of adding the rdp port.  If i remember right, I saw a tech support forum post that said you have to open the udp port 18018 too.  once you're at your instance overview screen; you'll have to wait like 5 or 10 minutes for the server to be all set up and ready to go before you'll be able to request your windows password.  but if you right click on the instance line you'll see a line that'll make a shortcut to your rdp session.  do that.. it's makes things easier.  Once you are able to get a response from the request windows password option it'll give you a popup with a button that you click for the "file"  click that and browse to/select that pem file you downloaded.  that'll put in the encryption and you'll see your p/w show up in the box for it.  copy that p/w.  then click on the rdp shortcut and put in Administrator (capitalized) for login and that p/w you copied.  You'll then be into the rdp session.

 

From there it's just like being on your computer.  Open internet explorer.  surf to lux's site.  download the appropriate 64 bit copy of luxrender.  no opencl version for all but the quad-gpu servers.  extract it like you would on your computer.  i just made it a directory on the desktop.  then go to the lux directory and send the luxconsole.exe to desktop as a shortcut.  right click on that shortcut, select properties and put a -s at the end of the target line.  okay your way out of it.  double click on the icon and your network session is ready to start.

in the top right corner of your rdp desktop you'll see the ip addy you'll need for the network session on your computer.  enter that and port 18018 like normal.  it'll take 10 minutes or so to transfer all the scene files to the remote computer so be patient.  soon your render will start just like a normal network render.  any other more in-depth explanation needed and i can sitemail you my phone number.  i'm better at phone support than web support.

another side comment.  if you got to the point where lux is up and going on the remote computer and you're still not transferring files to it; go into the rdp server's control panel and turn off windows firewall.  i'm not sure if it does anything but my remote renders wouldn't transfer files until i made several changes and i'm not sure which change was the winner.

 

mind you.. since you said you had some older network experience.. i worded myself to aim at someone who had a passing knowledge of the kind of shorthand that my babbling explanation was meant to be.