Techniques for improving logon time for remote desktops a user has not logged onto before. In general, these techniques involve utilizing a pre-logon script to create a profile-specifying registry entry that links to an already created persistent or “mandatory” profile. Linking to a mandatory profile, rather than creating a new profile from whole cloth (which is automatically done by operating systems such as Microsoft Windows upon detecting a log on from a user that has not logged on before), reduces the amount of time associated with logging on.