MySQL Remote Connection Error on Windows 2008 r2

By default, Windows 2008 r2 blocks incoming connections on port 3306.  To get around this problem, do the following:

• In MySQL, allow access for user@host (root@% for root access from anywhere)
• As administrator run the command: 
• c:/> netsh advfirewall firewall add rule name="MySQL Server" action=allow protocol=TCP dir=in localport=3306 

Now you should be able to connect remotely to your MySQL server on Windows 2008 r2