TUTORIAL: GET MCP WORKING ON WINDOWS

Node based MCP tools are broken on Windows, at least the ones in the repo here: https://github.com/modelcontextprotocol/servers

Solution:

  1. Have a pro account. Have Claude Desktop latest version.

  2. make sure you're in developer mode on Claude Desktop (lower left, click near your name, enable dev mod)

  3. Run Claude Desktop as an administrator

  4. Modify claude_desktop_config.json according to these instructions: https://github.com/modelcontextprotocol/servers/issues/75

but short summary:

  • make sure your filepaths have \\ escaped backslashes

  • The command should be the same for all node tools: "command": "path\to\your\node_install\node.exe",

  • the first arg should always be "args":["path\to\node_modules\@servername\dist\index.js",...]

  • non-node-based tools should just work, ie sqlite works just fine

Example for fileserver:

"mcpServers": {
    "filesystem": {
      "command": "C:\\Program Files\\nodejs\\node.exe",
      "args": [
     "C:\\Users\\myname\\AppData\\Roaming\\npm\\node_modules\\@modelcontextprotocol\\server-filesystem\\dist\\index.js",
        "C:\\Users\\myname\\myfiles
      ]
    },