is a VPN capable broadband router what I need ?

[Valhalla1]

Here's the scoop - my fathers office has DSL and currently I have it shared over the network via win2k ICS. He needs to be able to access the network from home, to be able to transfer files and VNC into each of the machines on the office network from home.

right now, I have it jury-rigged up and I have problems. the only way I've been able to VNC into the client machines is by first VNC'ing into the ICS machine from home, then starting a vnc session there and jumping over to the client machines, ("double"-vnc i call it). this is slow and inefficient.

we have cable at the house, and my dad's pc gets its internet connection from my XP machine, which shares the cable over XP's ICS. this causes problems because he can't FTP into the office machine (the ICS machine also runs IIS 5.0 ftp server). I can ftp from my XP box but he can't, because his home pc is behind mine on the network and for some reason it wont let him login to the ftp server. (well, he can login but then it wont show a file listing or transfer files, passive mode or active mode)


so if we got a VPN enabled broadband router at the office to replace the win2k ICS machine, would he be able to establish a connection to link the home network with the office network, and then directly VNC into the any office machine, and would that also solve the FTP problem? or would I need to have a VPN router at home as well? would he be able to make a VPN connection even though he is behind an ICS box at home?

if not, how else can I accomplish this?

[home pc]-->[XP ICS]-->[internet]--->[office ICS]-->[office clients]

need to be able to FTP and VNC from [home pc] to [office clients]

 

[Tallgeese]

short answer: yes

long answer: If I were doing such a change I'd take a good look at the setup overall, because there may be some design choices right now that are a bit risky.

When you mention "shared over the network via Win2K ICS," you should realize that whatever machine is doing the sharing is exposed on its public side to the whole Internet. :Q Hopefully this machine stores no confidential or important information.

A broadband router that can act as a VPN peer or termination point will work just fine for what you want. Basically, the VPN session will create a "tunnel" on the machine from home, which then makes it part of the office network (the VPN hardware and client software must be able to assign it an IP address--either statically assigned or dynamically--that matches the office network's scheme). Since it can route traffic straight to the office network (which passes over the encrypted tunnel), you could install and configure VNC on every office machine, then use VNC Viewer right from the house and connect to whichever one you wanted.

BE SURE that the router you buy supports the features you need. MANY routers' packaging touts the ability to support VPNs, but most of them are talking about VPN PASS-THROUGH. An important feature for VPN clients, VPN passthrough means the router allows VPN traffic to traverse through it successfully. Without this feature, any VPN client behind that particular router would fail to successfully negotiate and establish a VPN tunnel with ANY VPN peer.

Just curious...why need access to every machine? No central server or store? How is their data backed up if not?

 

[Valhalla1]

there is a file server that holds a database file which the client machines all use with some software that he runs the business off, and its backed up several ways, but he needs to vnc into the clients too, so when his employees are having trouble he can access their machine from anywhere

 

[FUBAR]

You may want to look into some sort of router for both sides of the link here. You are wanting to do vnc to all machines on the other side, which means you have to forward 2 ports to 5800 and 5900 of each box on the other side. You will have to forward to ports other than those for all but one machine, don't know if you can do all that with ICS.

This is of course without the VPN, that will make things different, not necessarily easier or harder, but different.

 

[Valhalla1]

alright so if I got a VPN router that supported being a VPN server and not just a passthru, then would a machine on my home network be able to make a vpn connection to the office network, even if said home machine is a 192.168 ip and gets its ip address from an XP ICS server?

and would I need additional VPN software of some type to do this, or can Win2k do everything I would need?


basically when u get a vpn tunnel that pc becomes a part of the office network correct? so it will see all the shares in net neighborhood (eliminating need for ftp server) and also can vnc directly to the other machines

 

[jkoXP]

win2k does really good with VPN so does XP, so yoru all set there. id go with an SMC broadband router, they support VPN