Remote Desktop help.

de8212

Diamond Member
Jan 2, 2000
4,021
0
76
I have been using pcanywhere for years without much of a problem. Recently I stated using Remote Desktop between my 2 pc's over my LAN at home. I was thinking of trying to us RD remotely to possibly replace pcanywhere.
How would I go about setting up RD to acces my LAN from a remote location to where I could choose which PC I wanted to connect to?
How secure is it? Wouldn't I have to forward some ports on my router? WOuld changing the default ports be enough for security?
BTW I know alot of people recommend vnc type applications. I have tried something like tightvnc or ultravnc in the past and it was incredibly slow.
BTW this would sometimes be a pc on dial-up accessing cable. I know dial-up is slow but pcanywhere is surprisingly fast (ok, not fast. But managable).
 

skyking

Lifer
Nov 21, 2001
22,705
5,829
146
Kaboodle
ultravnc
Those two together are more secure, encryption wise, than either pcanywhere or RDC.

I use them all.
You'd have to forward ports in your router.
With Ultravnc, you can specify the serving computer's listening port.
You could make computer "a", 192.168.0.3 listen on 5900
and computer "b" 192.168.0.4 listen on 5901, for example.
They all have provisions to help with dialup, but it will suck.
 

OmegaXero

Senior member
Apr 11, 2001
248
0
0
RDP is remarkably more efficient that any of the VNC apps that I've used (tightvnc, realvnc) concerning low bandwidth connections. I believe RDP is also encrypted by default (correct me if I'm wrong). I would change the default port that RDP listens on to something completely different. If you need to RDP into multiple machines you could have a different port forward to each machine inside your network, or you could just forward one port to one machine, and then RDP from that machine into another machine on your LAN. You have a few options to consider either way.
 

JackMDS

Elite Member
Super Moderator
Oct 25, 1999
29,545
422
126
Whether to use WinXP Remote Desktop (RTP) or a regular remote program might depend in the way you are using your system, and who, or what is on the other side. RDT is more like an OS thing rather than an application.

I use RDT between spots that I need to Connect to Repetitively for long periods of time and when on the other side there is someone who understands how it works. I would set it up, and insist that No one would touch the settings.

Link to: Set Up Remote Desktop Web Connection with Windows XP.

Link to: How to use remote Desktop Access in Windows XP.

Otherwise I use Ultr@VNC (free program). Its provides: Remote Control, File Transfer, and Chat between LAN computers or over the Internet. It takes only few minutes to set it.

Most of the time, for security purpose, and to avoid System's load on resources, I want the remote application out of the picture once the session is terminated. Ultra@VNC one closed is out of the system with no functional traces.

In most cases, even if some one "played" with the system I still will be able to connect with VNC.

Link to: Ultr@VNC - Installation, and Settings

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