[surjones]

Okay so here is my dilemma - I have been offered to chance to Telecomute from my house in Maine, but the condition is that I need to remote desktop. NOW I know nothing about this stuff - I am a newb to the max on this. I know Apple has a program called Remote desktop - But I need to make the NEW MacBookPro at my house in Maine basically be the machine at my current desk. I saw when leopard came out SJ was talking about look at a window like it was the monitor of the other machine. This needs to be seamless so I dont loose a day of work because I am the backbone of the company that makes sure all 7 division play nice together.....help!!!

thanks

[Fahrenheit]

[ot]Anyone else read the title of this thread like 15 times and still not understand it?[/ot]

[curiousuburb]

Originally Posted by Farenheit [ot]Anyone else read the title of this thread like 15 times and still not understand it?[/ot]

State without offices or a state without work?

Maybe it's a state of confusion.

http://www.apple.com/remotedesktop/ (there are tutorial videos at that link)

[surjones]

oh BTW - and I dont know if this will make my dilemma worse, but they are PC's and I am mac

[euain]

It could well be Microsoft Remote Desktop - used to remotely access windows machines.

Have a look at: MS's website for the free download.

It works pretty well. I use it occasionally to access Windows machines, er, remotely and haven't had any problems. I use the Beta version that's available and haven't seen any problems.

Euain

[surjones]

Moving to my place in Maine, the office I am at is in Colorado. Our office is networked with like maybe 7 computers, and my desk being one station. I want to be able for it to seem like I am in the office, but in realty I am living in another state.

[Xaqtly]

Yeah, follow euain's link above and download Microsoft Remote Desktop for Mac. That will allow you to sign into a remote Windows machine and use it as if you were sitting in front of it.

[surjones]

So does Apple's Remote desktop do the same thing? Just curious.

[Wyatt]

Originally Posted by surjones So does Apple's Remote desktop do the same thing? Just curious.

Yes, it does the same thing, but it's optimized to work with Macs. (PCs and Linux machines with VNC will also work with Apple Remote Desktop.)

Microsoft's program works pretty well, from my experience. I use both Microsoft's and Apple's on a regular basis, and Microsoft's is more than acceptable when working with a PC, and it's much cheaper (free).

[euain]

Nope, while they perform a similar function (though I think Apple's one has more system management functions), Apple's one is for remotely accessing Macs (I think it uses VNC behind the scenes) whereas the MS is just for accessing Windows machines.

[surjones]

I know somethings come to a personal preference, but for me since the company is paying, I dont mind buying a program. My PC desktop on my desk here at the office has to access the server for certain things. (a time clock being one of the programs) I am sure this program wont be free forever, and I also love Apple, so I know native software would run better I would think.

[surjones]

I just Tried the MSRDesktop and put in my ip, user and pass and if gave me a error - Do I need to install this on the network server as well?

[euain]

The windows box you're connecting to will need Terminal Services (or something like that) set up. It should be installed already (certainly on XP Pro). It is a service that needs started and possibly something needs enabled.

Sorry I'm being so vague. I've not set it up in ages. If you are still having problems, I'll have a look into one of my windows machines later on and drop you a note. Feel free to PM me.

[Banana]

It may also be good to keep in mind that VNC isn't the only way. You may want to use a VPN tunnel so you can access all files or other network resources but work with everything locally, which would be much more faster than working with stuff directly on the remote computer.

Also, be sure to encrypt the connection- VNC doesn't have any encryption, and I can't recall whether the Windows' Remote Desktop offers any encryption (without paying for it, that is).

Brad has a link about SSH/VNC tunneling somewhere if you want to do it the free and the company doesn't have the necessary software.

HTH.