Chuck your Monitor

Here’s a cool piece of software that can save you money.

Most small office networks have a file server. Now you can buy a monitor for that computer that will rarely get turned on, or you can use remote control software to operate the computer, without having to have a monitor or waste time moving over to the computer to operate it.

This remote control software is also handy in situations where you may want to have a look at a computer that you are no where near (or even your home computer). Its a great tool for troubleshooting.

Anyway the product PCAnywhere has been around for ever. What you don’t probably know is that for small solutions, you can use a product called VNC for free. That’s right, free as in it costs you nothing. Why would VNC do this? So if you want to use their bigger solutions, you will be already on their path and be happy to pay for an upgrade. But for most small users, this isn’t going to happen.

When installing VNC, you have to install it on two computers (kind of obvious). One computer is the server, the one your want to control. The other computer is setup to be the viewer, the computer you use to do the controlling.

Now you can achieve the same solution using Remote Assistance and Remote Desktop in Windows. Windows Remote solution under Windows XP is accessed via Control Panel -> System –>Remote. However both computers have to be using the correct version of Windows, and it’s a lot harder to connect up this solution when the computers reside on different networks. Effectively it means that you are unlikely to get it going without assistance.

VNC however works across any TCP/IP network, yes the Internet is a TCP/IP network. Plus comes in lots of different flavours, including windows, linux and even a java based version that runs on almost anything.

VNC is available at www.realnvc.com

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