Helping my parents remotley

[GoinAllTheWay]

What program do you guys suggest using when trying to dial in to someone elses machine? My parents are constantly in need of assistance and it would be a hell of a lot easier to just connect to their rig remotley then trying to help them out over the phone.

Something light, doesn't always run in the background and most importantly, secure, as they don't have much in the way of security on their end.

Logmein? Is that any good? What do you guys suggest?

[FireInTheHole]

Try Mikogo - it's free.

http://www.mikogo.com/

[sclitheroe]

I cannot say enough good things about LogMeIn, which is free for personal use as well. I recently used LogMeIn to fix a Mac and a PC in Dubai. Works very well. I also had an engineer here in Calgary run SolidWorks CAD on a multi-monitor workstation remotely from a Macbook while on vacation, and it was able to handle that beast of a graphics app too with no issues.

Edit: I didn't see that you don't want something that runs in the background all the time - LogMeIn will run as a service by default. Honestly though, its quite lightweight, and very stable. I wouldn't worry about that too much, and once you fix something remotely once, you know you will be called upon again in the future....

[Roast Beef]

Another vote for LogMeIn. I mainly use it as a teaching tool so I can walk my parents through any questions they have.

[GoinAllTheWay]

Not running in the background would be more of a preference I guess. With LogMeIn, I would install the exact same app on my rig?

[sclitheroe]

Originally Posted by GoinAllTheWay

Not running in the background would be more of a preference I guess. With LogMeIn, I would install the exact same app on my rig?

A small app runs on your parents computer full time - they aren't going to even notice its there. You would log into the LogMeIn website when you need to connect, which would then present you with a list of machines you have the client software installed on. You then click connect, and it runs a plugin in your browser that makes the connection and shows the remote screen. A java version of the plugin is available for Mac users, or people operating on computers that are locked down and don't allow ActiveX.

Another benefit I've neglected to mention is that LogMeIn doesn't open holes in firewalls - there's no router config required for LogMeIn to operate (even corporate networks...its quite effective at establishing a connection, but I won't go into technical details here), so there's no external attack vector for hackers to target on your parents machine.

[Jayems]

I use teamviewer. Free.

[d_phaneuf]

Originally Posted by Roast Beef

Another vote for LogMeIn. I mainly use it as a teaching tool so I can walk my parents through any questions they have.

Logmein is fantastic

use it quite a bit

[psicodude]

Originally Posted by Jayems

I use teamviewer. Free.

+1. I use TeamViewer all the time and it is great. Completely no brainer as well. If your parents can read numbers, they can use TeamViewer.

[GoinAllTheWay]

Beauty guys, thanks a ton. I'm gonna give LogMeIn a rip.

[photon]

The nice thing about logmein and its like (vs just using the built in Windows remote control) is that while yes it has a small program running all the time, that allows it to operate from behind a firewall without having to mess with the firewall settings at all.

I use it as well.

[FlamesKickAss]

I used to use MSN messenger with my grandparents when they were down in phoenix with XP, I know its not great but it worked and it was free.

[Russic]

Everytime my parents forget how to copy and paste, logmein saves me from having to scream into the phone. +1 for saving my family.

[Jimmy Stang]

I use Tight VNC when I need to do this for my folks, but as mentioned earlier, it does open a hole in the firewall and could be compromised by a hacker. There is a password, but it isn't encrypted.

So yeah - not the safest route. But my folks just use it to check on news from the motherland, I am looking into creating a SSH tunnel which is apparently easy and free... Or maybe I should just use LogMeIn as suggested in this thread.

[photon]

The one thing I don't like about LogMeIn is that it's in someone else's hands. So if I was setting up remote access for a company or to some important servers I wouldn't use LogMeIn, because I don't have full control from front to back.

But for personal use I'm comfortable with it.

[Sliver]

Logmein's customer service is excellent as well. You can phone in and talk to an actual person right away and they know WTF they are doing instead of it being some random call centre staffed by useless morons.

[GoinAllTheWay]

Originally Posted by sclitheroe

A small app runs on your parents computer full time - they aren't going to even notice its there. You would log into the LogMeIn website when you need to connect, which would then present you with a list of machines you have the client software installed on. You then click connect, and it runs a plugin in your browser that makes the connection and shows the remote screen. A java version of the plugin is available for Mac users, or people operating on computers that are locked down and don't allow ActiveX.

Another benefit I've neglected to mention is that LogMeIn doesn't open holes in firewalls - there's no router config required for LogMeIn to operate (even corporate networks...its quite effective at establishing a connection, but I won't go into technical details here), so there's no external attack vector for hackers to target on your parents machine.

Ok, just so I'm clear, I get my parents rig needs to have software installed on it, do I need to do the same on my rig or I simply access their computer by going to the LogMeIn website?

**edit**

NM, clearly a case of RTFM.