remote thru the router

[Ree]

I  can't remember how to  set up  the router so I can remote to the other puters on  home network.
I  know I should know....but that's another one of the holes in the swiss cheese brain

[Thor]

I  can't remember how to  set up  the router so I can remote to the other puters on  home network.
I  know I should know....but that's another one of the holes in the swiss cheese brain

It's more a question of setting up the other computers on the network properly if you want to get access to them. Which version of Windows and what, exactly are you wanting to accomplish?

[Ree]

Usin XP on both laptops...want to be able to remote from one laptop to the other so I could run like programs from  my laptop on the other one without having to pick in up and run a program

[LC EFA]

You might try setting up Remote Desktopâ„¢, supplied with XP for anything more intensive than sharing files and devices.

[Ree]

I've turned it on on both laptops...but I prolly did somethin wrong...maybe I'll try again tomorrow.

[Thor]

I've turned it on on both laptops...but I prolly did somethin wrong...maybe I'll try again tomorrow.

You also have to send a request to the computer to have a remote desktop connection and that request has to be accepted I believe.

[LC EFA]

I've turned it on on both laptops...but I prolly did somethin wrong...maybe I'll try again tomorrow.

Once Remote desktop is activated - you'll need to use the Remote desktop client - enter in the IP address of the second computer and so forth.

[Ree]

Once Remote desktop is activated - you'll need to use the Remote desktop client - enter in the IP address of the second computer and so forth.

I did that but it won't connect....I  thought I had to open a port on the router, but That part of my memory is scrambled...

[Thor]

I did that but it won't connect....I  thought I had to open a port on the router, but That part of my memory is scrambled...

Can you see the other computer on the network?? If so, then the router is working fine. (I'm not up on remote desktop because  never use it. I turn the damned thing off on every installation because it opens one's computer up to hacking.)

[korporal_krakrs]

A few questions...

1) You WILL be using Remote Desktop, yes?

2) What is the operating system on the computer you want to allow remote desktop connections to?  XP?  Vista (gasp)?  Win7?

3) If you don't mind telling me, what kind of router are you using?  The model number, i.e. "Linksys WRT54GL".  If it's an ISP provided router (like ATT U-Verse or something) I might not be much help here, but we can give it a shot!  If you don't want to tell me, I can give you a rough idea of what you'll need to do possibly, but not as much of a step-by-step.

4) How many routers/devices do you have between your machine and your gateway device?  In other words, is the flow "your machine > router > internet (wall jack)"?  Or is it like "your machine > some router or device > router > internet (wall jack)"?

5) Is your home machine set to obtain a dynamic IP address from your router?  If you don't know, we can figure it out when I know what version of Windows you're using (the easiest way to explain how to find out changed a bit between WinXP and Vista).

6) Have you ever heard of Dynamic DNS?  (http://dyndns.com)  If so, do you already have an account?  (I think you can only get one dynamic domain name-to-IP address mapping for free with them)

I think that's all I would need to know to tell you how to do it, or at least explain the way I've done it before.

~ kk

[Janice]

(I'm not up on remote desktop because  never use it. I turn the damned thing off on every installation because it opens one's computer up to hacking.)

I am of like mind ...

[korporal_krakrs]

I'm not aware of any remote desktop problems.  Sure, someone could open a remote session and try to hack into your machine by trying to crack your password (repeated login attempts), but if you have a descent password and have a lockout threshold enabled (lock the account for 5 mins after 5 invalid tries for instance) it makes cracking extremely difficult, extremely impractical, probably impossible.  Here's a neat chart:

http://www.lockdown.co.uk/?pg=combi

Without a lockout, with a complex password (say upper, lower, special characters) of 8 characters, it would take a supercomputer 83.5 days to crack the password.  With a 5 minute lockout after each 5 failed passwords, you're looking at, well...

1,000,000,000 passwords/sec  (Class F super computer hack)
There are 200,000,000 groups of 5 password attempts (after 5 attempts we'll lock them out for 5 minutes)
This is where my math gets fuzzy, but I believe if you make the hacker wait 5 minutes after every 5 invalid passwords, you're adding 200,000,000 5 minutes intervals to their hack-time, which breaks down to 694,444 hours, or 1902 YEARS!  And remember, this is for a SUPER computer!  I'm sure we'd be talking about up-teen millenia for Joe Blow hacker.

Of course if there are any other attacks that happen over port 3389 that I'm not aware of that don't attempt to crack a password, then that's another story.  And if you know of one, let me know!  Cuz I use RDP for work all the time!!!  haha

~ k

[Thor]

I'm not aware of any remote desktop problems.  Sure, someone could open a remote session and try to hack into your machine by trying to crack your password (repeated login attempts), but if you have a descent password and have a lockout threshold enabled (lock the account for 5 mins after 5 invalid tries for instance) it makes cracking extremely difficult, extremely impractical, probably impossible.  Here's a neat chart:

http://www.lockdown.co.uk/?pg=combi

Without a lockout, with a complex password (say upper, lower, special characters) of 8 characters, it would take a supercomputer 83.5 days to crack the password.  With a 5 minute lockout after each 5 failed passwords, you're looking at, well...

1,000,000,000 passwords/sec  (Class F super computer hack)
There are 200,000,000 groups of 5 password attempts (after 5 attempts we'll lock them out for 5 minutes)
This is where my math gets fuzzy, but I believe if you make the hacker wait 5 minutes after every 5 invalid passwords, you're adding 200,000,000 5 minutes intervals to their hack-time, which breaks down to 694,444 hours, or 1902 YEARS!  And remember, this is for a SUPER computer!  I'm sure we'd be talking about up-teen millenia for Joe Blow hacker.

Of course if there are any other attacks that happen over port 3389 that I'm not aware of that don't attempt to crack a password, then that's another story.  And if you know of one, let me know!  Cuz I use RDP for work all the time!!!  haha

~ k

KK, apparently you're not aware of how many end users simply don't use a password.... I know of more people than not.

[korporal_krakrs]

KK, apparently you're not aware of how many end users simply don't use a password.... I know of more people than not.

Well, ok, yes, you need to have a password.  I would assume someone who would want to use remote desktop probably has a password.  If you're not using a password for every account on your computer, don't use remote desktop.  haha

[LC EFA]

When you run the out of the box setup on most brand name XP home machines it creates a user account which may or may not have a password, depending on the user. Leaves the administrator account with a null default password.