Remote access

[Robert]

I've recently started a small business that requires me
to have a computer operating 30 miles away form dusk till
dawn. I have a system at home running Win. XP home edition
and the computer in the field is running Win. 2000 pro. My
question is how do I remotely access the field computer
with my computer at home over a dial-up connection? I
cannot get the ISP to assign the field computer a static
IP address so I need to access it modem to modem. I've set
the incoming connections to accept incoming calls over the
phone line but I can't get the field computer to pick up
when I dial it. Also is there some remote desktop software
I need to install to see the field computer's desktop? Any
help would be appriciated. Thanks.

 

[Eric Albert]

Unfortunately, the OS you are using are not very good for
RAS purposes. If you had the one you need to access on
High speed internet, you could use netmeeting, but in
this case I would buy something like PCAnywhere to make
your connection, because it has the ability to wait for a
connection through a modem.

 

[Giridharan Sridharan [MSFT]]

Check your Incoming Connections configuration to ensure that modem is
selected and that you use a static address pool for distributing ips to your
Incoming connection client. (Right click on incoming connections, click on
properties and in the general tab make sure that modem is selected. Also, in
the network tab, click on TCP/IP, click on properties and use a static
address pool).

For seeing the desktop, you can use Remote Desktop Connection available with
the OS. (mstsc)

Thanks
giri

 

[John Lewis]

I would take a bit of a different approach to this one. You say you can't
get a static IP for the remote. Is it on some sort of broadband? If so,
you have to use it! Not that a dialup situation isn't possible, the
broadband would just be so much faster. Check out www.dyndns.org. Allows
you to have a fqdn (thenameyoupick.dyndns.org) for your computer with a
dynamic IP. BTW, that service is free. You would have to configure the
remote computer to handle the registration, but it is easy. You also may
want to search the web for 'dynamic dns service', there are several others.

Software wise, check out www.tightvnc.com. Wonderful remote control
software, and again it is free. Would be great over a broadband connection.
Works reasonably well over dialup, but you have to take the speed of the
connection into account.

On to the issue of your modem not picking up. What kind of modem are you
using? If you could throw an external on there for a bit, much easier to
figure out what is going on with lights and all.

If you dial the number from a regular phone, what do you get? Does it
answer at all, or just ring forever? Does your modem have two jacks on the
back? If so, make sure the phone line is connected to the proper one. If
it is connected to the proper one, switch the polarity of the phone line --
open the box on the wall with the phone jack in it and switch the green wire
and the red one (assuming you are in North America). That is not supposed
to make a difference, but sometimes does. Also, if you have two jacks on
the modem, plug a phone into the other jack. Does it ring?

Can you dial out with the modem? Can you hear it dial?

Just some thoughts.