Accessing Multiple Desktops At Office Via XP VPN

[Guest]

I have 4 computers at my office all on Windows XP Pro. I have a dsl
connection with a static IP as well as a linksys router. I want to be able to
have each of my employees be able to access their own respective computers
from their home or their laptop while traveling. The home computers and
laptops also have Windows Xp Pro. Is this possible? If so, can someone point
me in the direction as what I need to do. I am pretty computer savvy so I am
thinking with some direction I could do this myself. Where I am getting lost
is I set the Static IP in the router and I put the port forwarding towards
one of the computers IP and I can connect but I dont know how to connect to
the other three.

 

[Nepatsfan]

You might want to take a look here:

http://theillustratednetwork.mvps.org/RemoteDesktop/Multiple_PC_RD.html

This is by far the best explanation I've seen. It's a lot better
than I could ever do in this forum. Keep in mind that if you're
running any kind of firewall software on the office machines,
including XP's built-in firewall, you'll need to make adjustments
to those settings as well.

Post back if you get stuck on any of the procedure.

Nepatsfan
message
news:[email protected]...

 

[Malke]

I have 4 computers at my office all on Windows XP Pro. I have a dsl
connection with a static IP as well as a linksys router. I want to be
able to have each of my employees be able to access their own
respective computers from their home or their laptop while traveling.
The home computers and laptops also have Windows Xp Pro. Is this
possible? If so, can someone point me in the direction as what I need
to do. I am pretty computer savvy so I am thinking with some direction
I could do this myself. Where I am getting lost is I set the Static IP
in the router and I put the port forwarding towards one of the
computers IP and I can connect but I dont know how to connect to the
other three.

You could do this with Remote Desktop or a third-party program like
pcAnywhere. However, be aware of the security issues. If it is very
important that your work data not be sniffed, you should set up a VPN
(Virtual Private Network). IIRC, XP Pro has the ability to do this.
There are also third-party VPN programs. This isn't an area where I
know a lot, so I'll bow out and hopefully someone else will have a more
precise answer for you.

Malke

 

[Guest]

Yes, I tried Remote Desktop. I got right in. Only problem is I only have one
static ip and when I went into Remote Desktop, I had to use that one static
ip and I dont know how to get into the others.

 

[Guest]

Try this article in the Microsoft Knowledge base:
KB 306759 http://support.microsoft.com/kb/306759

You can change the listening port for each PC then connect using the port
number as a suffix to the static IP address. eg if using port 3390, you
would type the RDC address as xx.xx.xx.xx:3390. Although I haven't used this
on an active network, I have tried it out as a test and it all seemed to work
okay.

Don't forget to add port forwarding to the router for each PC/port you
configure.

HTH

Adrian

 

[Nepatsfan]

Following up on my earlier post, the key is that you have to set
up port forwarding on your router. The following works on a
Linksys BEFSR41. Your router should have similar settings.

Let's call your office machines Comp1, Comp2, Comp3 and Comp4.
Your machine is Comp1 which you can already access. Also, all
your machines should have static IP's in the private IP range of
192.168.1.XXX. Keep in mind that anyone who wants to access their
machine from home has to do so with an account that does not have
a blank password.

Access the router's web interface by going to Start -> Run. Enter
http://192.168.1.1.
That should bring up the login box. The default password is
admin. If you changed it, enter the appropriate password. Next,
you want to access the page "Applications and Gaming". Once
you're there, click on UPnP Forwarding. Down towards the bottom
(below the list of preset applications) you want to enter the
following values:

Application: Comp2 (you can name these whatever you want)
Ext. Port: 3390
TCP: X
Int. Port: 3389
IP Address: 192.168.1.XXX (enter the correct static IP)
Enabled: X

Application: Comp3
Ext. Port: 3391
TCP: X
Int. Port: 3389
IP Address: 192.168.1.XXX
Enabled: X

Application: Comp4
Ext. Port: 3392
TCP: X
Int. Port: 3389
IP Address: 192.168.1.XXX
Enabled: X

Click Save Settings and close the router program.

If you have a firewall program running on these machines, you're
going to have to enable the correct ports for each machine. For
Windows XP's built-in firewall go to Start -> Control Panel ->
Windows Firewall. Click on the Exceptions tab. Click on Add a
port. Name it something like Home Access. Then enter the port
numbers (3390 for Comp2, 3391 for Comp3 and 3392 for Comp4).
Click on Change Scope and make sure "Any computer" is checked.
Click on OK.

With this in place, the people in your office would simply need
to append the port number assigned to their machine to the static
IP that your ISP assigned to you. Let's say that your public IP
is 123.123.123.123. Then the person who wants to access Comp2
enters 123.123.123.123:3390 in the Computer box of the Remote
Desktop Connection's General page, then enters their User name
and password and hits Connect. For Comp3 it's
123.123.123.123:3391, Comp4 123.123.123.123:3392. You should have
them modify the settings on the other pages to bring them in line
with your office network.

Malke brings up a good point about security. While Remote Desktop
transmissions are encrypted, you've still opened up a pretty big
hole to your network. If you're really concerned about it you
might want to scroll down a notch and post your question to the
Remote Desktop group. They might be able to help you set up a VPN
connection. At the very least you should follow some simple
guidelines. Don't let anyone use simple to guess passwords.
Passwords should be a combination of upper case, lower case,
numbers and symbols. Also, if you're going to open up your
network to the outside world you better have a real good backup
sytstem in place. Only share what needs to be shared and never
share the locations where your backup files are stored.

Hope this makes sense.

Nepatsfan

message

 

[Guest]

Thank you for yout time at helping me with this. I did as you said .... I can
get on one computer the one that has the 3389. When I go to try to access the
one PC2 which I set as 3390 I cannot connect. I did do all this in UPnP. Do I
not put anything in Port Forwarding or Port Triggering? I have Windows XP SP2
on this computer and couldnt get on. I turned it off and still couldnt get it
to connect. Any ideas? And I do have a Linksys BEFSR41 ver2. router that I
upgraded the firmware as well.

 

[Nepatsfan]

Does your router setup look something like this (just change the
names and IP addresses):

http://home.comcast.net/~nepatsfan2005/remote.html

Make sure you have checked Enabled and click apply.

On each of the office computers, did you go into Control Panel ->
System and on the Remote page -> Remote Desktop section put a
check mark in the "Allow users to connect remotely to this
computer"? Click on "Select Remote Users". You should see a line
"(User name) already has access". Unless you've added other
accounts, that's the user name you should be trying to logon
with. Any account you're trying to logon with must have a
password (no blank passwords allowed).

In Control Panel -> Windows Firewall -> Exceptions make sure that
Remote Desktop is checked.

What error message do you get when you try to connect to the
other computers?

When you try to connect what numbers are you entering?
It shouldn't be 192.168.1.XXX:3390.

Are you trying to connect from a remote location or are you
testing this within the office network?

This should work. The reason I say that is because I got the
picture in the web site from an office that's 25 miles away from
here.

Keep in mind that Linksys has a help line that might be useful.
You can reach them at 800-326-7114.

Nepatsfan
message

 

[Nepatsfan]

Almost forgot this one. Your Linksys router must have UPnP
enabled. You should find the setting on the Password page here:

http://theillustratednetwork.mvps.org/RemoteDesktop/Router/EnableUPnP.JPG

Also here's another view of what the UPnP forwarding page on your
router should look like:

http://theillustratednetwork.mvps.org/RemoteDesktop/Router/RdUPnPForwarding.JPG

Note: you may have to hold your cursor over these images and wait
until a button with 4 arrows pops up in the lower left corner.
Click on it to expand the image.

Nepatsfan