Remote Access – New Style
CONNECTED WHILE ON THE GO
Remotely accessing your office PC
Why would you need to access your computer on the go?
In today’s fast-paced world, many businesses require employees to work past the standard 9-5 workday. If there is a way to allow users to access their computers from home, that can create a win-win situation.
Why?
Studies show that working outside the office, with the correct rules in place, allow for higher work productivity (don’t show this to Marissa Mayer of Yahoo!). However, providing employees with a laptop is not always cost efficient and secure. Therefore, providing a secure method of accessing their office desktop from home is a perfect solution!
How do they work?
There are different programs which allow users to access their desktop from different locations. The first step is to download and set it up on your office desktop, and then you need to connect from your laptop or home PC to confirm all the settings are set up properly.
Are there any security risks involved?
Depending on which program you use, there are potential security openings. However, we have found most businesses to be OK with allowing users to access their desktop from one of these types of programs.
What are the big names in the business?
LogMeIn– With a free account, you can log in from any PC, and access any of the computers which you installed LogMeIn on. As a security note, if you give someone your password they will have access to all the computers under the account. The good news is you can place an additional password on your computers, so that when logging in remotely there is an extra level of protection.
GoToMyPC– Depending on the amount of users and computers, the price varies. The cheapest plan is $9.95/month or $99/yr which comes with the ability to remotely access one PC. We generally don’t recommend GoToMyPC due the cost, however the drag and drop file transfer (simply drag the file on the screen, and it gets transferred to the other PC) is quite cool and extremely easy to use!
Team Viewer –
Team Viewer works differently than the LogMeIn and GoToMyPC in the setup. To access your computer remotely, you need to enter in the assigned code into the installed program on the “guest computer”.
Remote Desktop – Is a free, built in Windows program, however, it only works with some versions of Windows.
VPN– A Virtual Private Network allows the user(s) to access all shared network resources (computers, servers, printers…) as if they were sitting in the office. A VPN connection operates by allowing the “guest” computer to be on the same network and IP address as the “host” network. The setup up for this generally requires assistance from your IT department.
As always, if you have any questions or concerns,
feel free to call us at 718-676-6910
