Remotely control Windows XP from older operating systems

By John Sheesley, TechRepublic, 6 May, 2003 12:31

The Local Resources tab shown in Figure D gives you greater control over remote hardware resources. You can cause Remote Desktop to transmit or block sound that's playing on the remote workstation to your computer by changing the options in the Remote Computer Sound drop-down list. The Keyboard drop-down list controls special Windows key combinations, either keeping them local to your workstation or sending them across the network. Finally, the Local Devices section allows you to share local drives and printers with the remote workstation. Figure D

Local Resources controls various hardware resources between the computers. If you want a certain program to run every time you make a connection, you can specify that on the Programs tab. Just select the Start The Following Program checkbox and enter the name of the program in the Program Path And Filename field. The Experience tab, shown in Figure E, allows you to optimise the connection based on your connection speed. In a limited bandwidth environment (i.e., if you're connecting to the remote desktop over a dial-up modem), you may not want to take the time to wait for the user's background to appear on your machine. Likewise, although things like full window drag and desktop animations may be cool, they can run very slowly over the network, causing you to have to wait for your screen to constantly repaint. Make the changes here that best suit your connection speed. Figure E

You can match your connection speed to various XP display features. Finally accessing the workstation
After you've customised the settings, you're done. Just click Connect to access the remote system. The remote Windows XP desktop will appear on your screen just as if you were running XP yourself, even if you're still stuck with Windows 95 on your own system.

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Talkback

I am really just a home user with a need to have two connections at the same time, 1 local and 1 remote -or- 2 remote. My wife and I use the Remote Desktop a lot when we are away from home, however, there are times when she is at home using the computer and I am at work and need to access a file from our home computer. She doesn't like getting kicked off when I log in. We would find it extremely useful if XP Pro supported two users at the same time.

I know that it is possible to set up a Terminal Server using Server 2003, but that is probably too costly for our needs. Is there any possibility that Microsoft will have some sort of "Terminal Server-Lite" for XP Pro and allow either 1 local user and 1 remote user -or- 2 remote users?

I understand that they need to keep their products differentiated in order to encourage people to buy the right product for their needs, but maybe by only supporting two simultaneous users, they will still leave the market wide open for Server 2003.

via Facebook 11 October, 2003 06:24

I just thought of this compromise to support two simultaneous users:

If Microsoft felt generous, they could build in two licenses to XP Pro for remote/local use for free. Or, they could SELL, for an additional $49.99, the option to have two simultaneous users. If they only allowed a total of two simultaneous sessions on each machine, they would not even touch their server market, while appeasing thousands of home users.

This optional license add-on would also solve the single user limitation that plagues the “Smart Display” devices (Mira), but that’s another story.

via Facebook 13 October, 2003 15:56

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