Filed under: Hardware, Software, How-tos, Internet Tools
Ask TUAW: Control a Mac from a PC?
Brian Alvey, co-founder of Weblogs Inc., (y'know, our bosses) has submitted a great question for this week's Ask TUAW post: What's the best way to control a Mac from a PC? Brian says he's tried Timbuktu but he isn't so hip on the $199 price. He's also tried VNC but says that no matter what VNC client he's using on the PC side, the session keeps dying on him, even though he's set his eMac to stay awake and he's running Tiger with all the latest patches.So it's time to ask you, TUAW readers: what are your thoughts? How else could Brian take control of his Mac from a Windows PC? Remember: "just use the Mac" doesn't cut it as an answer.
Also, don't forget that Ask TUAW is fueled by reader-submitted questions, so if you have a burning question or topic, please submit it to our Tips form using "Ask TUAW" as the subject. We'll sort through everything and post one question each Friday.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
janeiro said 5:54PM on 9-23-2005
There's this hint over at macosxhints.com that I've been meaning to try (http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20050808134043984&query=vnc) which allows multiple users to be connected to a Tiger box over VPN.
The built-in VNC server (remote desktop with allow vnc clients to connect checked) has worked for me (connecting from OS X and Linux).
there may be some issue with the encoding scheme his client is trying to use. perhaps he should play around with changing the encoding?
A better, sure fire alternative is to enable remote logins (SSH), and fire up PuTTY. (you said he wants to control it, not that it had to be graphically).
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Michael Schneider said 6:22PM on 9-23-2005
Chicken of the VNC on the mac and VNC server...
MS remote desktop is great too but strangely on a wifi network it's slower than over the net...
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Dan said 6:58PM on 9-23-2005
Which VNC server are you using? Did you try Apple's Remote Desktop server? It can connect from a VNC client if you provide a password. I haven't used it, because OSXVNC works perfectly. Of course, the Mac it's serving from is running Apple's latest stable OS, 10.3.9.
Without knowing the details, I would suggest
1.) Playing with encoding schemes, as someone suggested already.
2.) Trying different combinations of server/client
3.) Use a wired connection on either or both ends, if possible.
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alex said 8:05PM on 9-23-2005
hm... couldn't you theoretically use SSH to run a remote X11 session, and then somehow bring up aqua? that could be interesting... thoughts?
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Steve said 9:06PM on 9-23-2005
Aqua doesn't prescribe to the X11 semantics and as such it is impossible to remote it through SSH - would be nice if it could though!
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found_drama said 10:26PM on 9-23-2005
how long on those sessions....? osxvnc server on the mac + win2vnc to "drive" -- i use this all day long -- 8-10 hour sessions without interruption...
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icerabbit said 11:35PM on 9-23-2005
Here we use OSXvnc on the Mac & RealVNC on the Windows client without issues or time-outs.
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Scott said 1:05AM on 9-24-2005
OSXVnc on Tiger and TightVNC on the winbox through an SSH Tunnel.
e.g. from winbox, use putty to setup an ssh with port forwarding:
ssh -L5901:iMuse:5901
tightvnc - localhost:1
Then I set the type to 'tight', compression to 9 and enable JPG compression.
I tried with Apple's Remote Desktop in VNC mode, it didn't support TightVNC and didn't seem to be as stable as OSXVnc.
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Mike said 9:14AM on 9-24-2005
If you enable VNC access with a password in the ARD client, then you can use TIGHTVNC from Windows (works better than RealVNC especially over wireless) from the Windows side. I use it all the time for servers and my desk machine from home over VPN. Also, RDC on OSX to control my Windows boxes when working on my OSX desktop...so, From either platform I can get to the other.
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l0ne said 9:43AM on 9-24-2005
Unfortunately, the way the Mac draws your screen makes it very difficult for VNC-like clients to capture it efficiently (Windows has a concept of a "damaged area" that needs to be redrawn that VNC can capture immediatly after the redrawing without having to get the whole screen; however, Mac OS X's Quartz redraws only when needed and does not signal applications when it does so, so VNC doesn't either; the server has to capture the whole screen repeatedly and send it to you, which takes more bandwidth and makes it all slower.)
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Brian Richardson said 10:04AM on 9-24-2005
I run UltraVNC on my office XP Pro box to control my Tiger system in the home office. The Mac is configured with OSXvnc, which runs as a service. UltraVNC has excellent custom settings to maximize the screen redraws on the remote Mac. Since my Mac is behind a router, I configured port forwarding and also use No-IP.com Update client to adjust to any changes in the dynamic IP that Comcast can change on me. On the Mac, I run MS Remote Desktop through our corporate Cisco VPN (using VPC) to remote control numerous Windows boxen at our offices.
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Garito said 10:10AM on 9-24-2005
I use Remote Desktop on my Mini and RealVNC on the Windows but I experience several problems
?" when I try to connect. The second try works ok
First one: "unknown message type. Do you wish to attempt to reconnect to
The second one: ARP client freezes mainly with my wireless connection and I need to connect via ssh to relaunch it
I try realvnc and tightvnc with the same problems
On the other side I use RealVnc server on my Windows and Chicken for the Mac box
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iFelix said 12:41PM on 9-24-2005
I installed OSXvnc on my G5 (which holds my music), I installed a VNC client on my iPAQ.
Connected to the G5, now this was a bit slow, but more than fast enough to control iTunes (in shrunk mode).
Not quite what you were asking, but certainly showing what is possible with VNC and OSXvnc.
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Marcello said 12:48PM on 9-24-2005
I use OSXvnc and Realvnc on my Windows laptop.
The iMac is behind both a router and an Airport Extreme (double NAT addressing) and I never had any problems, neither on a wired nor a wireless connection.
However, due to my DSL upload bandwidth (200 kbps) I set the vnc client to use 64 colours only when I am away.
Right now I'm writing from Hong Kong and accessing my Mac in Switzerland flawlessly, no session timeouts.
Someone mentioned in a previous post about a "built-in" vnc server? what is that? (ok I admit it, a I'm a newcomer to the Mac....)
iFelix, you might want to check out AirControl (http://www.wolaver.net/aircontrol.html) to control Itunes on a Mac from a Windows Mobile PDA. It works great!
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iFelix said 2:11PM on 9-24-2005
Cheers Marcello
Thanks for the link
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l0ne said 3:54PM on 9-24-2005
There is a built-in Apple-made VNC server that you can activate in place of OSXvnc by activating Apple Remote Desktop in the Sharing pane of System Preferences, clicking on Privileges and enabling the "VNC clients can control the screen with password:" option. However, many have found this client to be less stable than OSXvnc.
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Nick said 2:47AM on 9-25-2005
I am not adept at vnc or vpn or ssh or anything. I am good with a GUI, but don't know too much about networking. Are there any good guides that will teach me how to port forward, and tunneling, and how to set up osxvnc on the mac, and chickenofthevnc or realvnc or whatever on the pc?
I have a friend that told me he does it by accessing his router through dyndns, and then turns on the forwarding or something, and then begins his vnc session. When finished, he reverses the process. This sounds safe, and he is going to help me do it (maybe), but I would like to know how to do it myself incase anything goes awry.
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Dominic Frascella said 11:36PM on 9-25-2005
synergy?
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Brian Alvey said 11:36AM on 12-18-2005
Great answers! I will check out OSXvnc. I have been using Apple's built-in Remote Desktop VNC server. The sessions I get last maybe 5 or 10 minutes before freezing up and locking me out. When I check the eMac, it is running fine.
ssh is great, but it doesn't let me surf our CMS in Safari from my PC.
My PC laptop is wireless, yes, but the only place I can plug it in and have a fully wired setup is right next to my eMac, at which point I don't need to use remote control since I'm already there...
As far as the speed goes, I get better responsiveness from a Windows server across the country than I get from my Mac in my own house (even with the session colors turned way down to 256 or 16). I hope OSXvnc isn't as slow as the built-in Remote Desktop VNC.
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