Re: Remote access vis pcAnywhere? (Probably OT)

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I'd written:

I want to be able to access my home PC from remote computers
using pcAnywhere. Glitch: my PC connects to the Internet
through a LAN, a router, pppoe, DSL. The IP address my ISP
assigns me (dynamically) is therefore the address of my
router, not my PC. There are 2 PCs on this LAN. So how
do I set up pcAnywhere on a remote computer to access one
particular PC on my home LAN?

And "Pegasus (MVP)" replied:

There are a few minor challenges here, all of which can be
resolved.

Glad to hear it. :-)

- External address. Since your address is dynamic, you must
use an external domain name server. www.dyndns.com or
www.no-ip.com offer free domain names that will resolve to
the current IP address. You must also run a service on your
PC that reports any change of your external IP address to
the chosen DNS. You can download a suitable module
from either of the above sites. Some routers even have this
service built in for www.dyndns.com.

My plan of action for that is actually a lot cruder (but
simpler): I punch 192.168.2.1 into IE. That brings
up my router's configuration interface (written into the
firmware in HTML, which is a very cool touch; I'm very
pleased with the ease of configuration of this Belkin router).
The "WAN Address" listed on that screen is the address my ISP
has assigned. I write that down on a piece of paper and stick
it in my pocket. The IP address doesn't change often, either,
because the connnection is pretty reliable, and the address
only when my DSL connection is broken and reestablished.

- Internal address. Your pcAnywhere PC must have a fixed
internal IP address.

Well, my PCs currently use my router's DHCP, so the IP is
variable (192.168.2.###). I suppose I could use fixed
addresses for the PCs, but I should think that the
Windows computer name should resolve to that. (Ie,
"COMPUTER1" = 192.168.2.87; "COMPUTER2" = 192.168.2.13; etc.)
My plan was to use the computer name in pcAnywhere setup,
in conjunction with the WAN IP address. However, when I tried
that, it didn't work, hence this post.

- Port forwarding: You must instruct your router to forward
the pcAnywhere port packets to the correct internal IP
address. I have forgotten what the default port numbers
are for pcAnywhere - perhaps 5035 and 5036.

I don't recall seeing that functionality in my router's
instructions or config. screens.

Surely there's some other way? How do web or Usenet or
SMTP or POP3 servers distinguish between two computers
on a LAN? Can't use port forwarding, because the ports
would be the same. I've always assumed it was done via
the Windows computer name.

You might consider using WinVNC instead of pcAnywhere.
It has similar functionality but is a fair bit faster.
Its default port number is 5900.

I don't have permission to install such software on the
computers I'd be remoting from. However, those computers
already have pcAnywhere installed. So it's really a matter
of having to use what's available rather than what might be
better.

--
Cheers,
Robbie Hatley
East Tustin, CA, USA
email: lonewolfintj at pacbell dot net
web: home dot pacbell dot net slant earnur slant


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