General Question: Access strategy to use

[jutetrea]

Hello,

We have a remote office running a DSL line. Currently we are using PCanywhere to access their computers from the head office. The problem is that at any given time there seems to be issues; lockups, reboots, slowness, etc.

We want to find a better solution. We were thinking of using the Linksys VPN router. Its cheap and I've heard its reliable. Any thoughts?

There are 4 users in the remote office, and there isn't a lot of network traffic between here and there.

Will the linksys router give access to their machines at all for basic IT work? Or will PCAnywhere work over a VPN line easier? Any thoughts or suggestions would be welcome.

Thank you,
Justin

 

[jpm121]

Do you mean you're using a modem to dial into the PC Anywhere host at the branch office? And want to switch to connecting via their DSL line?

You mention four users, so I'm assuming four PCs. The problem with the Linksys solution is that you won't be able to specify which PC you want to connect to from the outside world, unless you change some port settings in PCAnywhere, which can be doable but a bit messy in some cases.

Give us some more info to work with and we'll get you on the right track...

 

[jutetrea]

That is definitely the issue. The users at the remote site access the internet via DSL and access the main office via phone line (pcAnywhere). We would like to have 2-way high speed communication (low cost if possible) while still being able to use PcAnywhere.

What type of info would be helpful?

Justin

 

[jpm121]

Well PC Anywhere can certainly work over TCP/IP. I have two branch offices that have time card PCs that we access over leased lines. It's zippy even on a 56k DS0, so DSL will be much faster.

Right now I assume your 4 PCs are networked together, probably with a hub and internet connection sharing? Or does the DSL modem have extra ports on it?

Does your ISP provide you with a specified IP address for each of those four PCs? Or are they using a private block (like 192.168.x.x or 10.x.x.x or 172.x.x.x)?

If they each have their own IP address, PC Anywhere will do the trick easily. If you only have one external IP address (i.e. the DSL modem) then you're going to have problems. Here's why:

200.200.200.200 = your one external IP address

192.168.1.1 = PC #1
192.168.1.2 = PC #2
192.168.1.3 = PC #3
192.168.1.4 = PC #4


So, you're in your remote location and you fire up PCanywhere to try to connect to PC#3 at the branch office. You punch in 200.200.200.200 because that's the "public" or "external" IP address of the branch office, but how can it tell whether you want PC 1/2/3 or 4?

Okay, I'm rambling here. Let me know which matches your configuration....