Setting up a VPN to print documents to work printer in one city from home

[Sue Adams]

Hi everyone. I have been working from home lately and we are trying to figure out a way for me to be at my home (in a different city from the office) and send something to our printer at the office. This could be via a vpn or via remote desktop? I'm somewhat tech savvy (was a mainframe programmer then web programmer for years, but now retired and working part-time for a very small office), but know virtually nothing about vpn's etc., We do no have a sophisticated network setup at the office, just two computer that connect to the internet and printers.

I did a bit of research and purchased a Netgear Nighthawk r6700v3 router and set up ExpressVPN based on a chat I had with them. Evidently they didn't listen, because once we got it set up at home and I asked them how I could send something to print at the office, they told me I could only print within my network. It was very upsetting as I told them multiple times I needed to print from one city to another.

Any help would be appreciated. Thank you!

 

[goombawaho]

You didn't need a new router AT HOME. You need a router at the office that supports client to site vpn connection. The simplest would be a router that supports PPTP connections. It's old and people would say somewhat insecure. But if you're only doing remote desktop, I think it would be okay. Other routers have better VPNs but the client side setup can be more complicated.

If you're using a gateway from Comcast or similar provider, most probably don't have a VPN capability. Then you would have to replace your Gateway with a modem and a router that you purchase. I would NOT just open a hole in firewall to the computer inside the network on port 3389. Anyone on the internet can just start hacking to get into the PC.

Once you can connect to the office via VPN, you need to have Windows PRO operating system (on the OFFICE PC) to be able to use remote desktop. And you would want to set a static ip address on the computers you want to connect to.

 

[goombawaho]

Probably should have said that something like LogMeIn, GoToMyPC or RemotePC (what I recommend) from the makers of idrive backup would make things much simpler and is not hardware-based.