Best Remote Desktop Program ?

[Yaja123]

i know about apple's expensive solution.

whats the next best 'out of the box' solution? dont mind spending money on something that works but i cant afford $300!

im tired of tweaking etc, just want something that works.

want to connect my powerbook to mac mini at home - both mac's are mine. Just trying to avoid using a monitor for my mac mini.

thanks.

 

[feakbeak]

There have been other threads about this topic - you can search, might find some helpful info. I've tried just turning on the Remote Desktop service in Tiger and then connecting using a VNC client (Chicken of the VNC) but it is pretty slow. It was usable connecting to my Mac Mini from my PC on my home network, but not great. When I tried connecting to my Mac Mini from work over the internet it was unusable. I just use SSH access when I am away now - I can't do everything but I can get access to my files and stuff. I'd be able to do more if I knew more bash commands, etc.

I would hope Apple's Remote Desktop is much better, but I'm with you - I don't want to spend $300 for this functionality to work well. Plus Apple doesn't make a Windows client for RD. This probably wouldn't matter in your case, but it's important to me.

IMO, Windows Remote Desktop rocks - it is very responsive, even over the net (at least at broadband speeds). Plus it is free with XP Pro and they make clients for most/all Windows versions and OS X.

I don't think there are any great solutions on the cheap out there. I hope you find something though, I'd be interested too. I'll keep my eye on this thread.

 

[Bear]

Actually what you have to watch out for when using VNC is the grapgics details. The higher the color option, the more data that has to get sent back and forth. Try thousands of colors and 256 colors to see if either improves the useabilitity.

 

[feakbeak]

Actually what you have to watch out for when using VNC is the grapgics details. The higher the color option, the more data that has to get sent back and forth. Try thousands of colors and 256 colors to see if either improves the useabilitity.

Thanks for the tip. I'll give that a try. I'm most certain I was only using thousands of colors before but I'll make sure and try 256 as well - though 256 is rather ugly but if it is more responsive and functional, I'll take it!

I run thousands when using Windows Remote Desktop across the net and it's still pretty snappy.

 

[Yaja123]

thanks feakbeak.

i needed someone to tell me to activate apple remote desktop on my mac mini... im a complete novice on this network type stuff.

anyway, i activated the remote desktop and put the relevant stuff into chicken and it worked immediately! hooray!

i still need to tweak it as this will be my sole way of accessing my mac mini for the most part. But i think it shouldnt be a problem - solved!

ill still do some more research and tweaking and report back.

via chicken it seems responsive for me (1.5ghz pb G4). however, i only want to do simple 'slave' work leaving my powerbook resources free for me 🙂

thanks guys!

 

[Yaja123]

update : response not great but certainly more than liveable with - only minor .5 sec lag.... if that.. not even sure why i mentioned it further. Its absolutely fine.

 

[Yaja123]

🙁

everything was OK for awhile but now its too slow and today im getting timeout error when connecting. So much for that solution. The best you can use it for is monitoring.

I also found out i can buy a dvi/vga 2 scart cable to watch on my tv but thats 60% of the cost of a LCD then id have to buy a scart switcher.... 🙁

Looks like i have to get a cheap flat screen.... but then that defeats the whole point of getting space saving mini. I might as well have brought an iMac.

Oh well, i wouldnt have known had i not tried.

Ill check the returns policy on mac mini.......... otherwise ill pick up a 2nd hand flat screen.

thanks for you help guys

 

[Yaja123]

i hope im not jumping the gun again but all seems well now using chicken of the vnc.

i was on the verge of an impulse buy of a monitor yesterday but instead decided ill stick it out over the weekend to see what i can learn and tweak settings etc.

The only thing ive done is hook the mac mini up the router via cable rather than wireless (no problem) and now it works fine connecting to it wirelessly with my powerbook. It worked all day yesterday and all night encoding and downloading and i was able to open chicken as and when i liked and get an almost instance connection and response times. There is a .05 to 1 delay - which is perfectly fine. Im able to do everything i want without any problems. So my guess is that having two wireless computers (and 2 other neighbour wireless routers!) buzzing around the room was not help full in maintaining a consistent connection.

This is where im at today and fingers crossed i wont have any further problems... thereby saving me money 🙂