VNC speed question

[superninjagoat]

I'm looking at a pair of macs. I'm a laptop freak, and have always eyed top-o-the-line powerbooks. But for a similar price -- I have my monitor already -- I can get a low-range PowerMac and an ibook.

The optimal solution would allow me to run programs loaded on the big mac's hard drive on the big mac's processor(s) and have the program window *only* displayed within the iBook's OS, as if they were actually running on the iBook.

I know I can controll the big mac over vnc and chicken of the vnc. I want to know:

1. How responsive does vnc feel over a 802.11b connection? 802.11g?

2. Can I controll the host computer at full screen, or do I have to run it within a seperate window? I want my experience on the laptop to be transparent, if possible.

Are there other solutions I should be looking at if I decide to go this route?

Thanks, s.n.goat

 

[40167]

I'm looking at a pair of macs. I'm a laptop freak, and have always eyed top-o-the-line powerbooks. But for a similar price -- I have my monitor already -- I can get a low-range PowerMac and an ibook.

The optimal solution would allow me to run programs loaded on the big mac's hard drive on the big mac's processor(s) and have the program window *only* displayed within the iBook's OS, as if they were actually running on the iBook.

I know I can controll the big mac over vnc and chicken of the vnc. I want to know:

1. How responsive does vnc feel over a 802.11b connection? 802.11g?

2. Can I controll the host computer at full screen, or do I have to run it within a seperate window? I want my experience on the laptop to be transparent, if possible.

Are there other solutions I should be looking at if I decide to go this route?

Thanks, s.n.goat

Personaly id just get a powerbook and do everything on there... but as far as your question, vnc can scale down for many connections... even wireless gprs < 56k and be quite responsive but in like 256 colors. 16bit should work fine with 802.11b and work like a normal system (assuming your using the actual clients, as the java ones over a webbrowser seem a bit slower) ~ You can control the host computer in full screen or a window, whatever you want.

 

[superninjagoat]

thanks.

I've given up on the PB as a desktop replacement b/c I run applications that really need the extra horsepower. I do a lot of high-resolution work in lightwave. Everything else I run, like Photoshop and Illustrator would be fine on the PB.

OTOH, all of the things I'd want to do on the laptop -- surf web from bed, take files on the road, type reports in front of the tube -- those things I could do on the ibook. PB would be overkill.

Honestly, I wish my budget was a little bigger, I'd get both pro models. but alas ...

 

[Logik]

VNC is nice for simple administration tasks.. you cannot do anything that requires lots of precision or anything graphically intense (games) over vnc. so if you plan on doing video editing, audio editing, playing games, modeling, etc vnc will not do as you want from my own experience.

 

[superninjagoat]

VNC is nice for simple administration tasks.. you cannot do anything that requires lots of precision or anything graphically intense (games) over vnc. so if you plan on doing video editing, audio editing, playing games, modeling, etc vnc will not do as you want from my own experience.

Could you elaborate? What connection speeds are you talking about, and what are the "symptoms?" Jumpy mouse? mouse lag time?