Comments on: Remote Access to Macintosh PC's

Question: Remote Access to Macintosh PC's

SirStan — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 10:10:04 -0800

MacFilter - How do I remotely work with Macintosh PC's?

I do a bit of consulting on the side, always for PC networks. I either have VPN access, and MSTSC/VNC to the servers/desktops in question, or I use a service such as LogMeIn/GotoAssist when I don't have network access.

A small group has asked me to support their 5 machine Macintosh network. I have never supported Macintosh machines, but their needs are limited, and they just want someone who can install software upgrades, diagnose hardware problems, and do installations of new hardware.

I would like to be able to help these folks remotely, but I have no experience with this. I know Apple sells a remote desktop style application, but do all OSX machines have the 'client' installed? Any tips/websites that detail remotely working with Macintosh systems?

Any tips, or common Macintosh issues and how to resolve them would be awesome. The know that I have little experience with Macintoshes, but the current vendor they use, as well as the previous one claimed to be experts, and routinely have issues doing simple tasks.

By: nathan_teske

nathan_teske — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 10:15:43 -0800

Apple's Remote Desktop client is installed on all Macs since 10.3. It's basically VNC which can be accessed with a normal VNC client or, for more bells and whistles, Apple's own Remote Desktop software.

By: nathan_teske

nathan_teske — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 10:18:24 -0800

Also, go buy yourself a MacBook or similar. You'll want to learn about MacOS X and, even if you hate MacOS X, you can easily reconfigure it to run WinowsXP or Linux.

By: SirStan

SirStan — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 10:21:02 -0800

I have a PowerMac G4 that is one of their old PC's. It is the exact config of their other 5 pc's which are now G5's.

Does the built in OSX VNC client support "Reverse" VNC sessions (ie, connect to a VNC server).. commonly known as 'Listen Mode' with newer releases of Tight/Real VNC?

Are there any VNC clients for OSX that do support the reverse session?

By: advil

advil — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 10:50:09 -0800

Also, all macs (if they're running OS X) are unix (a BSD variant originally), and so support the full complement of command line utilities, have a built-in ssh server (enable in system preferences), etc. I don't know offhand what kind of command line based administrative interfaces apple has provided but I would guess they have provided something.

By: SirStan

SirStan — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 10:56:36 -0800

SSHd is nice and all, but I am going to be doing mostly work that would require video. I could probably tunnel SSH and VNC over it.

By: wearyaswater

wearyaswater — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 12:02:30 -0800

I have OSXVNC installed on client machines. When they have a support request, I have them start the app and then I connect with a RealVNC viewer (the viewer is free, but we use the RealVNC enterprise server piece for PC support).

When I first started supporting Macs, I bought The Macintosh Bible. That was great to begin with, but now when I'm in a pinch I stop by the MacOSX forums or the MacFixIt forums. Also, cocktail is a great system utility application that will probably come in useful.

By: revgeorge

revgeorge — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 13:27:49 -0800

iChat for OS X 10.5 (the next version) will support screen sharing. I don't know if it will use VNC like the afore-mentioned Remote Desktop (which rocks, BTW), but if you have a spare Mac lying around you should be fine when it's released.

By: devilsbrigade

devilsbrigade — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 16:56:45 -0800

Depending on what you mean by video, VNC is going to be hell. Its not exactly careful about what info it sends over it (its not X or RDP, its just a framebuffer), so if you're not on a 100Mbit LAN, its slow as hell (and even if you are, it can still be quite an unpleasant experience).