I’m in the same boat with LogMeIn. I’ll probably give Splashtop a try.
I use TeamViewer, despite its nags. I’d pay $50-100/year not the $800 they want.
Is this the same thing as Splastop? Are people using other apps than Splashtop? I don’t see why… Splashtop is awesome, great iPad interface, and I use it from my main computer to control other computers throughout my house. No-brainer!
I’m with Rei here - TV is the only decent solution IME which is easy to explain to explain and doesn’t open massive security holes like windows own service does.
I’ve been using TeamViewer for a couple of years on a couple of PCs and iPad (mostly to control a headless media server). I gave Splashtop a go yesterday. I was impressed by the speed of the rendering for video and audio (flawless) but other than that, is there a compelling reason to switch that I’m missing? To get the remote access that I have for free with TV, I would have to pay $16.99/yr. Are there other features that give it an edge?
I’ve used splashtop from the iPad a while back but never from pc to pc. I guess I’ll have to re-install it and give it another try.
Yah, I use it all the time when my wife calls about some issue with a crying child and a improperly working HTPC ;)
Also, just used it to monitor a Mac at the office from an iPad at home…pretty seemless.
My office ponies up the $300/year for Logmein Central which allows continued use of up to 100 free logmein clients. If it was out of my pocket, the $60/year for Splashtop’s unlimited PC access is a pretty great deal.
On my Galaxy S series phones and on my Nexus 7, I’d tried Team Viewer and Splashtop before trying Jump Desktop and ended up sticking with the latter. I occasionally control my home and work Windows machines for basic tasks and maybe it’s just me, but it seems to be vastly superior in a few ways. It’s not free, but while I was comparing my experience it was one of those “just works” situations and had none of the frustrations I experienced using the other two.
So I tried out splashtop again and apparently I’m grandfathered into a lifetime subscription to splashtop anywhere. It seems to work pretty well and quite a bit more polished since I last checked it out. The 5 pc limit is a tad small though.
I never heard of Jump Desktop before. It looks like a fancy login that uses gmail for authentication and then just taps into the underlying RDP/VNC (win/mac). PC to PC is free but the mac client is $30 and the ios client is $15. Not horrible for one time costs but I’m guessing performance is only going to be good as the underlying protocol it’s utilizing. That’s not necessarily a bad thing and if it “just works” like barstein says it very well might be worth the price. I’ll have to give it a try. PC to PC being free for Jump Desktop I think will be good enough for something I install on my parents PC’s, and then I’m thinking of continuing using splashtop for my personal pc’s.
Still, I miss logmein. Nothing beats the simplicity of just having a browser and a small plugin to get a client going. It worked with every OS I can think of including chromeos.
Thanks for elaborating on Jump Desktop, guess I should have described it a bit more. It’s worth mentioning that the installer also handles the underlying RDP/VNC stuff for you and you don’t have to mess around with anything before or after running the wizard.
So is there no way to try Splashtop without paying around $20? I installed the app on my computer and downloaded the $1.99 personal version to my iPad, but when I try to connect to the PC sitting 2 feet from me, the app simply shows me the Anywhere Access Pack in app purchase screen. I thought if you were connecting from the same local network it was free.
Edit to say: I see from a link in the purchase window that Splashtop thinks my computer is on a remote network and they do list some things to try to iron out the kinks. So that’s what is going on. Maybe the TeamViewer app I had installed had ports tied up or some such issue.
Edit 2: Turns out uninstalling and reinstalling it on the PC fixed the issue (that’s the first thing they say to try). So… success! So far I like it!
It’s been a year since the last post. Is there anything new? I’m leaning to try Jump Desktop to connect to my in-law’s laptop half-a-world away to do the monthly Java update (his stupid stockbroker website still needs it). Is it really free? Hassle-free?
use teamviewer
2nd vote for teamviewer. simple, can reconnect easily after reboots, and can also install it on a machine so you can connect at will (vs having to wait for them to get the code to you)
Can you explain the last bit more? I’m skimming their brochure right now, and I gather that I install regular teamviewer on my machine, and install “teamviewer quickconnect” on my parent’s machine, then they need to run it and give me a code. I’d rather skip that code step if possible.
I’m also running teamviewer, and it’s fantastic.
You can create a password protected “account” on Teamviewer, something they call “Unattended Access” (PDF instruction link), which will let you log into a remote machine without the user there needing to give you the code. It’s a bit fiddly, but easily doable, so you’ll definitely be able to accomplish what you want.
Yes, Ephraim is correct. I haven’t had any issues with it, and its been a godsend, have it installed on both my parents computers.
I used to use something else, and it would always time out in the time it took for my mom to send me the code. So annoying.
Maintaining through reboots is key for patches and uninstalls as well.
Just to echo Ephraim and feanan, Teamviewer is great for family/casual tech support needs. I support my parents (2000+ miles away) and in laws (1000 miles away) and it’s a piece of cake.