If yous accept never used Remote Desktop, it is a actually great fashion to connect to another PC (office, home, etc) remotely and become work washed that you otherwise could not get done unless yous were physically at the machine. I routinely employ remote desktop to connect to servers at our part, connect to user'southward computers to provide tech support and to connect to my personal calculator at domicile to access files.

In order to utilise Remote Desktop, there are a couple of things yous demand to sympathise. First off, remote desktop only works with Windows XP and Windows 2003. What I hateful by this is that y'all can only connect INTO a Window XP or 2003 machine. You lot can use a Windows 98, ME, or 2000 to connect INTO a Windows XP or 2003 car, just y'all cannot connect INTO a 98, ME or 2000 automobile remotely. If you want to be able to connect to a Windows 2000 or before machine, you'll take to buy commercial software.

Since this mail service is over seven years sometime, the above statement is out-dated. You can also connect into a Windows Vista, Windows 7 or Windows eight machine. Also, since Microsoft has recently concluded support for Windows XP, this tutorial will becomes less useful as time passes. If interested, check out my post on configuring remote desktop for Windows eight.

Secondly, you lot need to brand sure that you are logged in as a computer administrator on the auto in order to set up it up for remote access. If you brought a computer from a shop or got information technology directly from the manufacturer, the first user proper noun yous create is always an Administrator business relationship.

An easy way to check whether or non you are an Administrator is to go to Start, Control Panel and then click on User Accounts. You'll meet your user name and it should have "Administrators" or "Computer Administrator" written next to it.

user accounts xp

Thirdly, the administrator account on your car must accept a password. If you do not have to type in a password in order to access Windows when you offset up your computer, then y'all do non have a password set up and Remote Desktop will non work. Remote desktop does not allow you to connect to a computer with a user business relationship that does not accept a password.

When you lot go to User Accounts and click on the Administrator account, you will meet an choice to create a password for the account. Become alee and do that before moving on.

create password user

Next, if the computer yous are connecting to is running Windows XP SP3, then y'all need to open the firewall to allow remote desktop connections. To exercise this, go to Beginning, Control Console, Windows Firewall and click on the Exceptions tab.

firewall exception

Brand certain that the Remote Desktop check box is checked. The final affair that needs to exist done in gild for Remote Desktop to piece of work correctly is to tell Windows that we want to let users to connect remotely. So far nosotros've just fulfilled the requirements, but now we take to actually allow remote desktop connections to this computer.

Go to Starting time, Control Panel, and click on Organisation. Click on the Remote tab and make sure that the "Allows users to connect remotely to this computer" box is checked. Don't worry about clicking the Select Remote Users button considering Administrators accept access past default. If you lot desire to give an non-ambassador account remote desktop access, then click that button and add the user.

allow remote connections xp

And that'southward it! Your reckoner is now setup for remote desktop! First attempt connecting to the XP motorcar from some other reckoner on your dwelling house network. In guild to connect, become to the other calculator and click on Offset, All programs, Accessories, Communications, and Remote Desktop Connection. If you desire to connect to the XP machine from Windows Vista, Windows 7 or Windows 8, merely click on Start and perform a search for remote desktop connectedness. On Windows 8, become to the Showtime Screen and start typing to perform a search.

remote desktop connection

In the dialog box, you lot can blazon in the IP address or the name of the calculator. The best style to connect is to type in the IP address of the computer. In order to become the IP address of the calculator you desire to connect to, go to the computer and click on Start, Run and type in CMD.

run cmd

In the blackness command window, type in the give-and-take "ipconfig" without the quotes as shown beneath and press Enter.

ipconfig address

Yous'll see your IP accost listed forth with some other info, just you don't need to worry virtually that. Write down that IP address (192.x.x.x or something similar) and type that number exactly into the remote desktop text box on the other computer (the computer you are connecting from).

win7 remote desktop

Click Connect and you should get a login screen popular up, which means you take successfully connected to the other computer. You can at present enter the Computer Administrator user name and password.

If you get an mistake saying that computer cannot have new connections, etc. that means something was not configured correctly. Retrieve y'all need to requite the administrator account a password, open the port in the firewall, and check the allow remote connections check box in the System properties. All  three items need to be performed on computer y'all want to connect TO.

Once yous are able to connect from within the aforementioned network, now you can effort to connect from outside. Then if yous desire to connect to your home computer from the office, y'all tin can practise that, simply you lot'll have to do a few extra things.

Offset, you have to get your public IP Accost (not the 192.168.x.x number) and you can exercise this by going to the figurer yous want to connect into and navigating to the spider web site http://world wide web.whatismyip.com/ and this will give you your public IP address. This is the address that tin can be used from anywhere in the world to connect to your specific location and is unique. Unfortunately, on most home connections, this public IP address changes oftentimes and without notice. Basically to solve that problem, y'all have to use dynamic DNS. I won't go into much particular in this mail service, but read my other posts on how to configure it:

Configuring a Router for Dynamic DNS

What is Dynamic DNS and How to Fix It Up

The second thing you lot have to do is open the port in your router (unless you're connecting your cable modem directly into your computer) and forward that port to the computer y'all want to connect to. Hither's how y'all would do this on a Netgear router (as I have that) and the process is pretty much the same for other routers, except that it might be called something else. Most manufacturer's spider web sites have an article on how to configure their item router for port forwarding since information technology's very mutual.

You'll need to log into your router past typing it's IP address into the browser address bar. You can effigy out the IP address of your router by going to whatever computer on your network (that you desire to connect into) and opening the command prompt like we did above and typing ipconfig over again. In add-on to the IP Accost field, yous'll too come across Default Gateway, this is your router. From the above screenshot, you can come across mine is 192.168.244.2.

Type that address into your browser address bar equally follows and printing Enter:

ip address

Y'all'll nigh likely be prompted for a user name and password. Commonly, you can find this in the documentation or on the nether side of the router itself. For my Netgear router, the username every bit "admin" (lowercase) and the countersign was "countersign".

Once you lot're in, you should see an choice called "Port Forwarding/Port Triggering" or something very similar. I know Netopia calls these Pinholes and on Linksys it might be called a Service or Applications.

port forwarding

Once yous're on the Port Forwarding page, y'all might see different layouts/options. The bones parts will exist giving the frontwards a name similar "Remote Desktop", choosing the external port and the internal port, the protocol and picking the IP address for the device the data is supposed to be forrad to.

new port forward

For remote desktop, you'll e'er want to cull TCP for Protocol. Be default, remote desktop uses port 3389, and then type that into both the internal and consign port boxes. Lastly, the internal IP address should be the IP address of the XP auto. On some setups, yous'll be asked for a starting port, ending port and triggering port. Just put 3389 for any port boxes.

port triggering

Click Apply and yous're done! You should now be able to utilize your public IP address (blazon this into the Computer text box in the Remote Desktop Connexion dialog) to connect through your router to your calculator!

If yous take any problems remotely connecting to your Windows XP machine, please post a comment hither and I'll attempt to help. Bask!