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I’m a one man IT consultant (I do this part time until I retire from my F/T job in 3 years). In the mean time, I’m looking for a solution for remote support.

For my business clients I use VNC, however I’m looking for something for my customers with little or no tech knowlege to be able to allow me remote access to their computers - attended and unattended.

I’m aware of several solutions like logmein, teamviewer, etc… but a lot of them are fairly expensive for a one guy shop. Any suggestions?

11 Spice ups
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You can go on this link. I think these are free for use. I think its not too expensive. Check this link for best remote access softwares.

http://www.techsupportalert.com/best-free-remote-access-software.htm

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Not free for commercial use. Teamviewer for example is $1500. Looking for something more comprehensive of a review.

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LogMeIn has a free version that you can use.

2 Spice ups
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We use a combo of join.me, zoho and remote assistance.

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Logmein is a good choice, if you want the user to see what you are doing, but you could use rdp and change the port number, all you need to do is setup rdp from the outsie on one machine, and rdp from that computer to the computer you need to access on the inside. There are many choices,but it ultimately depends on what you need to be able to do remotely

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ZOHO looks interesting, is it on demand or does it allow unattended connections?

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The Bomgar Box resides at your facility under the security measures already in place. Bomgar offers more control over security, giving you a safe way to integrate remote support with identity management and making it easy to export reporting data and videos for a complete audit trail.

Bomgar

Bomgar’s patent-pending Rep Invite feature lets an internal support technician send anyone a one-time-only collaboration invitation.

Administrators can set strict security rules for invited reps and report on every detail of the support sessions they join.

Bomgar introduced remote support for Mac in 2006, long before it was popular and over two years before GoToAssist™ .

Unlike other remote desktop control software, Bomgar works almost the same on Mac as it does on Windows. Recent enhancements to Bomgar’s remote Mac support include:

Unattended Remote Access Included

Not all remote support sessions have a confused human on the other end. Often technicans need remote access to unattended remote desktops or servers in the datacenter.

Bomgar lets support technicians can gain remote desktop control of unattended computers and servers through firewalls with our patent-pending Jump Technology.

Other remote access solutions make you pay for every remote desktop or server you need to access. But Jump Technology is included in every Bomgar license.

In many cases, Jump enables remote access with no pre-installed client on the remote computer.

Vendor Access Management

A patchwork of VPNs and legacy remote control utilities (like VNC or RDP) is not the most secure setup for letting in vendors to support critical 3rd party applications in your network.

It’s your data. It’s your network. It’s your neck on the line. Shouldn’t vendors use a remote support tool YOU trust?

Bomgar’s patent-pending Embassy™feature lets you manage vendors’ access into your network at a granular level.

Create an Embassy for each of your vendors and set specific security parameters for each, such as whether or not the vendor will have full remote control or view only access.

Embassy also lets you report on and audit vendor activity. It even produces videos of every remote support session involving a vendor.

1 Spice up
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I use AMMYY admin often. Really simple but with almost no options.

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Thanks for all the suggestions! For now, it looks like Zoho is my best option. Again, thanks to all who replied. I ran out of “helpful” answers, would give more if I could.

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Zoho is very nice, thanks for the tip!

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Try Mikogo anyway

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We use Kaseya. I believe they have a free version as well

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we use GoToMyPC… quite cheep, easy to use, good performance. Only annoying thing is that it must be installed beforehand, and require admin permission. Also, if a computer hasn’t been connected, the program will pop up every 5mins asking you to register… not sure why i’m using it actually!

i also sometimes use https://join.me. free, easy to use, but not very good performance… find it very hard to take control of people, so usually use it to guide them instead

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Mikogo for external and remote assistant for internal. We have Dameware as well but that has given us problems lately

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I use Techinline remote desktop. You can look at my page :
http://www.ezsupport.biz/remote.html
So they go on my website and get their Client ID and that’s it.
That very easy for both of us. I was looking for very easy in use (has to be easy for all my clients),cost-effective and functional software. Worked with Logmein and Teamviewer but found a cheaper alternative Techinline. Very reliable tool and may be the easiest that I found.
Would recommend it with assurance.

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NWBS HelpDesk wrote:

Logmein is a good choice, if you want the user to see what you are doing, but you could use rdp and change the port number, all you need to do is setup rdp from the outsie on one machine, and rdp from that computer to the computer you need to access on the inside. There are many choices,but it ultimately depends on what you need to be able to do remotely

You can select to blank the screen and block keyboard access with Logmein. However, the risk is that if the screen is blank the user may think there is a power problem and try to turn the PC off while you are working on it.

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I second Jules8152 post. We use Bomgar and it’s one impressive appliance.

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We use logmein. Logmein has been great to manage computers all around the world. I also use the logmein app on my iphone and ipad. It has saved me a trip back to the office on more than one occasion.

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Just recently we bought Teamviewer for my company. Just over $700 for a ONE-TIME license fee: one technician, unlimited host installations (including unattended, remote reboots with auto-reconnects, etc.).

I did not want ongoing fees and I wanted unattended capabilities and re-boots into Safe Mode (w/ auto-connects back to me; great for remote malware work).

When I was a self-employed techie I used: http://www.remotesupportsystem.com/

It is VNC-based (but not free) and I could brand with my logo. It also has unattended option and unlimited host installations (I like flat fee pricing as you can tell).