Remote Access to Private IP Address

[sandy978]

My work has mixed systems on our network (MAC's, PC's) . The router is assigning all computers a private ip address 192.168.xxx.xxx, etc. I understand that I cannot connect to a private IP unless I configure port forwarding, which I have already done. I forwarded ports 445 and 3389 For file sharing and remote desktop. so my path is \\192.168.xxx.xxx:3389 This however does not work. When I go to whatismyip.com on the PC, I am shown the ip address for our MAC server. So I cannot

obtain a public IP. I am not sure what I am doing wrong at this point, any help would be reatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!

[DigeratiPrime]

Hey sandy978 welcome to MSFN

If you have the default RD port forwarded on your router to the pc you can access it by putting the WAN IP into remote desktop e.g. "192.168.xxx.xxx".

To access a network share on the local network you can use the UNC path without the port e.g. "\\192.168.xxx.xxx".

Hope that gets you started.

[sandy978]

Thank you very much for your fast reply! I did put the PC into remote desktop, and still nothing. However, I am mostly wanting to use file sharing to access files more than remote desktop. We are housing Quickbooks files on the PC, and want them to be accessible from another location, allowing the other individual to open the files, change them and save them as the same file. I am not sure remote dektop would serve this purpose fully. I have another PC in the office on the network able to access the main PC's files using the UNC path without the port, but not the remote PC at another location. Do you know what I need to do in order to enable this way of accessing files?

I have enabled and opened all necessary ports. If remote desktop works the same way as file sharing, do you know what may be wrong? Thanks!

Edited June 28, 2008 by sandy978

[DigeratiPrime]

It sounds like you want a VPN.

Just want to clarify one thing, on the LAN you need to use Private IP addresses, while over the Internet you need to use WAN IP addresses.

[eyeball]

Im not really sure what you are asking here. Can you clarify? Do you want Remote access to all PCs files?

[sandy978]

I really appreciate all the posts - I am very sorry for seeming so ignorant, my boss asked me to set this up at work and I am not really very advanced in IT, my boss knows this but this is something he wants done by the end of the week.

I know what a VPN is, but could someone help me with instructions on how to set up a VPN? And how do I obtain a WAN ip address when the router will only show the private ip? I am guessing my WAN ip is what shows when I go to a site like: whatismyip.com? If that is correct, everytime I try to acess throug this IP I am taken to the MAC G5 Server computer's files instead of the PC.

Also, I am not wanting access to all PC files, just one shared folder that houses our Quickbooks files. Thank you so much for any help you can give me!

Edited June 29, 2008 by sandy978

[eyeball]

Ok. You should put the following case forward to him:

VPN - standard easy to setup PPTP can be done quickly however the security is very low and with quickbooks data flying across it who knows what could happen.

The easiet thing to do is remote access a pc and run the data that way for a number of reasons, one being that there is WAY less data to transfer over the net, you are only transfering over the images and the KB and mouse input, rather than the actual Quickbooks data.

The 2 best ways to achieve this (IMO) is to install logmein (www.logmein.com) on the pcs and access all of them via that or forward RDP through to the quickbooks pc.

I think that logmein is easier and safer because:

1) 256bit encryption

2) No ports have to be forwarded

3) You can use a completly random email address to signup with such as 56655214kkjidgr@yourdomain.com to give you maximum security. (Do you have access to your server to setup address's?)

Anyway il leave this with you

EDIT:

you can also use L2TP VPN which harder to setup, but what also occurs to me is that you could use Hamachi to setup a VPN really easy (if your Boss 100% sure he really wants/needs VPN)

Thanks

Edited June 29, 2008 by eyeball

[CoffeeFiend]

logmein might be the easiest thing, but there's plenty of other solutions. I use OpenVPN myself. Cross platform (linux, windows and others), VERY secure: it uses the industry standard openSSL for encryption instead of a closed-sourced implementation which you can't even be sure is used properly in logmein's case, it can even use certificates and smart cards if you want (a LOT more secure than just a password, but you pick what mode you prefer), it runs on whatever protocol you want it to (UDP or TCP, any port you want), they don't try to lure you with their free product to later on sell you their commercial one like logmein and others -- it's completely free and open source. There's lots of help, documentation and how-to's online, there's commercial books written about it, etc.

Over a VPN, you can access ANY remote computer, transfer files to/from them, use remote desktop, vnc or anything you so please, just like if you were physically there.

Yes, it is more work, and definitely more complicated to setup (you need to have basic networking knowledge and such), but you only have to do it once, and the results are definitely worth it IMO.

Don't get me wrong, the logmein service works, and I'm sure they have lots of happy customers, but there's lots of other solutions out there.

Edited June 29, 2008 by crahak

[eyeball]

your right Crahak and given the choice i would use a proper VPN, but in this case something simple may be better.

However how would your VPN solution deal with all the data being transferred over the VPN? as opposed to just KB and mouse input over RDP or Logmein?

P.S i honestly an not an insider from logmein its just saved my butt so many times when ppl ask for remote access solutions

Cheers

[CoffeeFiend]

your right Crahak and given the choice i would use a proper VPN, but in this case something simple may be better.

You may be completely right.

However how would your VPN solution deal with all the data being transferred over the VPN? as opposed to just KB and mouse input over RDP or Logmein?

Same as any VPN. If the files are small, accessing the files remotely (many ways) will be MUCH faster. If they're huge, then RDP (or VNC or what have you) would be faster. You can use both methods over a VPN, it's just like if you were connected locally (albeit, with a slower link).

[eyeball]

Ah i see what you mean now. His boss could VPN in first then RDP to his desktop or any desktop he wishes Yeah thats a good idea.

Cheers