So I am trying to use my Eee PC 1000HA (XP Home 32) as a remote for my HTPC (Vista Ultimate 64). I installed TightVNC last night on both and I could connect to and see the HTPC, but it wouldn't take any input I was giving it. I have used TightVNC on XP Pro 32 before, so hopefully I am not just making some dumb mistake. If it does actually work and I am just goofing up let me know and I'll fiddle with it some more.

What is a good (preferably free or easily torrentable) remote desktop program to use? Will UltraVNC work? LogMeIn? I can't use the built in remote desktop because it would show the logon screen on the TV the HTPC is connected to.

All I need it to do is some pretty basic input, I have looked around for wireless keyboards with touchpads and they are a little more than I am willing to spend and using my laptop would then get double duty out of it.

It seems like both uVNC and Logmein supports 64-bit, but you will notice that the latter is more sluggish than the former when used in a LAN, probably because of the web interface.
Just try it out and you'll see, and remember to configure the routers and firewalls correctly.

Sweet, I'll try uVNC when I get home since it is probably similar to TightVNC which I have some experience with. Hopefully it will work.

you don't by chance have the tightvnc option enabled to only view the remote, have you?

just checking.


what I hate about tightvnc is having to add it to the windows firewall each time I set up a new pc, and that I keep forgetting I have to do that, so when I try to connect, nothing's happening :-L


otherwise that's exactly what I use my laptop for, remoting to the various other pcs around the house.

You might be interested in the terminal services hack that allows multiple concurrent logins using remote dektop (or concurrent local and remote logins)
http://www.kood.org/terminal-server-patch/

I had a nice long reply prepared on the concurrent logons until I reread his post and saw what he was really trying to do.

First when you do concurrent logins, they need to be different users. So you can login with one user and then login remotely with the same user, it has to be a different user. That wouldn't really allow him to do what he wants which is to control the current user remotely.

And when you get into the "hack" nature of the it, it's kind of a scary thing to get into. I did just that on my HTPC and had all kinds of problems trying to get it to work. You need to have the right termsvr.dll file and do the registry edits just right to get it to work. I ended up breaking Remote Desktop altogether before finding the right combination. So it's not for the light of heart.

FWIW, I have used TightVNC under XP and under Vista 64 (server side only). The latter does work, in the sense that I can control things remotely, but the display doesn't update properly: I have to request a refresh every time I do something like open a menu. So, yes, not too useful.