Quote Originally Posted by mickcant View Post
Hi all,
Firstly I am only a home computer user; I use Windows XP Professional on a desktop tower, with Office 2007.
My wife (with me paying) has just bought a laptop in the Philippines that has XP Home on it.
This is for her to keep in touch with family when she joins me in the UK in a few weeks.
I know there is some sort of remote assistance possible, but could this be easily enabled there so I could at least make sure anti virus is run along with the windows firewall etc?
The wife’s siblings can all use a computer but as this has always been in a cafe, know nothing about anti virus even.
Thanks,
Mick.
As a software developer I agree with Iain, the kids will find some way to screw it up.

The problem with Remote Assitance is that it requires a request to be issued from the remote PC and that requires someone there that can understand how to issue the request in the first place, plus if the machine is already toast as a result of a virus then you won't get that far.

Other alternatives are to set up a Real VNC server on the laptop, there is a free edition available http://www.realvnc.com/

The only problem with Real VNC is that you need to know the IP address of the remote PC and this will change, you could get round that by installing a Dynamic DNS client but now we are starting to get into complexities that I suspect you want to avoid.

Direct Microsoft Remote Desktop has the same drawbacks as VNC you need to know the IP address,

Another possibility is a service like "Log Me In"

https://secure.logmein.com/UK/home.aspx

This is a good option as it get round the IP address issue but it's a pay service.

Finally Microsoft Live Mesh is a free solution that has a mechanism similar to Log Me In (you don't need to know the remote IP Address), it also gives you 5GB of free online storage, it's still in beta but it is very stable and I think microsoft have stated that it will remain free!

https://www.mesh.com/welcome/default.aspx

I love live mesh it's the best remote management and sync solution I have ever used, it's basically Remote Desktop without the need for dynamic DNS plus you can activate or deactivate the remote console (keyboard and screen) at the same time as you are remote controlling it whcih makes it like VNC as well.


Jim