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Win XP and Remote Assistance

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6 replies

by sdburr

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I want to use Remote Assistance to help my clients remotely. I cannot get a connection to them using Remote Assistance. I have Win XP Pro, ZoneAlarm Pro 3.0.83, LinkSys BEFSR41 Cable/DSL Router (firmware 1.42.3) with UPnP enabled on the Router and in Win XP Pro. I am using Windows Messenger 4.6 on my machine and asking clients to request Remote Assistance from Windows Messenger 4.6 and/or MSN Messenger/NetMeeting (for Win 9x systems).

What if any, ports, settings, etc. do I need to change toget this to work? Are there any settings my clients need to set?

6 replies

by timwalsh

The last part of your first paragraph "(for Win 9x systems)" is the key. Remote Assistance will ONLY work between XP machines. This function will not work with any other Windows operating systems.
If some of these systems are XP, and you still can't connect, make sure TCP port 3389 is opened in all firewalls between you and your client.

by nhansen

Further to the above answer, it WILL work on Win9X. Use your XP cd to install the appropriate components on Win9X, NT or 2000 on the client pc's.

by timwalsh

There are 2 remote contol features included with WIin XP Pro: Remote Assistance and Remote Desktop. Both of these features use Terminal Services technology as used in Win2K Server.

Remote Assistance: from page 1470 of the Microsoft Windows XP Professioanl Resource Kit Documentation - "Remote Assistance requires that both computers are running a version of Microsoft Windows XP." If your clients are not running XP you can't use this feature.

Remote Desktop: from page 332 of the Microsoft Windows XP Professioanl Resource Kit Documentation - "Remote Desktop is based on Terminal Services technology. Using Remote Desktop, you can run application on a remote computer running Windows XP Professional from any other client running a Microsoft Windows operating system." You can install a client on any Windows computer, BUT, the computer to be remote controlled MUST be running Win XP Pro (or Win2K Server). This connection is only one-way - from the client computer to the Win XP Procomputer.

If the above conditions are satisfied, Terminal Services clients (to include Remote Desktop clients and Remote Assistance connections) use TCP port 3389, which must be open in any firewalls between the 2 ends.

by sdburr

Have looked at this configuration and opened port 3389 in my firewall for outgoing and incoming. Still no connection between 2 computers both running Win XP Pro. BTW, is that port UDP or TCP? I would think it would be TCP, but I configured the computer(s) both ways UDP-UDP, and TCP-TCP to no effect.
As to non-Win XP systems, you can use Netmeeting to get the same effect from a Win XP to non-XP computer with no problems.

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