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Does ExpanDrive allow remote access to main computer desktop?
I need to access my main computer remotely. That is, I want to see my home Mac (Mac Pro) desktop on my remote MacBook Pro when I am away on travel. Is this possible with Expan 2? Can I remotely wake my home Mac from sleep with ExpanDrive 2.
My home Mac is on my local LAN and it connects to the outside world via Verizon FIOS servers. Will ExpanDrive get thru the Mac Pro's firewall? Both Macs run OS 10.5.6.
If thsi works as I hope, it will solve my probles in establishing remote access to my home Mac?
Thanks,
Tom Casselman
cassco@c-fourth.com
My home Mac is on my local LAN and it connects to the outside world via Verizon FIOS servers. Will ExpanDrive get thru the Mac Pro's firewall? Both Macs run OS 10.5.6.
If thsi works as I hope, it will solve my probles in establishing remote access to my home Mac?
Thanks,
Tom Casselman
cassco@c-fourth.com
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Inappropriate?Hi, Tom,
The situation you've described here is something I often do on my home network. To make it work, you must be running an SSH server on your home machine. On Leopard, you can do this by going to the "Sharing" pane of the System Preferences window, and enabling the "Remote Login" check-box.
You will also need to instruct your FIOS router to forward requests from outside for port 22, to that machine on the inside network. The exact details of how to do that will depend upon what kind of router you're using, but many routers have a web-based interface for setting up port-forwardings of this kind. Either Verizon or the router's manufacturer should have documentation for this step.
Once that is set up, you should be able to connect to your home machine with ExpanDrive. The hostname to use will be whatever Verizon has assigned as your public IP address, and then you can log in with whatever name and password you would normally use for the home machine. If you do not have a static IP number, you may have to update your drive when it changes (I find no-ip.com helps with this). -
Inappropriate?M. J.,
Thanks for your response. Using other approaches, my home computer won't wake up. I can access my FIOS router and will try to allow entry via Port 22. Will ExpanDrive awake my sleeping home Mac? Or, do I need to leave the home Mac awake during the time I am away from home?
As I understand it, I will be able to remotely access the desktop of my home computer using ExpanDrive - is that correct?
Finally, (I am sorry to be so slow), when I am in the drive setup panel, I assume the drive type is SFTP (SSH). Also, I am not sure what my server name should be. Is it just the router's address or is it the IP address given to me by Verizon FIOS (I think this is a dynamic address) - I do have software called No-IP that constantly updates to my current IP. One last question, what do I use for my user name? According to my System Prefs>Accounts, it is Thos Casselman. Is that what I should use?
Much thanks,
Tom Casselman
cassco@c-fourth.com -
Inappropriate?Hi, Tom,
If you're planning to run a machine as a server, you should probably instruct it not to sleep. The "Energy Saver" preferences pane has an option to let the computer wake up for network access, which might also work, though I have not used it in this context. On my server, I just shut off the display.
The host address to use is the FIOS router's public IP address, or its no-ip alias if you have one. It's very likely to be a dynamic address, but in practise I find they don't change very often unless you reboot your router. And yes, for the user name, you should use whatever name you would enter to log into the machine directly.
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