Solidworks, VPN, Remote Desktop Connection

Yes I have. In my experience, VPN is just way too slow to open up assemblies of any size. Individual parts and part drawings may be ok if you are not in a big hurry. Just remember, every time you save a file, it saves it through the VPN also. If you really want to use VPN, I advise simply copying your files from work to home (still slow), working with them locally, then copying them back to work. By the way, both my work and I have cable connections.

There is one other alternative that I have never tried, but seems feasible. You could use VNC software to remotely control your computer at work. There is very little bandwidth used doing this, only the graphical image of your computer screen at work. And when you open or save a SW document, the data is only having to travel to and from your work computer and the server, unless of course your files are located directly on your work computer in which case it would be that much faster. Also, your work computer would be doing all of the number crunching on its processor, not your home computer. I've heard that VNC works really great for general software. But with the fact that SW has constantly changing screen updates (rotations & zooms), it may possibly not work very well either. If anyone has ever tried the VNC solution, post your comments. By the way, VNC software is free.

Thanks for your input Seth. I'm going to look at the VNC option and see what I can come up with.

Has anybody tried the VNC option?

Richard

Richard,

We've used VPN for file access and backups.

One of the problems I see right away is the display. There's some very intense graphics stuff going on when you use SW. When you use a program like PC Anywhere or Remote Desktop, all the remote system does is act as a dumb frame buffer. This is several orders of magnitude too slow to support interactive 3D graphics. Even the old X-Terminals did all the graphic processing locally. Windows isn't set up to pipline these types of tasks to a remote machine.

You're much better off installing SW on the remote machine and using VPN for file transfer. Even then, it will be too slow for large files.

Regards

Mark

Ok, thanks for your input Mark.

You should try freeware called Ultr@VNC or similar, but I have a feeling that it's still going to be too slow

We are running VNC Viewer 4 with favorable results. I am located in Southwest Michigan and able to work in Solidworks on a PC that is located in Amsterdam. Parts and small assembly speeds are tolerable and this allows me to trouble shoot VB programs that I send over there. Amsterdam is a fun town but after awhile flying over there can be a hassle and I would just as soon do the work from my own office.

Jim

I have used SW successfully over both VNC and RDC. It is just like using it locally, although you do miss a screen refresh once in a while.

Remember, RDC comes free if you have a Windows XP machine.

I have used it for both.

To make it even more confusing... You can use either VNC or a VPN or RDC to get into your machine from outside your firewall. Then, you use either VNC or RDC to get to another machine on your network.

Are you confused yet?

Very intriguing.

Hadn't considered it before, but that means I could fire up WinXP on my Mac in Virtual PC (yeah, I know it is slow) and try running my work PC remotely on my PowerBook. I may try it when I get some time.

Bo

There's an installable version for Linux and source code for UNIX. You could probably find an installable version for OS-X. Start at

What would be the difference in running a remote desktop via VNS from running it via the built in remote deskotop in Win XP

Krister L

"MM" skrev i meddelandet news:XkX6d.4666$ snipped-for-privacy@newssvr13.news.prodigy.com...

In a nutshell, the key difference between the two approaches, VNC and Remote Desktop, is as follows:

a) VNC connects to (a live) desktop session and simply captures the screen on the Master machine and forwards it to you on the listener machine.

b) The remote desktop software in Windows creates a new session of its own on the Master machine and is *completely* different from any sessions running on the same machine. All resources of your desktop (master machine) are shared across the two sessions.

I have seen VNC used extensively for connecting to a live session but it has a few issues. One critical issue is that to be able to connect you must know the IP address of the (Master) machine you are connecting to. In addition, if this machine is behind a firewall, you would need to set up an arrangement so this (Master) machine is visible from the (listener) machine you want to connect from.

If both machines are behind the *same* firewall (for instance, when using a VPN solution), then all you need to know is the IP address of the Master machine, and plug it in the VNC viewer software on the listener machine.

Another issue, with VNC, as pointed out by another poster is that of performance when working with graphics intensive applications such as SolidWorks.

Hope this helps.

- Rajiv _____________________ snipped-for-privacy@pdmoffice.com Conferencing and Collaboration for the Knowledge Worker

Thanks Raijiv

That helped a lot

Krister L

can anyone help in setting up VPM connection for PDM client login, I've already set up but there comes an error PDM doesn't connects with archive server & archive socket port please help me out in establishing this connection

Rahul