Ken E

Is it possible to administer a win XP Home machine by dialling in from a laptop ?

A customer of mine has 2 PCs networked, the main one runs XP Home and has the internet connection and the second is a Win98 machine. They share the internet connection, and they have Norton Internet Security on the main one.

I have supported them onsite for a while but as it's a 40 mile round trip I was wondering if I can do this from my office by dialling in. Can anyone give me any guidance on the best way to go about this please.

Also, rather than paying me for every call out they have asked me about a support agreement. I have to talk to them about it next week, and am looking for any info on what I need to include and what sort of things I need to consider. I think it needs to be quite simple and cost effective, but want to make sure I don't end up getting caught out with the terms somewhere along the way. Can anyone help me out with this ?

Thanks in advance

Ken

towzer

A tool such as PC Anywhere should allow you to do this regardles of whether the O/S is Win9x, W2K or XP/home. i've never configured it's supposed to allow remote dial in to any PC

I'm working on a bunch of contracts right now and the services ones can be very complex. Why does you client want a contract? Is he looking to fix his costs for a period of time or does he want a guaranteed response from you with penalties for failing to meet the agreed times? If I were you, then i'd try to get a letter of understanding rather than a contract - I asume you work for yoursel? An LOU details what service you will perform without going into things such as limit of liability and step in rights.

Hope this helps,

Phil

Ken E

Phil

Thanks for the reply, I was thinking of PC Anywhere but didn't know if there was a way within Windows to do it. I have NT Terminal Server and was wondering if I could use that.

I believe they just want to fix the support costs, probably something along the lines of a fixed price per year to include telephone support, possibly a couple of visits and an annual checkup with an agreed fixed price per incident to be invoiced separately as and when it happens. They are happy with the service they have received and responses etc. and aren't running mission critical apps so agreed response and penalties is probably not an issue.

I think the letter of understanding might be enough to cover it, as the preferred option for both is to keep things simple.

Many thanks

Ken