In the corporate world, remote access has long made business sense. However, with an average of 5 connected devices in each household, personal and home users are also increasingly demanding a sound solution for accessing information remotely. Whether it’s a question of locating a work document from home or viewing a movie you downloaded on a different device, having control over your PC from afar is becoming ever more important to the user experience.
Of course, for those with the technical expertise, remote access is little more than using a VNC (virtual network computing) Server and matching it with a VNC Client to access the relevant information or computer. However, there are also plenty of solutions which can be purchased in order to make the job much more straightforward. Of course, there are several factors to consider before installing an RDP platform or solution.
Whatever your reasons for remote access, it is quite likely that speed is of the essence. Slow access can make it difficult to access and interact with graphics-rich programs such as PPTs and PDFs. Of course, it will also have a major impact on the effectiveness of downloading and streaming. All of these are tasks which would be considered routine on your PC. They need to be just as straightforward when accessing remotely too. Therefore, selecting a high-speed RDP solution is crucial with market leaders such as Ericom providing some very quick and reliable options.
You will also want to make sure that the RDP client you use supports a variety of platforms – Just check that it is compatible with at least Windows, Linux, iOS and Android. Any quality remote solution should also enable browser-based access too. This will make things easier to manage, especially if you need remote capability for your office environment.
In truth, each RDP solution has its own variety of features which you may or may not require. A few to consider include the capability to transfer files, which is probably significant for most users. It is also an advantage if you can install and update software remotely too, allowing you to establish consistency across all your devices. Another extremely useful feature which some RDP platforms provide is a wake-on-LAN which can wake a sleeping computer remotely and then put it back to sleep. Perhaps the most important feature of all though in today’s BYOD environment is fast and reliable access to hand-held devices including phones and tablets. Without it, remote access will be extremely limited.
Another factor which must not be under-estimated is a secure and safe RDP solution. It is no good being able to access sensitive data remotely if others can do so too. As a result, it is well worth checking that your chosen platform is secure, usually thanks to an SSL security layer, which is used for server authentication and for encrypting all data transferred between the server and the client. Verifying a secure connection should give you peace of mind.
As the demand for instant and reliable access to information continues to grow, remote access is increasingly important. However, it is worth taking some time to select the right RDP solution.
