Just like being there - review of six remote access software packages - includes product directory - Software Review - Evaluation

Home Office Computing, May, 1996 by Joel T. Patz

IT'S EVERY BUSINESS TRAVELER'S NIGHTMARE: YOU'RE in your hotel, reviewing a PowerPoint presentation for the next day when you discover that you've misspelled the client's name on the first screen. You have only the runtime version of PowerPoint on your notebook so you can't edit the presentation.

Is it time to start practicing those apologies? Not if you have a remote access program installed on both your notebook and your PC back at the office. Simply launch the program, dial into your office computer, and you have full access to its files. You can launch the standard version of PowerPoint, make the corrections, and save the file. Then using the remote access program's file transfer feature, download the corrected file to your laptop.

It's the next best thing to being there. With remote access software, your notebook's keyboard and mouse can fully control the PC sitting in your office. Did you leave an important file on the office PC? Dial in and transfer the file in minutes, if not seconds. Need to leave room on your notebook's overcrowded hard drive? Dial in and view large files while on the road. Many remote access applications also ship with a chat feature (much like you'll find on a commercial online service, such as America Online) that lets you carry on an interactive dialogue with a user at another computer.

You don't have to be on the road, however, to take advantage of remote access software. With a special parallel or serial cable, each of the packages reviewed here lets you quickly transfer files between machines that are in the same location. If you have to install software from a CD-ROM onto a computer without a CD-ROM drive, simply connect a PC with a CD-ROM drive to that computer and install the application via remote control. Best of all, if you edit a file and then recopy it, most of the applications are smart enough to transfer only the bytes that have changed in that file. In fact, these packages make it easy to create a mini-network for sharing files and applications without the headache or expense of using network cards or adapters.

We tested the six remote access programs in this roundup using a Dell Dimension XP133c Pentium 133 desktop with built-in 28.8Kbps modem and an Epson ActionNote 880CX notebook with a U.S. Robotics Sportster 28.8Kbps PC Card modem. We used each computer as both host (the machine being called) and client (the machine placing the call). Both units were running Windows 95.

In our tests we transferred two types of files: a 1.1MB bitmap graphic and a 1.226MB PowerPoint presentation. We then modified the title screen of the PowerPoint file and retransferred the file. We selected these specific file types to test the products' compression feature--bitmap files are easily compressed but the much-denser PowerPoint files do not compress as well.

Because of the complex nature of video card drivers, we strongly recommend that you purchase any of these products from a source that offers product refunds. Only pcAnywhere32 was completely trouble-free. Your experience will vary based on your system's components.

Carbon Copy 3.0

Rating: ** 1/2

Setting up Carbon Copy is a breeze. The program asks if you want your modem configured as part of the setup procedure; say "Yes" and its Wizard will configure your system to let you get to work as soon as possible. If the program's choice of modem isn't an exact match, there's a directory of 583 to choose from. As with the other programs, you'll specify whether your machine is a guest or a host. To accept incoming calls in either mode, Carbon Copy's window needs to be minimized; you can set this to occur on startup, if you wish.

The large push buttons on Carbon Copy's main window make your options extremely clear: "Call a Host" or "Call a Guest" launches the Phone Book dialog box for selecting a preprogrammed number, or you type in a number for a onetime call. There's a Redial choice if you don't connect on the first try. Clicking on the Wait for Call button configures your modem to accept incoming calls and minimizes Carbon Copy's window.

Once you've established a connection, you can configure Carbon Copy's security feature to allow access to its other features: Remote Control, Remote Printing, File Transfer, Remote Drive, Remote Clipboard, and Chat. Permission to use these options, in addition to the Phone Book and Password Table, along with the number of logins permitted and whether callbacks are required, can be quickly established using dialog boxes. In addition to communicating by serial modem, Carbon Copy lets you connect in a variety of ways--by direct cable connection, for example, or through a gateway or remote access server.

In our tests the Chat function worked smoothly, and the Remote Control sessions refreshed screens nicely and worked without a hitch. We ran into problems, however, using the built-in File Transfer feature both over modem and with a direct serial-port cable connection. Though text files generally transferred quickly, the program would not successfully transfer either our PowerPoint or bitmap files. We also tested PCX, DOC, and AVI files with very mixed results. Fortunately, we were able to use the Remote Drive feature, which allowed us access to the other machine's files via Windows 95 Explorer; we could then transfer files between machines using Explorer. At press time, Microcom's technical support was looking into this problem.