How to turn my old desk top into a remote access media server?
HI, Please can someone advise how I can go about setting up my old desktop as a storage system that can connect from anywhere in the world and watch movies and listen to music stored on it. Currently running on Windows XP. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
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The easiest and probably most suitable way is to install the free Teamviewer 4 from http://www.teamviewer.com in host mode. Setup a password, get yourself a teamviewer web account and then you can remotely access the computer through the web anywhere.
I use Teamviewer 4 on my personal system, and also on a series of virtual machines that I access from my work computer.
You could also use VNC, but it’s a bit of a pain to get working right if you don’t have a static IP, and I wouldn’t advise using Remote Desktop for this either as it is not really fit for the purpose. Both it and VNC are better for internal remote access where Teamviewer is perfect for external access even over firewalls.
You will want to lock down the computer a little… make sure the administrator AND guest accounts have passwords. It is particularly important that the guest account has a password because otherwise it can be used to abuse the network. The administrator account is equally important because it can give complete control over the computer.
Be aware that you will not be able to watch movies over a remote connection. Even internally, watching movies on anything larger than a 320×240 Windows is nigh on impossible. Listening to music over a remote connection is possible… you will need to use Remote Desktop for that as it can bring sound from the remote computer to the one you are on.
I’ve given you the basics but I think really this is a lost cause except for using it to store things on. You probably want to invest in an iPod or something.