Splashtop's control center app consists of a well-designed main menu that lists your remote machines, each with icons that let you connect to the remote machines, open a file-transfer menu, open a chat window with the remote user, or perform actions like rebooting the remote machine in normal or safe mode. You can also log in to your Splashtop account through any web browser and connect to remote machines, view logs, or set options.
I prefer a single integrated app like that used by TeamViewer, because I use my systems interchangeably as both local and remote machines, but the separate-app method makes sense if you'll be using remote access software to run other people's machines for tech support or demos and you don't want to confuse your remote users with menu items they can't use.
Like VNC Connect, Splashtop uses two separate apps: a server app called Splashtop Streamer installed on the machine you want to log into and a central control app called Splashtop Business, which you install on machines you want to view from. TeamViewer has whiteboard capability for macOS and Windows platforms. This is a terrific feature, but Splashtop hasn't implemented it-yet-on platforms other than iPad and Android.
If you access a desktop computer from Splashtop Business running on an iPad or Android device, you can run a full-featured whiteboard, complete with screen recording and spotlight features, using the device's touch screen for drawing and writing. Some can use the remote screen like a whiteboard, for things like drawing lines and arrows. Some remote access software also lets you make video recordings of what happens on the remote screen. You can generally even open a chat window so you can talk with someone sitting in front of the remote machine. This gives you access to your own home or office desktop while traveling with your laptop, or you can send out an invitation to someone else that lets them access your machine.Īlmost all of these remote access apps also let you perform other tasks, such copying files back and forth between the local machine you're really sitting in front of and the remote one, or copying text or graphics to the clipboard on one machine and pasting it on the other. You connect to the remote machine using the app, and then-until you click the mouse outside the remote access window-everything you type and every move you make with the mouse gets sent to the remote machine. Why Get Remote Access Software?Ī remote access app lets you run a computer located across the room or across the world as if you were sitting in front of its keyboard and screen. I couldn't see any pattern in this, but it occurred more than once. Even with the latest version, though, I sometimes encountered a minor glitch where Splashtop popped up an error message saying it couldn't connect to the remote machine-but then connected correctly when I tried again a few seconds later. Recent updates to Splashtop have given it a far more elegant design than earlier versions had, and many of the same advanced conveniences found in LogMeIn, GoToMyPC, or TeamViewer. Older versions made you use an file-manager-style window for transferring files between computers, but the latest version lets you drag and drop files between desktops, and the feature works on both Windows and macOS systems. You can only access Windows and macOS systems, but you can access them from just about anything, including iOS, Android, Kindle Fire, and any platform that can run the Chrome browser. You also get advanced features like the ability to restart the remote machine in safe mode when you're troubleshooting someone else's machine.
The Splashtop Business Access Pro plan offers 256-bit encrypted sessions with all standard remote access features plus some important extras: a chat window, file transfer, a shared clipboard, local printing of remote files, and access from mobile devices.
A free Splashtop Personal account lets you access other machines on your home network, and you can buy an Anywhere Access Pack ($4.99 per month or $16.99 per year) that lets you access remote machines from anywhere on the internet.
If, for example, you want multiple users to access your machine at the same time, add a Splashtop Classroom account, designed for education, but usable by any business, with subscriptions starting at $29.99 per year with shared access from three devices. The Business Access Pro plan should have everything that most business users need. Like most remote access services, Splashtop offers a bewildering menu of options.