dchoung

Here’s a great solution for people who own multiple computers and are too cheap to purchase a KVM switch.

That’s right, I’m talking about VNC. Sure it’s really meant for remote connections over long distances, but it works great within a LAN too.

For the uninitiated, VNC stands for Virtual Network Computing. Basically, it’s a technology that is meant to connect your computer to another, remotely.

So here’s my situation, I’ve got a G4 Mac and a Vista machine, but only one monitor between the two. Since it’s G4 I can’t view pages through Internet Explorer (Unless you count the dinky Mac version Microsoft abandoned years ago), but my Vista PC definitely can.

Simple solution:

1. Download Chicken of the VNC for Mac
2. Download UltraVNC for Vista
3. Install both on their respective machines, follow the directions
4. Voila, you’ve got yourself a nice dual platform work environment!

I will admit, it’s not the most perfect solution. I do believe there are some security issues in running VNC, it does tend to lag a bit, and at a certain point I kind of thought to myself that my Vista PC had become an overpriced Internet Explorer viewing machine. But it works!