Has this ever happened to you? “Wow, I really want to use my home computer,
but I’m stuck in this place surrounded by computers like, say, a school computer lab
or library, and I don’t know what to do! 💡😮 I have an idea! I will remote desktop into my home computer
from one of these! But how? ...” Then boy do I have the solution...s for you! I’m Chris Kalos, I like computers, and today
I’ll be looking over remote desktop software and comparing them to each other to find the
ultimate one! ... For your use case. Remote desktop software are programs that
allow you to access one computer from another. There are many forms of remote desktop, ranging
from a simple terminal interface (through something like SSH), to a full low-latency
video feed of another PC. Today, I will be focusing on the latter form
of remote desktop, as it’s useful for more people than a simple command line is, and
there’s also competition in this space, whereas SSH is a one-way road because it’s
an open standard. Several remote desktop software solutions
will be tested and pitted against each other. The comments I make in this video are entirely
subjective, but I will be trying to justify my opinions as much as possible. I ran a poll here on the YouTube community
tab about this topic, and I also recently uploaded a short video here on YouTube Shorts
and on TikTok, showing off a quick script that allows for quick remote desktop. While the TikTok comments did not understand
the assignment so to speak, they gave me many ideas for what to include in this video. Along with the poll answers, the feedback
really helped this project come together in one way or another, so I would like to thank
everyone for participating in the conversation. I am not sponsored by anyone. No conflict of interest is involved. Without further ado, let’s jump right into
it with general-purpose remote desktop software! ### TeamViewer Okay. You all expected this to be first on the list,
and there are many good reasons for that! Firstly, according to the YouTube poll, most
of the people that answered it are most familiar with TeamViewer, even if it beats out the
second most popular option by a very small margin. Secondly, it is accessible from every major
OS. There is a client for Windows, macOS, Linux,
Android, iOS, and even the web. There’s also a portable version available
for Windows, if you need it just once and don’t want to install it. Thirdly, it’s free for personal use, meaning
you only need to pay for a license if you’re using TeamViewer in a business setting (although,
TeamViewer are a bit shady about that, which I’ll get to later). Lastly, TeamViewer was highly praised in my
TikTok comments by casual users, so it clearly has the heart of the people. But is it really the best? Right off the bat, for me, TeamViewer gets
points for committing to be Apple Silicon native from the very beginning. I’m an M1 Mac user, so I really appreciate
this move. Connecting to my Windows PC took only a couple
of clicks after logging in. The cool thing about TeamViewer, though, is
that I don’t even have to log in at all! With just a computer ID and a password, you
can connect to any device that has TeamViewer open, from anywhere, over the internet. The passwords are automatically generated
every time the host system launches TeamViewer, even if unattended access is enabled. However, you can enable Easy Access, which
allows you to connect to any of your devices without a password by logging into your account,
although some may see this as a security risk. However, before adding any devices to my account,
it asked me to verify whether I made the request via email, which is an extra layer of security
that is pretty standard nowadays. Speaking of security, the connection protocol
that TeamViewer uses is a proprietary one, and apparently uses port 5938, but not much
is known about it other than that its traffic is encrypted using RSA 4096 public/private
key exchange and AES 256-bit session encryption. It is not publicly documented, so when TeamViewer
claims that your connection is secure, you’ll just have to take their word for it. For what it’s worth, though, TeamViewer
is not really known to be a security risk, and has been used by businesses for almost
20 years, with very few cybersecurity incidents being associated with it; the latest one was
in 2020 and the vulnerability was patched very quickly. When it comes to usability and reliability,
TeamViewer is one of the most widely used remote desktop software for good reason - it
gets the job done. I mean, don’t get me wrong, it doesn’t
look the best, nor does it feel the best to use, but it’s not designed to be flashy. What’s that? A family member or a friend needs tech support? No problem, just tell them to install TeamViewer
and give you their ID and password, and you’re in. Actually, chances are they already have it
installed, because it’s just so dang popular. You can always rely on TeamViewer to try to
fight its way through even the most unreliable of connections, even if that means the quality
will suffer. It also has some built-in communication features
such as text and voice chat, but honestly I’ve never used these, and they seem very
outdated. One issue that I haven’t run into myself
but my friend Chris Miniotis brought up is that TeamViewer Business and TeamViewer Personal
are the same product, despite one being paid and the other being free. As such, TeamViewer might sometimes mistakenly
declare that you’re using TeamViewer for business and limit your sessions to 1 minute
if you use it too much, which is frankly very annoying and anti-consumer. For example, if you have a home server, never
turning it off might trip TeamViewer’s usage detection...thing, and limit your sessions. TeamViewer’s definition of what business
use entails is so broad that legitimate home use cases like this fall under the category
despite being... well... home use, and TeamViewer (the company)
is notoriously difficult to negotiate with, perhaps on purpose, when it comes to such
issues. They want you to pay. Even paying customers, though, have been known
to have frequent complaints. It is just one of TeamViewer’s anti-consumer
behaviors, but for now, I will overlook it for the sake of testing the actual software. Video quality is... alright. I’ve had mixed experiences. When connecting from my Mac to my Windows
desktop on the same network, there is very little latency and the video and audio quality
are great aside from a few weird graphical glitches I’ve encountered. However, when I connected from that same Windows
PC to the Mac, for some reason, it all went downhill. Look at this. Observe. Feast thine eyes upon this video unfolding
in front of you and tell me that doesn’t look like crap. It does! There’s no way around it! I don’t know why this happens, I mean, I
even tried disabling the background and changing the quality setting, but it’s either gonna
look like crap or it’s gonna lag like hell while still looking kinda crap, with no in-between. It still gets the job done, don’t get me
wrong, but it’s far from a good experience. Also, there is no sound when connecting to
macOS hosts because of how macOS screen capture works. Other remote desktop and screen sharing solutions
have found ways around this, but not TeamViewer. Let’s test platform support. I installed TeamViewer Remote Control on my
Android phone, which is only one of ***six*** TeamViewer apps on Android, each being used
for a slightly different purpose. Connecting from my Android phone to my Windows
PC was once again very easy, but the experience was mediocre at best, and just horrible at
worst. I mean, you can’t expect a 6-inch device
with nothing but a touch screen to try to replace the functions of a mouse and keyboard,
but janky controls aside, it was just very finicky and laggy, which makes no sense as
these devices are all on the same network. Watching a YouTube video worked for a little
while but then froze up on me for no apparent reason, so this is definitely not suitable
for media consumption or gaming. It kinda generally works, but it’s just
there to get the job done. I don’t understand why Android to Windows
works so badly when Mac to Windows works flawlessly. Just to exhaust all my options, I installed
TeamViewer Host on my Android phone as well, but I couldn’t get it to work. Maybe I have to install a third app to get
the second app to work, or maybe I just have to install all six and pray to Cthulhu, I
don’t know. I won’t bother. Overall, I appreciate TeamViewer’s effort
to provide options. However, I think sometimes their software
ends up being finicky and unreliable as a result of trying to support so many platforms. There is no consistency between platforms,
and I wish they’d document their software better and be more honest about how well it
works under which conditions. And now, it’s time to show the average viewer
that there are more options than just TeamViewer. Let’s move on to their most popular competitor... ### AnyDesk AnyDesk is another piece of software that
was highly praised in the TikTok comments and YouTube poll. However, after trying it, I can confidently
say that there’s no real reason to use it unless you’ve gotten limited by TeamViewer. It essentially offers the same features as
TeamViewer but somehow manages to be even slower... Disgustingly so, in fact. You’re going to need a lot of patience if
you’re planning to do more than 5 clicks a minute. If you are actually using the software commercially,
AnyDesk has substantially cheaper pricing models compared to TeamViewer. Buuuuut you get what you pay for... I think the footage you’re seeing speaks
for itself. There’s no real way to make this look or
work better than it is. Oh, and by the way, the footage is sped up. Its security protocol is less secure than
TeamViewer’s, too, which is baffling in and of itself, considering that the security
tradeoff doesn’t result in a faster connection. Basically, it’s TeamViewer from [Wish.com](http://Wish.com). I’m sorry AnyDesk fans, I really cannot
justify spending more time on this one. But what if you didn’t have to install third
party programs to remote into your computer? Let’s check out the three major desktop
OS first party solutions, starting with none other than... ### Microsoft Remote Desktop Yep, the built-in remote desktop software
on Microsoft Windows. Not only was this the 2nd most popular option
in the YouTube poll (even being first for most of the poll’s run), but the TikTok
comments on that short video were very quick to point out my solution was needless when
Microsoft Remote Desktop exists. Let’s take a look - is it all it’s made
out to be by its diehard fans? Immediately upon starting my research, I noticed
Microsoft Remote Desktop is only available in the Pro and Enterprise versions of Windows. Automatically, then, this lets us know that
this software is not made for casual users, and many many people are practically locked
out of using it. Strike 1. Microsoft clownery aside, Remote Desktop has
official clients for Windows, macOS, Android, iOS, and the web. On Linux, you can use Remmina instead, which
can interface with Microsoft Remote Desktop. Sadly, though, but perhaps predictably, hosting
is only available on Windows systems running an aforementioned Pro or Enterprise version. Big oof. I can only test this one way, then, connecting
from my Mac or my phone into my Windows PC. Strike 2. The power of Microsoft Remote Desktop becomes
apparent when using general purpose software, like Office suites or sys-admin tools, from
another device in the same network. Latency is kept to a minimum, and the text
and any UI elements are as sharp as your host OS would typically be, because Remote Desktop
adjusts the resolution to match the client’s display. On a MacBook, it can even optimize for a Retina
display, and the macOS client is also M1 native, which is a plus for me. Microsoft Remote Desktop integrates natively
with Windows, and you can even pass through devices like your microphone, webcam, printers
and storage on supported devices. Sheesh. This is especially handy with iOS and Android
devices if you don't have a webcam on your computer, although, I’ve had a rocky experience
with this feature - sharing an iPad’s microphone to a Windows PC and using it on Discord resulted
in a choppy unintelligible robot voice, so I can’t guarantee that this works all the
time. The webcam was fine, though! And hey, if you ever wondered what it's like
to use Windows with a touch screen, Microsoft Remote Desktop is the best way to try it out. Unfortunately, Remote Desktop comes with a
number of downsides because of the protocol’s nature. The protocol, named RDP, is pretty old, and
it’s really starting to show its age and its limitations. It requires port 3389 to be open in order
to connect, as it was designed for local networks like businesses where there’s no firewall
between devices. This is fine on your home network if you're
just in the other room, but it can be a nightmare if you're trying to connect from outside your
local network. Port forwarding is an option, but it's a significant
cybersecurity risk. I mean, you’re literally opening a port
to your IP address to the public internet. Not fun! Another option would be self-hosting a VPN
for your home network, but that’s outside the scope of this video. Adding to the quirks, when you connect to
your RDP session, Windows will disconnect your main screen from your user. This means that you cannot be using your machine
both physically and through Remote Desktop at the same time. Finally, the compression algorithm of RDP
is outdated and cannot keep up with any sort of video or game. Because of these issues, RDP can only be useful
for machines you want to control inside your house for basic tasks or for headless systems
and servers. Strike 3. In my eyes, it’s disqualified from this
competition, because it needs tedious setup to connect over the internet from anywhere,
but I won’t be so quick to push its usefulness aside over this one transgression. Next up, ... ### Apple Remote Desktop Did you know macOS apparently has a native
remote desktop client made by Apple? I can’t wait to try it out! It costs 80€. And there’s no trial. It costs 80€. And there’s no trial. That’s a no from me, Apple. I can’t test this, I don’t live in a mansion. Maybe I’ll make enough YouTube money out
of this video to afford this stupid thing... but I probably won’t buy it, anyway. Next! ### Chrome Remote Desktop I’m gonna be honest, I’m not very big
on browsers doing everything nowadays. Maybe I’m just being cynical, but I don’t
like the hypothetical future where everything is done through an internet browser. Alas, Chrome Remote Desktop seems to be loved
by many as is evident by my TikTok comments, so I gave it a chance. After all, with so many students using Chromebooks
nowadays, it’s one of their only options and I assume it works great on Chrome OS. Installing it is a bit sketchy. There’s a companion app to go along with
the Chrome extension, which is required if you want to be able to host, either for “Remote
Access” or “Remote Support”. It’s pretty standard to have companion apps
for this kind of thing because it needs permissions. I would assume “Remote Access” means you
are able to access your own computer through your account, and “Remote Support” is
for sharing your desktop with another person via code. After installation, you actually have to set
up the computer for hosting, which is very straight forward, all you have to do is give
it a name. Then, by logging into a Chromium-based browser
with your Google account, you can access that computer from anywhere! It did try to get me to install Google Chrome
instead of Microsoft Edge despite Edge being Chromium-based, but I can confirm it works
the same way on Edge. I don’t know how I feel about a browser
running constantly in the background on my computer, though. RAM is precious. On the flip side, maybe it’s better to have
a browser extension that does the same thing as a dedicated app. Although, this technically **is** a dedicated
app, just disguised as a browser extension. I digress. Performance is alright. It’s very comparable to TeamViewer, although
it actually looks better and feels a bit more consistent. It uses WebRTC, which is the same technology
apps like Discord use to transmit video. It’s pretty secure, as it must use SRTP
encryption to be classified as WebRTC, and I’d trust Google of all companies to be
honest about their protocol because, well, they made WebRTC. Surely they won’t lie about using it. Overall, pretty solid! It doesn’t selectively render some elements
better than others like TeamViewer, it’s just all around alright. The user interface is definitely the most
noob-friendly out of all the remote control software we’ve tested so far, although at
times it can be a bit too simple. Uninstalling it was a bit sketchy too, though. I had to look up how to uninstall it. Basically, there was an uninstaller app in
the Applications folder, but for some reason it didn’t show up in the Launchpad. After this, I had to also uninstall the extension. I can confirm the uninstaller worked, but
I don’t know if it left any residue per se, and there’s no way to check for it. Anyway. Onto **more** web-based technologies… ### DWService.net I was not aware of the existence of this. Apparently, it’s been around for a few years! Fellow YouTuber Excelsior Tech (great videos,
by the way!) made a comment in the YouTube poll I did, letting me know of the existence
of DWService. He says: “[DWService.net](http://DWService.net) has
a really cool free option. I have tried many even way back in the early
VNC days. Parsec is the most performant for personal
use, but lately I have been really happy with DWS for family tech support.”  It’s convenient, web-based, and perhaps
most importantly, open-source! They make money by offering paid services
with more features, but there’s also a free plan. I was surprised that something like this existed,
to say the least, and I was even more surprised that I’d never heard of it. While I was at home during May for spring
break, my friend Chris Miniotis had been going to work, so he was kind enough to test DWService
to for me by connecting from his work computer to his home PC. Take it away, Chris! Hi Chris! DWService impressed me during my short time
with it, as it’s very similar to the other solutions in performance but doesn’t need
to be installed on the computer you want to connect from. Since it’s just a website, you just go to
the address, log in and connect to your computer at home. It only relies on an HTTPS connection; there’s
no chance of it being blocked, unless your administrator blocks that specific website. However, given that it is only HTTPS, it is
forced to go through the DWService servers and that introduces additional latency. Performance felt comparable to AnyDesk, which
is to say usable but not enjoyable. However, the reliability of this website could
be really handy if you’re stuck at your grandma’s house or something. It should be noted that not much is known
about the protocol used, other than that it’s based on HTTPS, so it is technically as secure
as your browser. Back to you, Chris! Last on our list is a slightly gaming-oriented
solution that also happens to work great for general purpose use. ### Parsec Up until this year, I remembered Parsec as
a software that allowed you to play local co-op games through the internet. I didn’t really understand it back when
it first came out in 2016. I was young, less knowledgeable, and just
enough outside the target audience to be able to ignore its existence. While that was, in fact, Parsec’s original
purpose, it has evolved to become a full-blown remote desktop software! And let me tell ya, I was blown away by its
performance. Once again, I was influenced by my friend
Chris Miniotis here - he started using it extensively to remote into his home PC from
our college computers, and I started doing the same. In fact, he’s the one that made the script
I showed off in that short video I was talking about in the beginning. Lastly, Parsec was bought out by Unity, the
game engine company, in late 2021. Despite this, Parsec is still an independent
project that gets regular updates. It’s free for personal use, and unlike TeamViewer,
Parsec for individuals and Parsec for Teams are different products, so you’ll never
get a pop-up nagging you to purchase a license. So, how does Parsec stack up to everything
else we’ve checked out so far? Well, firstly, it takes a different approach
to remote desktop compared to the rest of the industry, by using the latest video compression
and streaming technology to achieve the lowest latency possible. It can do H.264 and H.265 encoding and decoding,
and the connection is peer-to-peer and encrypted with DTLS 1.2. It supports and actually encourages hardware
encoding and decoding, so you can put that GPU to work to have a smoother experience,
if you so desire. Parsec’s documentation on their technical
specifications is actually quite good, it can be found on [their website](https://support.parsec.app/hc/en-us/articles/115003442732-Security-At-Parsec-)
quite easily, unlike *certain other companies* (TeamViewer). By default, Parsec uses a random port, but
you can specify the host and client ports to whatever you want, if for example your
organization doesn’t allow those ports to be opened. However, you do not need to do any sort of
port forwarding on most networks that don’t block UDP traffic by default. Parsec’s focus on low latency pays off,
because aside from showing video compression artifacts on unreliable connections, it is
incredibly fast. It was originally designed for gaming, so
obviously, the latency is so low that even gaming through Parsec is viable, under good
conditions. I admit, I’ve played a fair bit of Teamfight
Tactics on college computers by remoting into my home PC via Parsec, and Miniotis has done
a fair bit of DJing through it. While it can’t grab the client machine’s
microphone and webcam like RDP, it does support controller input on top of mouse and keyboard,
which is a unique quirk of this software. There’s also no clipboard syncing, no file
sharing, basically anything that isn’t a Video and Audio stream. If you have a very reliable connection, you
can customize the settings to transmit uncompressed audio as well, which is a nice touch if you’re
doing something like music production on a remote machine. So, let’s talk ease of use. Once you make an account, you can register
your computers by logging in (with two-factor authentication via email), after which point
you can access any one of your computers from anywhere through your account. You can also add friends on Parsec, who can
allow you to access their computers. Remember, this was made for gaming together. Of course, you can’t just access anyone’s
computer all willy-nilly, they have to accept your request every time, so it’s not unsafe
to add someone as a friend on Parsec, as long as you trust them. Parsec can also be configured to run at startup
**before** logon, so that you can simply press the power button on your home PC and not worry
about it before leaving the house! For this to work, you need to install Parsec
system-wide, not just for your own user, so go through the installation process carefully. Compatibility is where Parsec starts to falter. First of all, it requires a somewhat newer
computer to host a Parsec session. While a dedicated GPU is not required per
se, it is highly recommended, along with a newer processor and operating system than
something like TeamViewer or AnyDesk would require. Secondly, although there are client apps for
Windows (portable version available), macOS, Linux, Chrome browsers, Android, and Raspberry
Pi running Raspbian, hosting is only limited to Windows, with macOS hosting in beta right
now. iOS is notably absent from the list of supported
clients. There is no app for Parsec on the iOS App
Store, and even through the web interface, Parsec is a simple black screen, thanks to
everyone’s favorite browser, Safari. In case you didn’t know, on iOS, every browser
is a glorified Safari wrapper, because Apple doesn’t allow different browser engines
to run on iOS. This means that no matter what browser you
install on your iPhone or iPad (or iPod Touch if anyone still uses those), Parsec will always
be a black screen because it requires a Chromium-based browser to function. To make matters worse for Parsec on the Apple
front, my experience with macOS hosting has been… bad. Don’t get me wrong, it’s fast and looks
just as good as Windows hosting, something I cannot say about software like TeamViewer
and AnyDesk, but it has very fundamental issues as of the making of this video. The app isn’t native to Apple Silicon, which
in the year 2022 is quite strange, and also there are critical bugs on macOS hosts like
being unable to open the Dock through another client (rendering the system very difficult
to use), and a system soft-lock bug where the whole OS becomes unresponsive to anything
but a Parsec client if another computer connects and then disconnects from it. That last one forced me to shut down the device
to restore input, and I haven’t tested macOS hosting ever since. Take my experience with a grain of salt, though,
because it’s been a few months since then, and critical bugs may have been fixed in the
meantime. Android compatibility is alright, it’s fast
and smooth, but the controls consist of trying to use a Windows PC with only a phone touch
screen, without changing the scaling from your normal PC monitor. Unlike TeamViewer, Parsec on Android doesn’t
have special ways to control the mouse like a trackpad-style control scheme, what you
see is what you get. It is, however, really useful for streaming
games to an Android device and using its controller input to control the game on the remote PC! Although, according to Parsec, this can be
unreliable according to your Android device and controller. If you’d like a Parsec-like experience that
does work on iOS, I’ve heard Rainway is an alternative, but it’s not mature enough
yet to compare, and its iOS support is in beta, and lastly I also haven’t used it. I hope you found this video useful, and I
hope it’s clear now that the industry leader doesn’t always have the best solution for
everyone! While TeamViewer gets the job done for many
people, if you’re looking for something more specific, there’s probably software
out there that better meets your needs! For organizations in the Microsoft ecosystem
running on a local network, RDP seems like one of the best options, while for general
purpose, Parsec or Chrome Remote Desktop or even DWService.net might be better! It all really depends on what you need. Unless we’re talking about AnyDesk. Nobody should be using AnyDesk. I’m Chris Kalos, I like computers, and I
hope to see you in the next video.
