Remote Assistance loses connection after around 10 minutes

Hi,

I have been using Remote Assistance between two XP Pro systems via dial up internet with email request.

I get running, take control and all seems fine - BUT eventually the connection is lost for no apparent reason. I have disabled screen savers, power savers etc on both systems but still only seem to run for +- 10 minutes.

Any ideas would be welcome as this could be the answer to many of my support requests - no more drive time!!

I tried Messenger but got a msg saying it is not installed - it is and it works!?

Regards

Tony Randell

 

Tony - I'm going to fumble around here and toss out some ideas.

- The ISP (at either end) may not "see" the remote assistance traffic somehow and drop an "idle" connection. I've read of people having this sort of problem with downloads where data is streaming along but the connection drops. Easy enough to try some sort of keep alive app to fire off every 5 minutes or so from PCs at both ends and see if that helps.

- Do you find any likely errors/warnings in the event logs?

- Since it seems that this is happening to almost any client PC you remote the issue is probably at your end. With the messenger option not working properly it really sounds like something at your end isn't installed correctly. Do you have another XP-Pro system that could establish the remote sessions just to see if the problem is local to your PC?

- Could you try a different (and preferably external) modem?

- Do you have access to a packet sniffer so you can see exactly what the packet content is when the connection drops?

 

Hi Newt,

Thanks for your suggestions.

I do not have another XP system to try this on just now as most of my guys are still on 98 and 2000. The one other user with XP is away on vacation. So:

o I have installed the latest version of Messenger and now it appears as an option for Remote Assistance.

o Plan to test connection via Messenger

o I don't have a packet sniffer - whatever that is?? Can you suggest one?

o I have checked the event logs and there is nothing relevant at those times.

o I use NOD32 antivirus and Zonealarm - my test client also uses Nod32 AV .......................??

o I only have an internal modem this end - remote is using an external one.

Will post if the test with Messenger works.

Regards

Tony R

 

Sniffing (network wiretap, sniffer) FAQ will tell you all about it and toward the end offer a pretty good listing of available products.

The short andswer is it will keep track of packets (the way internet information is packaged) and will have a feature to decode the binary stuff into english and put it in a log file for you to view at your leasure.

As long as you are on the same wire as the PC(s) you want to sniff, you can just tell the thing you want to see all packets between computerA and computerB or all packets from anyone to computerB.

Cost will range all the way from free for a software solution to $50K for a full featured hardware solution.

If you will be doing much serious network admin, you should really be familiar with this topic. How to use it yourself and how to spot it and prevent it from unauthorized folks.