Chrome Remote Desktop vs.Microsoft Remote Desktop

What's best for accessing your computer from afar?

- IAN EVENDEN

WE SPEND MUCH of our time with firewalls and other security apps trying to prevent other people from connecting to our PCs and taking control of them over the internet. However, there are times when you need to help someone out, or administer one of your computers while you’re not physically sitting in front of it. This is where Remote Desktop applications come in.

Administrators of large numbers of commercial PCs will have networks set up specifically with this in mind, using commercial software packages such as TeamViewer, but there are also free options that are ideal for anyone who just wants to remote-control one Windows PC at a time.

Two of the most easily acquired are Microsoft Remote Desktop, or RDP, which comes bundled with some versions of Windows, and Chrome Remote Desktop (we’ll call it CRD), which can easily be installed as an extension to the Chrome browser. You’ll need to have that particular web access software installed to use it, which means Edge will probably whine at you, but can be safely ignored in this instance.

Both allow you to remotely control a Windows computer via another PC, a Mac, or even a mobile device. You can use them to take control of a virtual machine that’s running on a server PC with a much less powerful computer, providing a sort of thin client functionality across a network, or just dip in and out to provide tech support to a less computer literate relative over the internet—as long as you set it up properly to begin with.