Submitted 2 weeks ago by abbadon420@sh.itjust.works to selfhosted@lemmy.world
I have an old pc on which I run jellyfin and some other stuff. It’s only connected through lan. I used to use window’s remotedesktop to connect to it, but that stopped working.
Now I’m looking for a good remote desktop. Because it s tucked away in a corner, fysical acces to it is cumbersome.
My server runs mint with xfce. My laptop runs windows 11, because of work reasons.
I’m inclined to use something like anydesk, but I’m unsure how to trust that company.
Sunshine and Moonlight.
It is made for gaming, but can be used for remote desktop. I use it when my laptop cannot handle a Blender scene and I want to use my desktop. It also works good with Headscale (or Tailscale if you use that). You can enable end to end encryption too.
If you want a direct replacement for Anydesk, check out Rustdesk. It is FOSS, but does not have good reputation.
Where does rustdesk not have a good reputation? I see it being recommended regularly and also use it myself heavily. Never had issues or heard about issues (that I would attribute to reputation).
Something something something China bad. It’s a bit overblown, but there was some drama about the dev earlier in its lifespan. I think something to do with not all of its code being open source? Like the official servers were running a closed version or something. I’m definitely butchering the information. It’s good software and works as intended.
I personally use Sunshine and Moonlight, but not because I have any particular problem with RustDesk, just couldn’t get it working well, and Sunshine also works for in house game streaming if I want.
Fwiw I use a fork called Apollo because it enables a headless setup
Sadly Windows-only last time I checked
if you can afford the hardware, getting something dedicated like a JetKVM is nice because you don’t have to wait for VNC software to boot. since it acts like a monitor and keyboard, you can even enter BIOS with it. JetKVM sells an extension board that you could hook up to your server motherboard’s power buttons to turn it on/off too.
for fully software solutions, i like using apollo on the server and moonlight on the clients. it’s built for game streaming, but it works for remote desktop too. i have apollo and moonlight installed on a bunch of my devices anyways so this saves me from installing an additional client most of the time.
There is also input-leap.
On the server/remote side, x2go is also worth a mention.
Another vote for Rustdesk
I use it mostly for family tech support where MY PC is running Linux and THEY are on Windows though it works great in both directions
Nomachine
That was going to be my suggestion too, had a decent amount of success with it.
Install Tailscale on all devices.
Then ssh into whatever you need.
If you need desktop remote access the Windows RDP should work for Windows to Windows machines.
For Linux host to Windows client I’ve had good experiences with Remmina Desktop.
Tailscale is american. There are European alternatives like netbird.io or self hosted headscale.
That’s misinformation. Tailscale is Canadian. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tailscale
Last I checked Tailscale is Canadian actually….but maybe they got bought out somewhere??
I hate having to continuously point this out, but DO NOT DO THIS unless you have a deeper understanding of networking.
“Just installing Tailscale” without proper configuration of the default routes is going to cause all kinds of routing inefficiencies and loopbacks in your internal network that is absolutely unnecessary, especially for what OP asking for.
This is just bad advice.
as someone considering going down this path, can you give some things to look up or watch out for?
I like RustDesk. If you’re worried about connectivity, you can even run your own relay server.
Seconded rustdesk!
vnc? TightVNC is open source i think.
Also, you could ssh to it instead of remote desktop. just a thought :)
I initially misread your question as “What good is remote desktop software?” and I thought, "look at this person, humble bragging that they are fit enough to occasionally walk across the room.
I guess now I need to go exercise.
I’ve had good experiences with Rustdesk. The client is open-source and the no-cost server components (ID and Relay servers) are self-hostable. The remote server works on X11 and Windows. I use this script to run XFCE+Rustdesk in a headless session:
export SERVERNUM=69 export SCREEN_SIZE='-screen 0 2560x1440x24' export DISPLAY=":${SERVERNUM}" export XDG_SESSION_TYPE=x11 xvfb-run --server-num="${SERVERNUM}" --server-args "${SCREEN_SIZE}" startxfce4 & disown sleep 1 flatpak run com.rustdesk.RustDesk & disown
Sunshine + Moonlight is also a good choice. I have Sunshine installed on a box at home and use Tailscale to connect to it from the Moonlight client. At 1440p 60 FPS it has no visible compression artifacts and responsive enough for gaming.
You sure you can’t do what you need from bash/ssh?
If you only need ssh, anything can be terminal as everything has a ssh client.
vnc
ssh
Also ssh -X is nice.
Will that still be supported with Wayland?
OP is used to Windows Remote Desktop SSH is a bit far from that, but still a good option
If you’re not comfortable using SSH, each Linux DE comes with its own RDP setup, so refer to the docs of whichever you’re running to set that up if you want things to be super simple.
Past that, there’s tons of stuff, but I would generally avoid VNC these days because it’s pretty much a dead protocol that is insecure and inefficient.
Some people prefer to use RDP compatible tools, some people just use Moonlight. You can use whatever is comfortable for you, really. I would avoid all the suggestions that are telling you to install the giant constructs like Mesh Central though. That’s overkill for just two machines here.
can I use it if my gpu is amd?
Sorry, are you asking about Moonlight specifically? I believe people use Sunshine for AMD acceleration. I wasn’t even generally recommending it for use as a Remote Desktop solution since it’s kind of overkill, just mentioning that some people use whatever tool will get the job done.
At work we use Meshcentral. It requires you to host your own server, but it’s very powerful, and very reliable. We’re managing something like 400 remote systems with it currently. We also use Netbird as a secondary access layer (I prefer it to Tailscale for the simplicity of setting up ACLs, and the really easy deployment).
For most home server usage though, I wouldn’t bother with Meshcentral. It’s a lot of overhead if you’re only managing a couple of systems. If you really need remote desktop (why do your servers even have desktops?) use RustDesk instead.
I guess another vote for RustDesk. I use it to administer several personal computers that my friends have. They are old heads like me, but unlike me, their tech savvy is lacking. So if they have an issue, I can pop in and help in any way I can. I was using Remote Desktop Assistant for a while, but kept hearing about RustDesk so I gave it a go.
Oh my god, you’re brilliant! I can have my parents install the rustdesk client on their pc! This is a life changer!
Um…I would not classify myself as brilliant, but yea…it works.
I’d figure out why RDP stopped working. Sounds like something changed.
Anything else could be stymied by the same things that blocked RDP - firewall change, etc.
I’ve used other tools since before RDP even existed as Citrix Remote Desktop in the 90’s… Frankly for LAN only there’s little reason to consider anything else with Windows boxes unless you want remote management features like services, shares, etc. Even then I often just use RDP because it just works.
RDP (the same protocol Windows Remote Desktop uses) works fine on Linux. I’d suggest investigating why that suddenly stopped working for you.
For what it’s worth Xrdp seems to work well on Linux for enabling a RDP Remote Desktop server… I suspect you are / were(?) already using Xrdp but maybe haven’t investigated why it stopped working.
Yes I was using xrdp, it is still installed and windows rdp can find it and connect. But once that happens, the applications crashes and shuts down…
That’s weird, maybe an update broke something? What I would maybe do is uninstall Xrdp (and maybe remove/rename the old config files just in case), then re-install and configure it. From there if it’s still not working try to see what’s showing up in the log files maybe.
I did notice that Xrdp requires some extra configuration to work properly with Linux Mint Cinnamon, you apparently need to create a .xsession file in the home folder of whichever user you’re trying to remote into. I’m not on Linux Mint myself but maybe searching around will give you some tips e.g. this seems like a good rundown gist.github.com/…/2ab9b5d41bbaceca8471d591755a189…
For what it’s worth Xrdp seems to work well on Linux
Even on Wayland?
Yup, been using Xrdp in a Debian + GNOME Wayland setup without issue.
Nomachine with local & Wireguard access only.
I use freerdp. it’s simple, works well, just use it via the terminal. I have it alias’d so I don’t even have to think about it.
Whatever computer you’re looking to connect to, install Moonlight.
Then you can use Sunshine on any PC you’re looking to connect from.
Other way around. Sunshine is the server, Moonlight is the client.
Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I’ve seen in this thread:
| Fewer Letters | More Letters |
|---|---|
| NAT | Network Address Translation |
| SSH | Secure Shell for remote terminal access |
| VNC | Virtual Network Computing for remote desktop access |
| VPN | Virtual Private Network |
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Depends exactly what you're doing on that old PC.
If you just need to connect for administration and the like, VNC is decent. It's my default.
If you want to watch videos or the like, I'd definitely suggest Sunlight and Moonlight. It's a streaming remote desktop that's meant for streaming gaming, and so it's really good at video and audio.
vnc with tailscale, i prefer this over others like moonlight since it can show non-blurry/original image, especially noticeable for text
I was using realvnc but I hit the 3 free PCs quickly. I’ve since moved to nomachine and run it “locally” over tailscale.
LifeInMultipleChoice@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
I use RustDesk because it’s good enough. It may not work for everything, but it is open source and has suited my needs.
I have it launch on boot in Mint and it works fine
Lemmchen@feddit.org 2 weeks ago
+1 for RustDesk. Basically open-source de-shittified TeamViewer.
LifeInMultipleChoice@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Exactly how I found it. Looking for open-source TeamViewer essentially.
Works very well for the tasks I throw at it. Hosting it yourself is easy as well
Voroxpete@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
RustDesk really is fantastic. No shade to any of the other solutions suggested in this thread, but 99% of the time when someone needs take desktop access, RustDesk is exactly what they need.
MoonRaven@feddit.nl 2 weeks ago
Agreed and you can self host the backend if you want.
LifeInMultipleChoice@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Yeah I suppose I should have said what I’ve used it for but I think I’ve only really used it for Android, Linux, and I think I may have put it on Windows once, not sure. Overall I run into few circumstances I’ve ever needed to go the machine, usually it’s tied to bios/driver issues on the laptop I use for a server, not Rust issues
Mihies@programming.dev 2 weeks ago
But does it allow login on machine and multi monitors like RDP does? These are two features I can’t live without (at least the former).
LifeInMultipleChoice@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
May I ask a bit more?
Can you launch on system start up as opposed to user, yes in my experience.
Can you login when the machine has not yet been logged in, yes in my experience so long as the program is launched by the system as a service and not a user login option.
If the machine has multiple monitors, you may need to test, as I standardly use a phone (android) to remote to my desktop/laptop seveer environments where I can individually choose a monitor if they have more than 1 I believe, but having one screen on the phone, I don’t view both at the same time… nor would it be convenient…
It’s a free 2 minute try it out really. The uninstall if you don’t like. If you really like it maybe consider hosting your own. But otherwise you can use it from their severs for free and it will remember your recent connections and passwords if you want on your local device…
I feel like a salesperson for a free product lol
ShortN0te@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
It actually does both. Not really tested the multimonitor features but its there and it works, not sure if to the same degree as in rdp.