Against
Not a thing.

Verdict
We really liked this package and recommend that you take a good look at it too. It is an excellent way of delivering support to end users out in the field or controlling a problem on a remote machine (say in a branch office) without physically being there to enter in the key strokes.

With an increasing number of users located away from your main support team – either in branch offices, at home or out on the road – the need to manage these users, support them and maintain the remote systems on which they rely is becoming increasingly crucial.

Of the remote control products reviewed in this issue, NetOp from Danware (and available in the UK from Richmond Systems) must surely be one of the best developed. As well as the usual features of being able to access one PC via another PC over a modem or network, NetOp has the ability to set up this type of operation on a proper server/client basis. A version of the NetOp Host Control program can be used to set up a workstation as a gateway for all incoming and outgoing transactions whether by ISDN, modem or network link.

Installing the package is relatively straight forward although the more you want to make use of NetOp, the more you will need to set up. With its broad cross platform support, you can run this product on any flavour of Windows plus DOS and OS/2 – there isn’t a version to run on Unix machines or Macs unfortunately. The package has various options which let you manage your operation and keep a log of the events that you are controlling. The installation options also allow for a silent install which will let you drop this on to your users’ workstations without them even realising it – you need to ensure that this product doesn’t get into the wrong hands and be used against you.

The product is ridiculously easy to use. The graphical interface makes what is available in the package very open and obvious. The drag-and-drop operation will be familiar to most people and the various set-up and configuration screens will be child’s play to MIS staff.

Using NetOp you have all of the usual remote control and file transfer facilities including conventional remote control where you take over the control of the users’ PCs as if you were physically there typing in the commands. Full file transfer facilities are available and comprehensive chat facilities are provided including voice chat – very useful when users are stuck in a hotel room or at home and they have only a single telephone line – you don’t have to break the connection to the PC in order to chat with them.