Whatever happened to RAS? Can I use something like NordVPN instead?

Eskimo007

I remember “in the old days” I used to be able to connect to one of the bank of modems back at the office with my PC, and if I clicked on “My Network” in File Manager, I could see the servers and the other machines on the LAN.
I wish I could still do that, running Win11 away from home and missing the ability to map a drive to a server share so I can transparently move photos and other things simply on my laptop to the Z: drive, say, and have them go to the server.
I currently have Teamviewer running on the server so I can connect using that, and use the file Transfer function but that’s kludgy.

just_4_fun

I’m not network admin or guru but WireGuard works for me. I mostly use it for use the RDP when away from home and mapped drives work fine. I did have an issue with RTSP but that seems to work now too. I’m running the WireGuard package within pfsense, if you don’t want to switch routers you could do it with a Raspberry Pi, just poke a hole in your firewall for the Pi. I did it this way first before using the WG pfsense package, if you’re interested I’ll see if I could find the video guide I used for the Pi and post it

Eskimo007

just_4_fun Thanks for sharing that info. Gonna go check out what WireGuard is/does, had never heard of it.
Just got a new internet feed put in, and the modem comes in Bridge mode, so am putting together a PC with 2 NICS to be able to run a firewall sw which I am also looking forward to learning based on feedback I received here. Thanks!

just_4_fun

Eskimo007 Gonna go check out what WireGuard is/does, had never heard of it.

It’s kind of the replacement or upgrade over OpenVPN, I’m sure some people still use OpenVPN. If you were to do the RasPi VPN install you get a choice between Wire Guard and OpenVPN, at least that’s how it was when I did the Pi setup.

OpenVPN served me well for remote access but after WireGuard because more popular I switched. There’s two more built on the WG platform, Tailscale and Headscale. The advantage of Tailscale is that it works with CGN or Carrier-Grade NAT, there is also a pfsense package for Tailscale it but I have a pubic IP so WG works for me.

Eskimo007

Thanks for those pointers and info, just4fun. Going to go educate myself about those products and see what I can use for my needs. Have a great day.